Citizens for Arkansas Public Education and Students (CAPES) submitted signatures on July 31 to place a veto referendum on the Nov. 2024 ballot to repeal the LEARNS Act, an education bill signed by Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders (R).
To qualify for the ballot, 54,422 valid signatures are needed from 50 of Arkansas’ 75 counties. A count of raw signatures showed CAPES submitted 53,444, falling at least 978 signatures short of the number required.
Thurston said CAPES also did not submit an official affidavit indicating the total number of signatures being filed. Thurston said, “Instead of the required affidavit, you submitted a document asserting that you collected only 53,675 signatures and only met the county distribution requirement in 48 counties. Thus, your own submission represented that you failed to meet both the total signature and county distribution requirements.”
