A coalition of Missouri business advocacy groups is suing to toss the election results, which saw voters raise the state’s minimum wage and guarantee paid sick leave for workers.
The election challenge, filed on Friday, requests that the Missouri Supreme Court set aside the results of Proposition A, which 57.6% of voters passed last month. It raises a number of issues, including the claim that the question breached a requirement that ballot measures only address one subject.
“While Proposition A is bad policy and will have extreme and detrimental effects on Missouri’s businesses, that is not the basis of this action,” the petition said. “Instead, the election irregularities and the constitutional violations are so significant that the election results must be overturned and Proposition A must be declared invalid.”
The challenge names Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft and State Auditor Scott Fitzpatrick as defendants, both of whom were in charge of developing the measure’s fiscal estimates and summaries.
Representatives from the state’s leading business organizations, including the Associated Industries of Missouri, the Missouri Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the Missouri Forest Products Association, the Missouri Grocers Association, the Missouri Restaurant Association, and the National Federation of Independent Business, are among those challenging the voters’ decision.
The legal action comes as Missouri Republicans have been outraged by previous statewide votes on progressive topics, such as last month’s votes to raise the minimum wage and legalize abortion under the Missouri Constitution. Republican lawmakers are also considering legislative proposals to curtail both measures.
Missourians for Healthy Families and Fair Wages, the principal proponent of Proposition A, issued a statement condemning the lawsuit on Monday. The message contained a remark from Terrence Wise, a low-wage worker and Stand Up KC organizer who questioned the action.
Wise, who is also a leader of the Missouri Workers Center, called the case “un-American.”
Friday’s filing provides a means for business organizations to challenge election results without government intervention. It claims that the proposal breaches the single-subject requirement because Proposition A included both a minimum wage increase and an earned sick leave provision.
The proposed vote proposition gradually raises the minimum wage. The current minimum wage of $12.30 per hour will rise to $13.75 on January 1, 2025, and $15 in January 2026. We will subsequently increase the wage annually to account for inflation.
It also mandates employers of 15 or more employees to provide one hour of paid sick leave for every 30 hours worked. According to the plan, the earned sick leave provision would not apply to government employees, retail or service employees working for a business earning less than $500,000 per year, jailed individuals, golf caddies, and babysitters, among others.
In addition to the single-subject issue, the election challenge criticizes the exemption for government employees, claiming that it violates the equal protection section of the United States Constitution.
It also claims that the proposal’s summary statement and fiscal note summary, which estimate how much the measure will affect government funds, were misleading.
Democrat Ashley Aune, the incoming House Minority Leader from Kansas City, criticized the lawsuit in a statement on Monday, stating that Proposition A “protects employees and helps provide a path to the middle class.”
“Missourians would be better served by employers doing right by the workers who keep their businesses running—rather than trying to overturn the will of the voters with meritless litigation,” Aune said.
Direct democracy
Successful post-election challenges are extremely rare in Missouri. However, Friday’s challenge comes only months after the state Supreme Court overturned the results of a 2022 election in which voters supported a measure requiring Kansas City to pay more for its police force.
The unprecedented ruling determined that Missourians were misled by statewide officials when they passed the proposal, providing a significant victory for Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas, who sued over the ballot question. The court ordered a new election, which took place in August.
Lucas’ complaint focused on a bill that state legislators placed on the ballot. In recent years, politicians have grown increasingly dissatisfied with progressive-leaning initiatives that voters have placed on statewide ballots through the state’s initiative petition process.
The minimum wage rise, abortion rights, Medicaid expansion, and marijuana legalization all made it to statewide ballots via voter-led initiative petitions, a more than century-old mechanism that allows voters to bypass legislatures and approve legislative initiatives.
Missouri Republicans, who control every statewide office and both chambers of the General Assembly, have been targeting this direct democracy method in recent years. They claim that altering the state constitution has become too simple, giving outside groups too much power.
However, Democrats and supporters of initiative petitions say that the existing approach allows citizens to directly participate in democracy.