When the conservative majority of the Supreme Court struck down the right to abortion at the federal level in the United States on June 24, 2022, it caused a legal, political, and social shock whose waves are still being felt across the country every week. Roe vs. Wade, the ruling that since 1973 had given protection to women in decisions about their own bodies, was more than jurisprudence and a symbol. For the Democratic Party, for the vice president Kamala Harrisit is one of the main themes of the campaign, one of the existential questions, pure principles. And this is why, while they aspire to reach the White House again, and to possibly be able to appoint magistrates capable of overturning the decision, they use all their strength in State-State struggles.
In these elections, not only the president, Congress or the 33 senators are chosen. In addition to them, there are countless state offices, judges, prosecutors and school boards at stake. And dozens of referendums of all kinds, of which 10, in as many states, on abortion, after cases of women who died without receiving the necessary medical care and procedures proliferated throughout the country because doctors, bound by the law, did not they intervened until they stopped hearing the heartbeat of a fetus, even though the pregnancy was clearly impractical. Kamala Harris has repeatedly addressed the issue in her demonstrations, especially in the city of Atlanta Candi Miller and Amber Nicole Thurmantwo Georgian women who did not survive.
The result of those referendums this evening is not uniform. Florida rejected the so-called Amendment 4, a proposal that sought to amend the State Constitution to prohibit legislators from limiting access to abortion until the fetus is viable or to protect the health of the mother. The literal text that was voted on and which did not have the necessary 60% support provided that «No law shall prohibit, penalize, delay or limit abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the health of the patient, as established by the «. patient’s health care provider,” but without changing “the Legislature’s constitutional authority to require notification of a parent or guardian before a minor has an abortion.”
It wasn’t enough. Republican governor Ron De Santis opposed head-on, just like recreational marijuana, achieved a sufficient victory, using all its political and financial capital. Its state agencies spent millions of taxpayer dollars on radio and television ads that misrepresented the measure, saying, for example, that it violated the rights of parents of minors.
Your government has created a website claiming that Amendment 4 «threatens women’s safety» and worked with the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, to add confusing language, arguing that the amendment would “result in significantly more abortions and fewer live births each year in Florida” and that this “could have a negative impact on the growth of state and local resources.» revenues over time», according to Rolling Stones magazine. In addition to putting pressure on television networks that aired commercials with threats of lawsuits.
Florida’s is the first measure in these two years that does not move forward to expand women’s rights and guarantees. Of the 10 proposals up for consideration tonight, three have already moved forward. The rest is still waiting to be counted.
One of those that went without problems was in New York, although it is the most unique. While in most cases the question was about when it should be legal to terminate a pregnancy or how to avoid the ban when the mother’s health is at stake, in New York state lawmakers opted for a strange indirect approach by presenting it as an anti-discrimination measure .
The State Constitution expressly prohibits discrimination based on race, creed or religion and the issued amendment proposes to add that no person may be denied civil rights because of his or her national origin, age, disability, sexual orientation, identity of gender, gender expression, pregnancy, pregnancy outcomes, or “reproductive health care and autonomy.” It is no secret that one of the motivations was to include the reproductive issue to mobilize the progressive electorate, arguing that with this new formulation the legal framework is consolidated, since any attempt to limit abortion through the back door would mean a unconstitutional act. of discrimination in healthcare.
In Colorado, Amendment 79, which passed, It was included as a referendum through a citizen initiative, which will make abortion a constitutional right in the state, as well as eliminate the current ban on state and local funding for medically necessary procedures.
Proposition 139 was also approved in Arizona, which would guarantee access to abortion up to the so-called point of fetal viability. The state now prohibits abortion after the 15th week of pregnancy, about nine weeks before the fetus can survive outside the womb. A group called Arizona Abortion Access obtained more than half of the signatures, far more than needed, and put the issue on the ballot, gaining support from 61.5 percent of citizens.
