A contentious dispute over Michigan’s petition to progressively raise the mandatory minimum wage to $15 an hour is poised to land in court. This follows a stalemate by an evenly split state board on the issue of certifying the submitted petition signatures.
At the heart of the debate was a session with the bipartisan Board of State Canvassers, comprising four members. They wrestled with the question of whether a modification in the initiative’s wording was significant enough to hinder the campaign’s progress. Notably, the amendment proposes that the wage increment only affects businesses staffing 21 or more employees.
Mark Brewer, attorney for the Raise the Wage campaign, voiced his perspective on the matter. Speaking to Michigan Radio, he emphasized, “The only issue before this board this morning is whether there are enough signatures to certify the proposal for the ballot and there are.”
Last year, the campaign presented an impressive number—over 610,000—of petition signatures to the Michigan Bureau of Elections. Despite this considerable effort, the timing wasn’t right to make the 2022 ballot cut-off. The campaigners have now set their sights on the 2024 general election ballot. This proposition will only make its way to the voters if the Legislature doesn’t adopt it first.
The board’s Republican members expressed reservations about proceeding without the backing of a court ruling. Tony Daunt, a GOP canvasser, communicated his concerns, telling Michigan Radio, “We have a well-organized effort with lots of funding that either changed something randomly without letting us know or made a mistake and are simply not owning up to it. I think this is a clear no vote for me.”
Opposing the initiative is a collective of business entities known as Michigan Opportunity. They argue that the apparent inconsistency in the proposal could have influenced some residents to sign the petition, when they might have otherwise opted out. The group’s official statement expressed, “The clear dissonance between the proposal summary and actual language should disqualify this proposal altogether. No one reading the summary could possibly have understood the true impact and apparent intent of this proposal, meaning hundreds of thousands of people were misled into signing this petition.”
Echoing these sentiments, Andrea Hansen, representing Michigan Opportunity, told Michigan Radio, “No one looking at this petition would have any idea that the ‘Raise the Wage’ was intending to change the definition of an employer.”
As the battle over the minimum wage increase in Michigan continues, both sides remain determined in their stance, with the courts likely to play a pivotal role in deciding the fate of the initiative.
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