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The Secretary of the Commonwealth’s Office said they have “received complaints from people who have said that they signed these petitions without reading them.”
Petitioners gathering signatures supporting the proposed repeal of recreational marijuana are being accused of either misleading voters or misrepresenting what’s on their petition, which state officials remind voters to read before signing.
Coalition for a Healthy Massachusetts is organizing around a ballot question to effectively repeal recreational marijuana — making it illegal to possess more than one ounce of weed. The committee’s goal is to gather enough signatures to get the question on the ballot next year.
Multiple social media reports, registered voters, and an industry advocate are accusing the signature gatherers of misrepresenting the ballot initiative. In response, a committee spokesperson called the allegations “baseless charges” and chalked them up to the initiative’s early success.
The state Attorney General’s Office confirmed they have received complaints about the petitioners but “cannot confirm, deny, or comment upon any investigations.” A spokesperson for the Secretary of the Commonwealth also said they have “received complaints from people who have said that they signed these petitions without reading them.”
“The Elections Division has informed those voters of the process for stopping certification of their signature, which involves filing a signed request with the local election office before the petition is submitted to that office for certification,” spokesperson Debra O’Malley said.
Cannabis business advocate: It’s ‘organized voter fraud’
David O’Brien, the president and CEO of the Massachusetts Cannabis Business Association, accused the petitioners of “organized voter fraud.”
“We’re hearing this all over the state. We’re hearing it from folks who are going to their grocery stores,” O’Brien told Boston.com. “The signature collectors on many, many, many occasions are lying to people to get them to sign it, and we think that’s fraud, and we’re going to continue to remind voters that they need to be eyes wide open about this.”
Jake, a registered voter from Gloucester, said a signature gatherer in Burlington talked to his wife about affordable housing, and she signed that one. Then, the signature gatherer “started talking, essentially using ambiguous wording about the redistricting of cannabis shops out of school zones and all that kind of stuff. She didn’t sign that one.”
The petition does not address any redistricting and leading with that “absolutely would be a misrepresentation,” said Wendy Wakeman, a spokesperson for the Coalition for a Healthy Massachusetts.
“Definitively, the committee does not encourage or support anybody collecting signatures and giving out false information. This is not a tactic of the committee at large,” Wakeman said.
Voters: Tables outside grocery stores reportedly draw in voters with affordable housing petitions
Misa Chappell, an artist in the Berkshires, posted on Facebook an image of a table advertising petitions for affordable housing and voting identification laws, “but if you ask to read the petition they won’t let you read it. Because there are things you might not want to vote for. Like making over an ounce of weed illegal,” she wrote.
In a seemingly similar situation, a Reddit user also included an image of a table reportedly advertising petitions for affordable housing and “same day voting” outside a Market Basket in Waltham.
“But in fact the paper you would sign was for prohibiting marijuana,” the user wrote. “You really needed to cross-reference bill numbers to see that they don’t match. When I told them that this is a classic case of bait and switch and they’re deceiving people they got angry and called me names.”
Petitioners: ‘When you sign a petition, you should read what you’re signing’
The compensated signature gatherers are also not working to gather signatures for any other petitions, including anything related to affordable housing, Wakeman confirmed.
“I’m not certain that all of the claims are truly fraudulent and not confusion on the part of the person who signed it,” she said. “When you sign the petition, the question itself is written at the top of the petition, and when you sign a petition, you should read what you’re signing.”
A user on social media also reported a “lying” signature gatherer outside the Trader Joe’s in Brookline, and another confirmed a sighting outside a Market Basket in Raynham where the sign didn’t reference marijuana.
Janice Hagerman, a Somerville voter, told Boston.com she signed a petition outside her local Market Basket “to put marijuana on the ballot,” she said the signature gatherer said.
“He didn’t say anything (else),” she said. “I think I should have read what I was looking at… I feel like normally when people ask for your signature, they want to explain what they’re talking about while you’re signing it, but he was just telling me where to sign.”
Wakeman declined to identify the firm hired by the committee to gather signatures. The Secretary of the Commonwealth’s Office said the petitioners authorized a representative from Impact Advocacy Group to pick up their petitions. The group, a political firm, did not return a request for comment.
“What happens in signature drives is that when the opposition starts to see that the signature gatherers might have success, they start throwing a lot of crap around and baseless charges,” Wakeman said. “The opponents to this ballot proposal are muddying the water.”
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