As state lawmakers become ever less responsive to the needs of their constituents, citizen lawmaking via ballot initiatives is becoming an increasingly critical tool to counter minority rule and usher in progressive policies — from raising taxes on the wealthy to expanding public health insurance. As the August voter uprising that defeated the Kansas antiabortion measure makes clear, such direct-democracy efforts will likely prove especially important in protecting abortion rights following the end of Roe v. Wade.

GOP-led states, however, are now waging a three-pronged attack on citizen lawmaking: erecting barriers to keep citizen initiatives off the ballot, impeding these initiatives’ passage, and sabotaging their implementation. The Ballot Initiative Strategy Center (BISC) discovered a fivefold increase since 2017 in bills that aim to threaten the ballot process. While some of the most egregious proposed restrictions can’t pass without voter approval, many recently passed laws have made it far more difficult for citizens to use the initiative process.

“There’s a clear connection between progressive ballot victories and attacks on the initiative process,” said Corrine Rivera Fowler, legal advocacy director for the BISC, which identified 146 bills introduced in state legislatures in 2021 to worsen the ballot measure process. “These state bills intend to impede and even take away our use of the ballot measure for liberation.”