“That lit a fire under us,” Elworth said. “I said, ‘No way are our signatures only 47% good.’ We went out there and collected far more signatures this time.”

The party’s petition wasn’t submitted earlier because Elworth said he did not want to compete with the medical marijuana petition in circulation.

The time is right for it now, though.

“We’ve got a lot of people saying, ‘I’m moving, I’m sick of this,’” he said. “They’re fed up, saying, ‘nobody is listening to us. We have no rights. Our votes aren’t any good.’ I heard it and I listened. Our petition went in because of that. I can’t listen to people giving up.”

Important to the LMNP is younger voters’ involvement in democracy.

“We feel they’re left on the side of the road,” Elworth said. “The adults are deciding the votes here, when there’s way more young people available to vote. We’re trying to represent them and get them active.”

He added, “They’re the future. Old people are not the future.”

Elworth said he has benefitted medically from using marijuana.

“I was on pills for mental issues, like ADHD, when I was a kid, and honestly, I started smoking marijuana when I was 14 years old, and I’ve never taken a pill for any of that stuff since,” he said. “It’s better than pills for a lot of ailments.”