After a controversial battle, 51% of Missouri voters decided to say yes to Amendment 3.

The newly-approved amendment returns the responsibility of redrawing district lines to a governor-appointed bipartisan commission consisting of an equal number of Democrats and Republicans.

This decision will remove the position of state demographer which 63% of Missourians voted to create in 2018.

The less-contentious Amendment 1 failed to get the votes it needed to apply term limits to all state offices.

Newly-elected State Representative Wayne Wallingford said Amendment 3 will return Missouri’s redistricting process to the way things were done before the Clean Missouri petition of the midterm elections.

“Clean Missouri ended up being Dirty Missouri because they tricked the voters. They started out by saying we are going to limit lobbyist gifts,” Wallingford said. “Ninety percent of the money to get Amendment 1 passed came from out of state, and I have a real big problem with people from out of state trying to tell us how to run our state.”

In addition to changing the redistricting process, the Republican-backed Amendment 3 lowers the allowed value of lobbyist gifts from $5 to a complete ban and lowers maximum campaign contribution limits from $2,500 to $2,400.

As the 2020 census wraps up in December, the Missouri redistricting process will be carried out next year in the same way as ten years ago — by a bipartisan commission which now will be appointed by newly-re-elected Governor Mike Parson.