Republicans plow ahead with anti-abortion agenda in states where voters approved constitutional amendments
After voters in seven states enshrined abortion rights in their state constitutions, GOP lawmakers have moved forward with bills to curtail them.
Even as Republicans swept into power in Washington in last year’s elections, abortion rights supporters found success at the ballot box across the country. But that hasn’t deterred abortion opponents.
Republican lawmakers have moved forward this year with bills to restrict abortion in more than half of the states where voters passed constitutional amendments in November to protect or expand reproductive rights.
They’ve also advanced bills in a bevy of states that would make if more difficult for groups to place similar measures on the ballot in the future. Those efforts extend to three states where amendments to enshrine a constitutional right to an abortion fell short last November.
“The abortion industry’s attempts to completely deregulate their industry via ballot measures is putting women and girls in danger,” Kelsey Pritchard, the director of state public affairs for Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, said in an email. “Republican leaders in states with pro-abortion ballot measures should be doing all that they can to protect health and safety protections for women and girls.”
Reproductive rights groups say the actions — even if ultimately unsuccessful — amount to an overt rejection of the desires of voters on the issue of abortion.
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