Utah Supreme Court to decide whether Amendment D will stay voided or be revived

There’s a chance the controversial constitutional Amendment D on Utah’s Nov. 5 ballot — voided last week by a district court judge — may come back from the dead.

Over the weekend, the Utah Supreme Court agreed to hear the Utah Legislature’s appeal. In an order issued Saturday, the court scheduled a hearing for oral arguments Sept. 25.

Amendment D would ask voters to sidestep the Utah Supreme Court’s interpretation of the Utah Constitution that limited the Legislature’s powers to repeal and replace government-reform initiatives and instead rewrite it to enshrine lawmakers’ power to override any voter-approved ballot initiative.

However, the ballot language posing the question to voters — which was written by Utah’s top Republican legislative leaders — did not explain that in plain language, prompting critics to sue, claiming Amendment D’s language was “false and misleading.” Last week, a district court judge agreed, and she voided the question while allowing it to stay on the ballot since the decision came so close to ballot printing deadlines.





https://utahnewsdispatch.com/2024/09/16/utah-supreme-court-to-decide-whether-amendment-d-will-stay-voided-or-be-revived/