If You Care About Abortion Justice, You Need To Care About Free And Fair Elections
If local government can’t protect voter access, democracy crumbles and so do our bodily rights
A s the 2024 election rapidly approaches, we’re working in the trenches alongside some of the most important, and threatened, public servants in America — election officials. Elections endure as the most vital connection between the public and politicians, between the will of the people and the government designed to answer that call.
America is bearing witness to a significant uptick in challenges to election administrators and a dangerous undermining of elections themselves as extremist citizens and government officials alike intimidate, sow confusion, and disenfranchise voters one county at a time.
And nowhere is this fight for election integrity more crucial than for the restoration of abortion access in states across the nation.
The gutting of the Voting Rights Act coupled with the end of Roe, has compounded the disenfranchisement of POC voters, exacerbated existing health disparities, and contributed to the enduring marginalization of vulnerable communities.
We now know that abortion rights and American democracy are not guaranteed. They depend on the laws — and the local and state elected officials — that we protect. This election season has been riddled with illegal power grabs and campaigns of misinformation.
And yet, we also saw sweeping victories for voters showing up for abortion rights:
1. Kentucky — Gov. Beshear won his race slamming his anti-abortion opponent David Cameron
2. Virginia — Voters flouted Gov. Glenn Youngkin and his draconian promise of a 15-week abortion ban
3. Ohio — Ohioans enshrined abortion in their state constitution with a resounding 57% in support of protecting access
But herein lies the rub. While Ohio is an unmistakable win for democracy and abortion justice alike, this victory was achieved despite cynical attempts to undermine voters’ power.
The Ohio abortion ballot initiative was accompanied by a stunning campaign of misinformation and egregious abuses of power by government officials including a state Senate website — “On The Record” — which ran incendiary articles riddled with falsities. And then there was anti-abortionist Secretary of State Frank LaRose who purged 27,000 voters before the election to try and silence those who would codify bodily rights.
But worst of all — and we saw this in Missouri, Florida, Idaho, Oklahoma, North Dakota, and other states as well — were the efforts to prevent voters from being able to weigh in at all. This past year has seen a barrage of bills designed to disenfranchise voters, from making constitutional amendments through ballot measures exponentially more difficult to racist gerrymandering.
HOW WE’RE FIGHTING BACK
Across the nation activists, lawyers, and progressive local leaders have worked in tandem to leverage litigation, local government power, and community voices to protect our rights and strategize future playbooks. Because these stories of malfeasance and election manipulation are not unique and they’re certainly not over.
Abuses of power and threats to our democracy are only growing more powerful and ubiquitous as states recognize the vital — and final — role they play in protecting abortion access.
On the heels of last week’s victory for reproductive rights in Ohio, PRP filed a brief this past Friday on behalf of 10 former Florida Republican government officials, arguing the Florida Supreme Court should allow Florida voters to add explicit protection for abortion rights to the state constitution.
The brief supports a constitutional amendment proposed by a coalition of health-care providers and civil rights advocates, including the ACLU and Florida Rising. Within the brief, former Mayors, Senators, and State representatives said Floridians must have a say in amending their Constitution to protect abortion access:
“We respect the authority of the people to engage directly in our democracy…we understand that while public hearing and deliberation is essential for developing complex governmental functions, some decisions about rights must be fundamental and decided by the people themselves.
This is especially true for an issue as controversial as abortion. The 1 ballot-initiative process is the most legitimate way to establish a contested right because every eligible Floridian has the opportunity to weigh in directly.”
Florida is continually wrestling with attacks on local government — just look at the ongoing case between Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and State Attorney Andrew Warren. Last August, Desantis fired Warren for a pledge Warren signed (alongside more than 80 other prosecutors nationwide) not to prosecute gender-affirming cases involving minors and certain abortion cases.
We not only filed a brief arguing Warren’s termination was unlawful — DeSantis acted out of retaliation against First Amendment-protected rights and political motives — we also supported Warren’s legal team to get him his job back, a job he was voted in for twice by the people of Hillsborough.
Because in the wake of Roe, prosecutors like Warren are facing a stark new choice. They can spend precious resources investigating doctors and throwing women in jail or go after meaningful threats to community safety like homicide, armed robbery, or a predatory corporation skimming pay from workers.
But despite the fact the District Court agreed that DeSantis violated the Florida Constitution, they ruled they were unable to reinstate Warren, based on a narrow interpretation of its authority.
And now? It remains to be seen whether Warren will run against Republican Susan Lopez (the judge DeSantis appointed to replace him) and regain his rightful position as an elected prosecutor.
PROTECTING VOTING ACCESS IS THE VITAL DEFENSE FOR ABORTION RIGHTS
This past July we celebrated a triumph for abortion justice in Missouri alongside Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas. Missourians were seeking to enshrine reproductive rights in the state constitution by putting the issue to voters in 2024, but their efforts were being blocked by Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey. Bailey had gone rogue and was refusing to fulfill his statutory duties by completing the necessary paperwork to allow abortion rights petitions to circulate.
We penned an amicus brief arguing that Bailey was not only acting outside of his authority but robbing Missouri citizens of their voice and constitutional right to put abortion on the ballot.
And we won.
The Court found that AG Bailey had inserted himself where he had no lawful place, and ordered him to do his job so advocates could begin collecting signatures to put abortion access on the ballot. But now we wait alongside six million Missourian voters to see if the Reproductive Freedom Amendment will make it to the 2024 November ballot.
Because here’s the thing. Since Roe v. Wade was overturned, voters in every state with an abortion-related ballot have voted to protect or expand abortion rights.
If local government can’t protect voter access and ballot validation, democracy begins to crumble and with it our civil rights. We need to fight tooth and nail against this trend of state officers abusing their power to prevent ballot initiatives that would restore or advance reproductive rights for the very communities they’ve been sworn to answer to.
