When canvassers fan out across neighborhoods, they usually rely on sophisticated lists that will tell them things like a voter’s political party and how likely they are to support a given cause. Jill Imbler isn’t bothering with any of that.
The 69-year-old has lived in Moberly – a Missouri town of about 14,000 people – her entire life. She doesn’t use a GPS when she drives around, knows where people live, and what time they’re likely to be home. And there’s a pretty good chance that she, or one of her six siblings, knows them personally.
She also knows there’s a pretty good chance they don’t agree with her politically. Imbler is the President of the Randolph county Democrat club, and Randolph county is just about as Republican as you can get. Donald Trump won the county by more than 50 points in the 2016, 2020 and 2024 elections. He also handily carried the state in all three elections.
But Imbler nevertheless started collecting signatures to repeal a new congressional map abruptly passed by Missouri Republicans in mid-September. At the request of Donald Trump, Republicans called a special legislative session and carved out the Kansas City congressional district of longtime Democratic representative Emanuel Cleaver, and replaced it with a Republican one.
It was part of a nationwide push by Trump to get about half a dozen Republican-controlled states to rejigger maps to find more GOP seats ahead of the 2026 midterms. But Missouri offers something distinct: a chance for voters to rebuke politicians and stop the map from going into effect.
A provision added to the Missouri constitution in 1908 allows voters to pause most enacted laws from going into effect and put them up for a referendum if they gather enough signatures. Since 1908, Missouri voters have used the citizens veto process about two dozen times. In nearly every case, voters have chosen to repeal the statute they have been asked to vote on.
The Missouri legislature approved the map in mid-September and Governor Mike Kehoe, a Republican, signed it into law at the end of the month. Imbler, her husband Lynn, and canvassers across Missouri have until 11 December to turn in more than 106,000 signatures that must come from six of the state’s eight congressional districts. If they can, the new map will be on hold until voters decide whether to adopt it in a 2026 referendum. Canvassers say they have already collected more than 200,000 signatures and say they plan to turn in more. “We turn in signatures, the map goes on hold,” said Richard Von Glahn, the executive director of People not Politicians, the group leading the signature gathering effort.
The Missouri effort is being closely watched amid an all out mid-decade redistricting war between Democrats and Republicans that will shape which party controls the US House of Representatives. Republicans currently have a razor-thin three seat majority, but have redrawn congressional districts in Missouri, Texas and North Carolina to add as many as seven seats. (The Texas map was recently struck down by a three-judge panel, but the US supreme court temporarily halted the ruling on Friday while an appeal is pending.) Democrats are poised to counter those gains with their own redrawn maps in California and Virginia.
Recognizing the huge consequences of the Missouri effort, outside groups have poured money into the campaign. Committees on both sides have raised about $7m, which includes funds from national Republicans opposing the effort.
Imbler, a retired teacher’s aide, ran for a few local offices in the 90s, and said she was outraged when she saw Missouri lawmakers move to weaken ballot referendums approved by Missouri voters last year that protected abortion and raised the minimum wage.
“I realized, ‘wait a minute, we don’t have the final say,’” she said over a cup of coffee at the Bean, a coffee shop just a few blocks from the old train depot at the center of town. “It pissed me off – I realized this is not right.
“When we first took this on, there were several comments made about ‘oh my gosh,’ you’re actually going to go door to door here in Moberly,” she said. “I said, ‘Yeah I’m going to. If the door shuts in my face, it shuts in my face.”
But on a warm fall afternoon earlier this month, doors weren’t closing in front of Imbler at all.
As Imbler popped door to door at an apartment complex for retirees, she barely had to mention gerrymandering before people would say they were willing to sign. “Have you heard about the gerrymandering, where they’re redistricting all the congressional districts,” she would begin. “They changed all of our congressional districts to try to push the power so Republicans can have most of the seats. They’re trying to get Emanuel Cleaver out,” she said.
“Normally we do that at the end of the decade after a census, and Governor Kehoe decided – he hasn’t given us any reason – for why he decided to do it in the middle of the decade,” she added. Nearly everyone she spoke with over the course of an hour decided to sign.
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“I feel that way because I think they’re manipulating to stack their votes up in one spot,” said one of the voters who signed the petition.
“I think things need to be left alone,” said another voter who signed. “There’s some things that shouldn’t be changed.”
Imbler has been making a similar pitch across Moberly since early October when she began collecting signatures. A few weeks ago, she said she had been in Cairo, a tiny town just outside of Moberly, to track down a man who had wanted to sign. She left her phone number with him and told him to pass it along to anyone else who might be interested. By the time she got home, she had gotten nine more signatures on the gerrymandering petition.
“People know me. I mean, if I don’t know you personally, I either taught your kid, or I went to school with your brother, or I rode the bus with your sister, or worked with you,” she said. “When people see that this is an issue that I’m willing to get out and ask for signatures for, they understand I’m not a radical either way.
Her tour also included a stop at a local motorcycle shop in town in late October during a toy drive. Imbler went to school with the two men who now run the shop and they agreed to let her set up a table in their showroom. She and Lynn set up a table in between a Trump 2024 sign and a rebel flag. “[They] were willing to sign and willing to agree that this isn’t about Democrat or Republican, this is about the vote of the people,” she said. By the end of the day they collected 56 signatures.
Recognizing the likelihood of the new map being blocked, Republicans have launched an all-out effort to halt the referendum. Missouri secretary of state Denny Hoskins, a Republican, is trying to get more than 90,000 signatures thrown out. A group funded by the Republican National Committee recently sent out a text message encouraging people to withdraw their signatures on the petitions.
The Missouri attorney general has also filed a separate lawsuit based on a fringe legal theory arguing that the state legislature has the exclusive power to draw congressional districts, so it cannot be overturned through a citizens veto. A shadowy group has offered canvassers $5,000 to stop collecting signatures, the Kansas City Star reported.
“This isn’t an easy undertaking. It’s not just something you do because maybe you’re a little upset,” Von Glahn said. “It’s really reserved for major infractions of the legislature.”
