‘Confusing verbiage’ may have influenced WA voters on statewide initiatives, expert says

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This year’s election ballots included four statewide initiatives. One expert says that to several voters, the verbiage wasn’t too clear, which may have influenced how they voted.

The ballots had four statewide initiatives:

1. Initiative 2066, which aimed to repeal regulations on natural gas.

2. Initiative 2124, which aimed to give people the ability to opt out of a state long-term health care program.

3. Initiative 2109, which aimed to repeal a state capital gains tax charged on sales of certain long-term assets.

4. Initiative 2177, which aimed to repeal the 2021 Washington Climate Commitment Act (CCA).

A number of voters told KIRO 7 News that some of the verbiage confused them.

“A critical thing with referendums is how they’re worded,” said Christopher Adolph, a UW political science professor, with more than 25 years of experience in the field.

Adolph told KIRO 7 News that a couple of the initiatives, 2109 and 2117, were clear as they showed the impact on voters.

“Listed clear tradeoffs that people faced. If you cut the capital gains tax, there will be less spending for education. If you eliminate the carbon tax credit mark hit and cap and invest scheme, there will be less spending for the environment,” he said.

But that wasn’t the case for the other two measures, he added.

Policies are often complex, he shared, so it’s difficult to summarize them on a ballot in a few sentences without missing key details.

He said some of the wording in initiatives 2066 and 2124 was vague and included double negatives.

“Shoving this all into one sentence, trying to do all those things at once probably was an unwise decision for making this clear to voters,” he said. “So you need to be reading this with an eye to punctuation and grammar to know even which direction this referendum is tending.”

“It doesn’t clarify what those laws do. Do they provide exemptions? Do they remove exemptions? It would be very easy to read this referendum, and think, ‘I don’t know whether this ropes me into WA cares or pushes me out, what it does for the program,’” he said.

According to an experiment conducted by Adolph and his colleagues, the data showed that verbiage influences how people may vote.

“When people are uncertain about a referendum, research has suggested they often lead to voting no as a result,” he said.

“What the research showed is that voters are much more in favor of carbon taxation when the benefits go to the environment. So these were all worded in a way that made clear, I think, to voters what the consequences were,” he described one of their research studies, which used hypothetical language.

While the intention behind the initiatives’ wording may not be clear enough, Adolph said confusing descriptions are not new to politics across the United States.

Adolph said he believes the initiatives could reappear on future ballots, especially since Washington is considered a strong blue state.

“It’s pretty clear that going forward, Republicans have limited avenues for statewide influence. That’s going to make the initiative process the most attractive option,” he added.

KIRO 7 News reached out to Let’s Go Washington, which led the initiatives, to see if the initiatives will reappear on future ballots.

We’re still waiting to hear back.