UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

┐ SENATOR JONATHAN LINDSEY; SENATOR JAMES │ RUNESTAD; REPRESENTATIVE JAMES R. DESANA; │ REPRESENTATIVE RACHELLE SMIT; REPRESENTATIVE │ STEVE CARRA; REPRESENTATIVE JOSEPH FOX; │ REPRESENTATIVE MATT MADDOCK; REPRESENTATIVE > ANGELA RIGAS; REPRESENTATIVE JOSH SCHRIVER; │ No. 24-1413 REPRESENTATIVE NEIL FRISKE; REPRESENTATIVE BRAD │ PAQUETTE, │ Plaintiffs-Appellants, │ │ │ v. │ │ GRETCHEN WHITMER, in her official capacity as │ Governor of Michigan; JOCELYN BENSON, in her │ official capacity as Michigan Secretary of State; │ JONATHAN BRATER, in his official capacity as Director │ of Elections, │ Defendants-Appellees. │ ┘

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Michigan at Grand Rapids. No. 1:23-cv-01025—Jane M. Beckering, District Judge.

Argued: December 11, 2024

Decided and Filed: December 20, 2024

Before: SUTTON, Chief Judge; BUSH and MURPHY, Circuit Judges.

_________________

COUNSEL ARGUED: Erick G. Kaardal, MOHRMAN, KAARDAL & ERICKSON, P.A., Minneapolis, Minnesota, for Appellants. Heather S. Meingast, OFFICE OF THE MICHIGAN ATTORNEY GENERAL, Lansing, Michigan, for Appellees. ON BRIEF: Erick G. Kaardal, Elizabeth A. Nielsen, MOHRMAN, KAARDAL & ERICKSON, P.A., Minneapolis, Minnesota, for No. 24-1413 Lindsey et al. v. Whitmer et al. Page 2

Appellants. Heather S. Meingast, Erik A. Grill, OFFICE OF THE MICHIGAN ATTORNEY GENERAL, Lansing, Michigan, for Appellees. _________________

OPINION _________________

SUTTON, Chief Judge. In Michigan, as in seventeen other States, citizens may use ballot initiatives to amend the State’s Constitution. Two Michigan state senators and nine state representatives argue that, if citizens use the initiative to regulate federal elections, that process violates the Elections Clause of the U.S. Constitution. Because they lack standing to bring the lawsuit, we affirm the district court’s dismissal under Civil Rule 12(b)(1).

I.

The Michigan Constitution does something the U.S. Constitution does not. It empowers citizens to amend the state constitution directly without support from their elected representatives in the state legislature or without the need for a convention. See Mich. Const. art. XII, § 2. Under the Michigan Constitution, this form of direct democracy takes two steps. A Michigan voter initially must file an initiative petition with the Secretary of State that contains the supporting signatures of individuals totaling at least 10 percent of the votes cast for governor in the last general election. Id. Then the proponent mus