 Today many petitions are carried by professional “mercenaries:” petitioners who travel from
state to state carrying any petition, regardless of the topic, and usually getting paid per
signature.- These mercenaries are driven purely by the dollar and are willing to bend or break state laws,
such as residency requirements, to circulate petitions promising a large paycheck.
- Some petition circulators sign the required state forms with incomplete or misleading
information, such as providing a local address that doesn’t exist.
- Mercenaries often use bait-and-switch tactics and other scams to get people to sign petitions.
Circulators are sometimes willing to lie to the public saying whatever voters wish to hear in
order to get their signatures.
- “Stopper petitions,” are often utilized as a way of getting voters to stop and sign a universally
popular initiative and then having them also sign the controversial petition.
- Mercenaries have copied signatures from one petition to another, usually from the most
popular, to other more controversial measures.
- Some circulators carry as many as twelve petitions at once.
- These circulators may have criminal records including forgery or identity theft.
- Some don’t “intend” to cheat the system...at first. But, because some states and companies
do not enforce regulations and because the lure of money is strong, circulators often see it in
their best interest to cheat the system.
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Contents
State by State Report Card 11
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