Following recent defeats at the ballot box, pro-life advocates are trying to prevent the issue from being placed before voters.
Pro-abortion activists supported ballot initiatives that won in Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, and Ohio after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022.
Since the high court's decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, voters in all seven states that held a statewide vote have backed access to abortion.
Now, several conservatives groups are calling for other states to stop citizen-led ballot initiative processes, Politico reported.
Pro-life groups in Arizona, Florida, Nevada, and other states are buying TV and digital ads, and employing grassroots tactics to persuade people against signing petitions to put the issue before voters in November.
"Just because the abortion lobby wants to come in like carpetbaggers to get out the vote for Democrats, you don't have to help them," Student for Life chief policy strategist Kristi Hamrick said, Politico reported. "Just because someone shoves a clipboard in your face, you don't have to sign."
Republicans also are encouraging state courts to keep referendums off the ballot, while GOP lawmakers in places such as Missouri and Oklahoma are pushing to raise the threshold for an amendment to either pass or make it to the ballot.
"All options should be on the table," Americans United for Life Chief Legal Officer & General Counsel Steven Aden said, Politico reported. "Because we believe that abortion is truly about the right to life of human individuals in the womb, we don't believe those rights should be subjected to majority vote."
Missouri Republican state Rep. Brad Hudson expressed a similar sentiment.
"I do not want to see abortion put in our constitution," Hudson said, the outlet reported. "I believe the right to life is a fundamental right that all human beings have and certainly should not be taken away because of a vote by a simple majority."
Hudson has filed legislation that would require Missouri constitutional amendments to pass with a statewide majority and a majority in more than half of the state's eight congressional districts.
Pro-life advocates and Republican state attorneys general in states such as Florida, Missouri, and Nevada, are challenging the initiatives in court as unconstitutionally vague, confusing or misleading, Politico reported.
In several states where abortion-rights initiatives passed, conservatives are suing to block their implementation.
In Nevada, a petition to put an abortion rights amendment to the state constitution on the ballot for 2024 was struck down late last month by district court judge in Carson City.
The petition was brought by Nevadans for Reproductive Freedom to enshrine abortion rights into the state constitution with a public ballot question. Calling the petition too broad, District Court Judge James Russell ruled the document contained "too many subjects."
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
Charlie McCarthy ✉
Charlie McCarthy, a writer/editor at Newsmax, has nearly 40 years of experience covering news, sports, and politics.
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