2026 initiatives on tipped wage, ranked-choice voting, taxes fall short

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(The Center Square) – One Fair Wage has suspended its campaign to place a referendum targeting Michigan’s tipped wage credit on the 2026 ballot.

The group had been backing the “Voters to Stop Pay Cuts” referendum, which sought to overturn Public Act 1 of 2025 – the law preserving Michigan’s tipped wage system. If successful, the measure would have repealed the law and reinstated a court-ordered wage structure that phased out the tip credit by 2029.

The campaign’s suspension comes as several other Michigan ballot initiatives have also struggled to gain traction or the signatures necessary to make it on the ballot.

The “Voters to Stop Pay Cuts” referendum required more than 223,000 valid signatures to qualify for the November 2026 ballot, but One Fair Wage recently announced it would suspend its effort and refocus on future election cycles.

It did not say how many signatures it collected. Instead, the group said in a statement that it is shifting resources toward other efforts this year.

“One Fair Wage has recently formed several new partnerships to help put key reforms on the ballot in 2026 and 2028 – beginning with passing key Money out of Politics reforms in 2026,” the group said.

It added that it plans to attempt the measure again in the next election cycle.

“If the legislature does not act, the will of the voters and working Michiganders will prevail at the ballot box,” it said.

Rebekah Paxton, research director at the Employment Policies Institute, told The Center Square in an exclusive interview that she welcomed the campaign’s suspension.

“This most recent attempt by One Fair Wage to push yet another ballot measure to eliminate the state's tip credit goes against what local restaurant workers want and ignores local restaurants' concerns,” Paxton said. “Michigan servers and bartenders have been fighting this law for nearly a decade, with nearly 80% saying they want to keep the tip credit intact.”

The referendum was a last-ditch effort to undo that law and revive the phaseout. Supporters of the referendum argued it was needed to help Michigan workers earn fair wages, a fight that has been ongoing since One Fair Wage pushed a ballot measure in 2018.

A Michigan Supreme Court ruling reinstating the original ballot measure’s wage schedule prompted bipartisan legislative action in 2025, when a bill passed capping the tipped wage at 50% of the standard minimum wage.

Paxton said economic data and worker feedback drove opposition to the measure.

“Economists have documented the negative impacts of tip credit elimination and high wage mandates on workers,” she said. “A Michigan Restaurant and Lodging Association survey of local tipped restaurant workers confirms this: 99% reported they were earning more than the state's minimum wage without eliminating the tip credit, but three-quarters said they believed they'd earn less under tip credit elimination.”

Multiple other proposals approved for signature gathering have either stalled or shifted timelines after failing to gather the number of signatures necessary to be placed on the ballot.

The “Invest in MI Kids” proposal would have added an additional 5% tax on all taxable income more than $1 million for joint filers and $500,000 for single filers. It paused its campaign despite collecting an estimated 250,000 signatures, short of the roughly 446,000 required for constitutional amendments, and plans to try again in 2028.

A ranked-choice voting initiative, known as “Rank MI Vote,” also suspended its effort and is now targeting the 2028 election cycle. The proposal would have required ranked-choice voting for federal offices and state leadership by allowing voters to rank candidates by voter preference starting in 2029.

Other proposals still looking for a place on the 2026 ballot include measures to require proof of citizenship for voter registration, overhaul voter verification systems, eliminate property taxes through the “AxMITax” proposal, and restrict political contributions from certain entities. It has not yet been announced how many of those received enough signatures to be on the ballot.

Under Michigan law, most ballot campaigns must collect hundreds of thousands of signatures within a 180-day window, a requirement that has contributed to many of the efforts falling short for the 2026 ballot.

Since 1986, Michigan voters approved 34 ballot proposals, defeating 31.

The one measure already set to appear on the ballot asks voters whether to hold a state constitutional convention. It will appear on the ballot as an automatic ballot referral, meaning it automatically appears on the state’s ballot every 16 years.

Michigan is one of 14 states that provides for an automatic constitutional convention question, something that was first approved by Michigan voters in 1960.

Despite suspending the “Voters to Stop Pay Cuts” referendum, One Fair Wage said it plans to revisit wage policy in the 2028 election cycle.

In the meantime, Paxton said the campaign’s collapse is a positive development for workers.

“Now that One Fair Wage’s campaign has stalled, tipped workers can breathe a sigh of relief,” she said. “Instead of having to worry about the future of their industry, they can focus on what they do best: providing great service for Michigan's restaurant industry.”