Florida elections officials have declared that no proposed citizens ballot initiatives have qualified to go before voters this year — after campaign organizers and advocates had warned a new state law would make it effectively impossible to qualify for the ballot. 

It’s the latest blow to a key tool Florida voters have used in recent years to bypass the conservative Legislature and implement landmark policies that are broadly popular, but which lawmakers have refused to advance. 

Advocates fear Florida’s approach could become a blueprint for other states to follow.

“It definitely seems to fulfill what people warned would happen,” said Derek Clinger, senior counsel with the State Democracy Research Initiative at the University of Wisconsin Law School. 

“We’ve just seen this whole package of reforms going through that make every aspect of the process more difficult,” he added.

Lawmakers’ push for new rules

Last year, Florida lawmakers implemented a slate of changes to the state’s citizens’ initiative process, in an effort to rein in what legislators say is a system that undermines their power and is corrupted by deep-pocketed special interests and tainted by fraud. 

On Sunday, Florida’s Department of State announced that no campaigns had amassed the more than 880,000 verified voter petitions required by state law ahead of a Feb. 1 deadline.

“All twenty-two active proposed constitutional amendments by initiative petitions failed to meet the requirements of Florida law for placement on the 2026 General Election ballot,” reads a statement issued by the department.

One major campaign has disputed the state’s assessment — which comes after state officials directed local election supervisors to invalidate petitions signed by inactive voters, a move that appears contrary to the state’s own guidance. 

Court challenges continue

Smart & Safe Florida, the campaign behind a proposed ballot measure to legalize recreational marijuana, is expected to continue court challenges against Florida’s new law — and its enforcement by state officials — as it and other campaigns prepare for a federal trial scheduled to begin Feb. 9.

“We believe the declaration by the Secretary of State is premature, as the final and complete county by county totals for validated petitions are not yet reported,” a Smart & Safe campaign spokesperson said, adding that “we submitted over 1.4 million signatures” and had “more than enough” to make it on the ballot.

Campaigns challenge constitutionality of new law

Smart & Safe Florida had already filed multiple lawsuits over the new state law, known as HB 1205, before the recent announcement — including challenging a state memo directing local officials to invalidate the petitions of inactive voters, who are registered to vote, but haven’t responded to a final notice from the state seeking to confirm their address.

If a court does determine the campaign collected enough petitions, a judge could theoretically overrule state officials and allow the measure to advance towards the ballot, according to Michael Morley, an election law expert at Florida State University.

“If it’s a question of, there are signatures but they were rejected, then you would at least have something in play,” Morley said. “If a court rules in your favor, it orders those signatures to be counted, then you could have your petition on the ballot.”

SSF has joined two other campaigns in a federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of HB 1205: Florida Decides Healthcare, a push to expand Medicaid in the state, and Florida Right To Clean Water, a measure to create a fundamental right to healthy waters.

Florida’s new restrictions bar non-U.S. citizens and non-Florida residents from collecting voter petitions, and enact stricter deadlines for campaigns to turn in petitions, along with harsher penalties if they fail to comply. Signers must now also write either the last four digits of their Social Security number, or their driver’s license number, on petitions.  

Also, under the new law, it’s now a third-degree felony for people to collect more than 25 signed ballot petitions, other than their own or those of immediate family members, if they don’t first register with the state as a petition circulator — a provision which critics have said amounts to a “criminalization of political activity.”

A national blueprint

Florida restrictions, passed by state lawmakers last year, are part of a national trend of legislators tightening restrictions on voters’ access to direct democracy. 

In 2025, nearly 150 bills were filed in statehouses nationwide aimed at making ballot measures less accessible and harder to pass, according to the Fairness Project, a progressive advocacy group that backs citizens’ initiatives.

Florida’s changes came six months after a decisive majority of voters cast their ballots to legalize recreational marijuana and enshrine abortion rights in the state, though both measures failed to clear the 60% required to pass. 

The new restrictions, implemented while campaigns were already gathering signatures ahead of the 2026 elections, amounts to moving the goalposts mid-game, according to Chris Melody Fields Figueredo, executive director of the Ballot Initiative Strategy Center, an organization that backs progressive ballot measures across the country.

“The rules are no longer fair,” Fields said. “They’ve been manipulated in a way that those in governing power prevent the people from actually being able to exercise their rights.”

Morley, the election law professor, said guardrails are necessary to preserve a “difficult balance” between providing a “populist alternative” to the institutional power of the Legislature, while filtering out all but those issues that have sufficient public support and “the most realistic chances of succeeding.”

Still, Fields argues Florida’s restrictions — already some of the most stringent in the nation — are more punitive than protective, making an important check on power essentially out of reach for voters.

“When you suppress these opportunities for popular reforms, you know, it has a risk of having people be disillusioned that government can work for them,” she said.

Kate Payne is The Tributary’s state government reporter. She can be reached at kate.payne@floridatrib.org.