Sec. of State candidate comes to town
Published 2:16 pm Wednesday, October 14, 2026
On Saturday, Arkansas Secretary of State hopeful Kelly Grappe (D) spoke to supporters at JJ’s Buffalo Bar and Grill. She also visited the District Fair taking place in Harrison. Grappe is running against Kim Hammer (R) and Michael Pakko (L).
“The system is rigged right now,” Grappe said, referring to citizen ballot initiatives. “We’re one of only 16 states that can make our own laws.”
Grappe thinks that the process has become convoluted and said that a clear process needs to be implemented. “We should never spend a year collecting signatures and then find out something is wrong,” she said.
Grappe has a BA in psychology from Lyon College and has spent much of her career in corporate management, much of it at Verizon. She believes that her background makes her well-suited to manage the complex system of the Secretary of State’s Office.
In addition to supporting voter ID requirements and transparency in the voting process, Grappe has positioned herself as strongly focused on ballot initiatives. Believing that the citizen initiative and referendum system has become excessively difficult to use, she argues that the legislature has added so many procedural requirements that ordinary citizens can spend months gathering signatures only to have their efforts invalidated on a technicality.
The role of Secretary of State, she believes, is one of administration, not gatekeeping.
Of the initiative process, Grappe believes signature collectors should be volunteers only, not paid. In her opinion, campaigns should spend money only on advertising, training, materials, and outreach.
Grappe is campaigning to ensure the Secretary of State’s office is equally available to rural communities throughout the state, not just in Little Rock.
Hammer has argued for stronger safeguards for ballot initiatives. He believes in requiring photo ID for petition signers and requiring petitioners to read, or have read to them, the ballot title. While Hammer believes these measures protect the Arkansas Constitution, Grappe believes these requirements make it too difficult for ordinary Arkansans to exercise that right.
