In late summer 2012, North Dakota Secretary of State Al Jaeger kept a medical marijuana initiative off the November ballot after finding that paid petition circulators, most of them North Dakota State University football players, had forged signatures. Ten NDSU players pleaded guilty to misdemeanor election fraud on October 2, 2012. The scandal delayed medical marijuana in North Dakota by four years, until voters approved Measure 5 in 2016, the same year a wave of medical and adult-use measures passed nationwide, as our marijuana history timeline shows.
What Happened
Two citizen initiatives were circulating in North Dakota in the summer of 2012: one to create a state conservation fund and one to legalize marijuana for medical treatment. Terra Strategies, an Iowa company, hired circulators, including NDSU football players, at $9 an hour to gather signatures, MPR News reported.
Staff in Jaeger’s office checking the petitions noticed repeated ZIP code errors, pages of names in the same handwriting and at least one signature in the name of “Hillary Rodham” giving the White House as her address. Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem said many signatures had been copied from phone books or simply made up, according to the Associated Press. Jaeger said circulators faced a quota of 50 signatures a day, with bonuses at 80, which gave workers who fell short a reason to invent names. When Bureau of Criminal Investigation agents interviewed the circulators, none would vouch for which signatures were real.
Jaeger threw out the suspect petitions, and with them gone neither initiative had enough valid signatures. On September 4, 2012, eleven people, including eight NDSU players, were charged; the count later grew to 15 circulators, 13 of them current or former players.
The Court Fight
The medical marijuana campaign, chaired by state Rep. Steve Zaiser of Fargo, asked the North Dakota Supreme Court to put the measure back on the ballot, arguing that Jaeger should not reject entire petitions because some signatures were fraudulent. On September 19, 2012, the court denied the request without oral argument so ballot printing could go ahead, the Dickinson Press reported. “Now they’re not even going to have a chance for North Dakotans to say ‘yea’ or ‘nay’ on this issue,” Zaiser said.
What Happened Next
On October 2, 2012, ten NDSU players pleaded guilty to misdemeanor election fraud. Each received a deferred sentence of 360 days of unsupervised probation, 50 hours of community service and $325 in fees, with the offense to be cleared from their records if they complied. Judge Douglas Herman said the defendants were “not smart enough, grown up enough or sophisticated enough” to grasp the consequences, according to MPR. Jaeger later argued that the penalties were too light and pushed lawmakers to make petition fraud a felony, the Grand Forks Herald reported.
Medical marijuana returned in 2016. Voters approved Initiated Statutory Measure 5, the North Dakota Compassionate Care Act, on November 8, 2016, with about 64 percent of the vote, according to Ballotpedia. The Legislature rewrote it in 2017, removing the home-grow option before the program took effect.
Where It Stands in 2026
North Dakota runs a medical-only program through state-registered dispensaries. Voters rejected adult-use legalization in 2018, 2022 and 2024. Current possession rules and the medical card process are in our North Dakota marijuana laws guide, and how state ballot measures compare nationally is on our cannabis laws page.
NDSU Football Players Petition Fraud FAQ
What did the NDSU football players do?
While working as paid circulators in 2012, they added forged or fabricated signatures to petitions for a medical marijuana initiative and a conservation fund initiative.
How many NDSU players pleaded guilty?
Ten, on October 2, 2012, to misdemeanor election fraud. They received deferred sentences with probation, community service and fees.
Did the 2012 medical marijuana measure make the ballot?
No. The secretary of state rejected the tainted petitions, and the North Dakota Supreme Court declined to restore the measure on September 19, 2012.
When did North Dakota legalize medical marijuana?
Voters approved Measure 5 in November 2016, and the program took effect in 2017 after legislative changes.
Originally reported by The Weed Street Journal; rewritten and updated in October 2026 with what happened next.
