Utah voters will decide in November 2026 whether future tax-related ballot initiatives need 60% approval instead of a simple majority to become law, and new polling shows the electorate is nearly split down the middle on the idea. A Noble Predictive Insights survey found 50% of respondents support raising the threshold, while 21% oppose it, 23% remain unsure, and 6% say they would not vote on the question at all.
The proposal, known as Senate Joint Resolution 2, cleared the Utah Legislature during its 2025 session on a nearly party-line basis, according to ABC4 Utah. As reported by Ballotpedia, the resolution passed the Senate 21-8 on Feb. 5, 2025, and the House 55-17 on March 6, 2025, with every yes vote cast by a Republican. If voters approve the measure, it would apply to tax-related initiatives on the 2026 ballot.
What the New Threshold Would Cover
The resolution text specifies that the 60% approval requirement would apply to four categories of citizen-proposed tax changes: creating a new tax, expanding an existing tax, raising tax rates, or preventing property tax rates from decreasing as much as standard law otherwise requires. The proposal focuses on citizen initiatives. Sen. Lincoln Fillmore has argued that raising taxes is significant enough to require increased public support, and supporters say the higher bar would discourage out-of-state money from swaying Utah tax law, preventing large donors without a vested interest in the state from influencing policy.
Opponents counter that the amendment would simply make citizen initiatives unnecessarily harder to pass. Better Boundaries and Mormon Women for Ethical Government have both said there has been a concerted effort in the Legislature to make initiating laws more cumbersome, according to the same ABC4 Utah report. Critics say the practical effect is to make citizen-led laws harder to pass while leaving lawmakers free to raise taxes by ordinary simple majorities.
The 2018 Ballot Measures That Would Have Failed
The debate is grounded in recent history. Utah voters approved three major citizen initiatives in November 2018: Proposition 2 on medical marijuana, Proposition 3 on Medicaid expansion, and Proposition 4 on independent redistricting, according to election data compiled by Ballotpedia. All three passed by slim majorities.
That matters because both the Medicaid expansion and medical marijuana initiatives included tax increases, meaning both would not have passed under the proposed 60% threshold, per the same ABC4 Utah reporting. The 2018 anti-gerrymandering initiative, which led to Utah's current court-approved congressional districts, was intended to likely usher a Democrat into Congress amid a razor-thin Republican majority in the state, the outlet reported, and it too passed only by a slim majority.
Courts Have Already Pushed Back on Similar Efforts
This is not the Legislature's first attempt to rein in the initiative process. In September 2024, the Utah Supreme Court unanimously voided Amendment D, a separate legislative proposal seeking power to alter or repeal voter-passed initiatives, ruling it used misleading ballot language and failed to meet constitutional newspaper publication requirements, according to the Campaign Legal Center. That ruling built on a July 2024 decision in which the court affirmed the co-equal power of Utah citizens and the Legislature to write laws, and said the state constitution protects government-reform initiatives from government infringement, including legislative amendment or repeal that impairs an initiative.
The fight over ballot access is also playing out in ongoing litigation. League of Women Voters of Utah v. Utah State Legislature has seen numerous rulings through 2026, according to legal tracking by All About Redistricting. Utah lawmakers also passed a companion bill during the 2025 session that proposed heightening fiscal impact publication requirements for ballot initiatives, according to TownLift, a move critics say imposes significant financial burdens on initiative organizers.
Where Utah Fits Nationally
Utah would not be the first state to impose this kind of hurdle. In November 2022, Arizona voters approved Proposition 132, establishing a similar 60% threshold for tax-increasing ballot initiatives, per Ballotpedia. As of August 2026, 11 U.S. states impose supermajority vote requirements or other thresholds for legislatively referred constitutional amendments. Florida also requires 60% approval.
Heading into November, the official ballot question will ask Utah voters whether citizen-proposed laws that increase taxes compared with existing law should require at least 60% voter approval, with voters simply asked whether they are for or against the amendment. A vote against it would keep all initiatives, including tax measures, subject to the current simple-majority approval standard. Polling from Noble Predictive Insights found voters remain undecided on the question, making it one to watch before ballots are finalized.
