Efforts to prevent Kansas from becoming one of the most abortion-friendly states in the country, despite its "red" status, have failed.
Voters there overwhelmingly decided to reject Amendment 2, which would have affirmed that "there is no Kansas constitutional right to abortion or to require the government funding of abortion."
The amendment aimed to overturn a 2019 decision by the Kansas Supreme Court declaring that the state's constitution "enables a woman to make decisions regarding her body, health, family formation, and family life, including the decision whether to continue a pregnancy."
That same year, the Kansas legislature passed a law banning second-trimester abortions, as well as another law pertaining to the health regulations of the gruesome procedure.
The Kansas Supreme Court in an overwhelming 6-1 vote decided that all of these laws violate the state Constitution. This year, efforts were made to override that decision with a vote – but they failed.
Unfortunately, the implications of the Amendment 2 vote in Kansas are nationwide. Other states may try to put forth similar ballot initiatives to decide the fate of unborn babies.
"It is not clear as to why the polls would have been so far wrong in this instance, but it is quite possible that the pro-abortion side was more energized than the pro-life side," writes Steve Byas for The New American.
"After all, the average person, on both sides of the question, probably thinks that the U.S. Supreme Court outlawed abortion nationwide, although all their ruling did was return the matter to the states – where it belonged."
Was Amendment 2 worded poorly, confusing voters into rejecting it?
Emily Wales of Great Plains Planned Parenthood was so excited by Amendment 2 being voted down that she issued a statement of praise and celebration for the "groundswell of grassroots support" that made it happen.
"Now, more than ever, our work continues," she added.
Joe Biden also issued a statement – well, he bumbled through something on a teleprompter, anyway – declaring that the vote against Amendment 2 proves that "the majority of Americans agree that women should have access to abortion."
"Listen to the will of the American people and restore the protections of Roe as federal law," Biden added.
Laura Kelley, the Democratic governor of Kansas, was perhaps the most dramatic, stating that had Amendment 2 been passed rather than rejected, it would "throw the state back into the Dark Ages."
There is some speculation that the wording of Amendment 2 may have been confusing to voters, who may have thought that voting against it also meant voting against abortion.
"There could also have been some confusion as to whether the yes vote or the no vote was in opposition to abortion (those who oppose abortion may have thought a no vote indicated opposition, while a yes vote was for abortion rights)," Byas writes.
"There is no doubt that the millions of dollars spent in Kansas in a massive disinformation campaign – claiming things like the Kansas Legislature was poised to ban contraception and the like – made a difference with many Kansans who naively believed such propaganda."
Byas also warns against calls for a constitutional convention on this and other important matters because he believes that doing so would result in a deluge of "untold millions of dollars of direct propaganda, along with pressure from powerful special interests, to produce a drastically altered U.S. Constitution – or even an entirely new document."
"State legislatures (or state conventions) would be subject to the same types of pressures," he says, adding that abortion might easily get enshrined into any new constitutions were conventions to be held.
The latest news about the abortion fight can be found at Abortions.news.
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