Montana seeks to revive signature restrictions for ballot petitions, including on abortion rights

HELENA, Mont. (AP) — Montana officials are asking the state Supreme Court for an emergency order to block a ruling that allowed signatures from inactive voters to count on petitions for several proposed November ballot initiatives, including one to protect abortion rights. Thursday’s request comes after a district court judge said Montana’s Secretary of State wrongly changed election rules to omit inactive voter signatures for three ballot initiatives. The rule change was made after the signatures had been turned in to counties and after some of the signatures had been verified. The judge gave county election offices until July 24 to tally signatures of inactive voters that had been rejected.