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OVERLAND PARK, Kan. – When abortion rights organizer Jae Gray sent canvassers to suburban Kansas City for the state’s upcoming referendum, they armed them with talking points aimed at all voters, not just liberals
“We definitely used messaging strategies that would work regardless of party affiliation,” said Gray, a field organizer for Kansans for Constitutional Freedom. “We believe that all Kansans have the right to make personal decisions about their health care without government overreach, that’s obviously a conservative talking point. We weren’t just talking to Democrats.” .
The effort paid off. On Tuesday, Kansas voters decisively defeated a ballot measure that would have stripped abortion protections in the state constitution, paving the way for additional restrictions or even an outright ban. That victory was powered by an opposition coalition that mobilized a large portion of the state’s electorate — including Republican and independent voters — to reach historic numbers.
The stunning defeat of a well-organized anti-abortion movement in a conservative state surprised many observers and even the organizers themselves, who said they capitalized on voter anger after the Supreme Court struck down. Roe v. Wade in June Voter registrations in Kansas rose dramatically in the hours after the decision was announced, according to KSVotes.org, an online voter registration service.
Nearly 60 percent of voters ultimately rejected the amendment, with more than 900,000 turning out, nearly double the 473,438 who participated in the 2018 primary election.
“Kansas turned out in historic numbers … because we found common ground among diverse voting blocs and mobilized Kansans across the political spectrum to vote no,” Rachel Sweet, the campaign director for Kansans for to constitutional freedom, in a press conference.
Sweet said she hopes the campaign’s victory will serve as leverage for abortion rights groups in other states with ballot initiatives in the coming months. In California, Vermont and Michigan, voters are being asked whether they will enshrine abortion protections in their constitutions. In Kentucky, voters are considering whether the protections should be revoked.
Sweet said organizers mobilized Republican and unaffiliated voters through partnerships with groups such as the Mainstream Coalition, a nonpartisan advocacy group based in Johnson County, Kan., a populous suburb of Kansas City that became blue for the first time in the 2020 presidential contest. About 1 in 5 Republican primary voters were in favor of abortion rights, a Washington Post analysis shows.
“It is a referendum on the annulment of the Supreme Court Roe v. Wade and as a society we don’t want to go backwards with our laws,” said Mandi Hunter, 46, a Republican attorney from Johnson County who voted no on the amendment. “People don’t want the government to be in charge or rule over their personal lives”.
Hunter said she was skeptical of Republican state lawmakers, who argued the amendment would not necessarily lead to a total ban, although some had previously said they were ready with legislation that would propose a total ban on the procedure for its legislative session in January. .
Kansans for Constitutional Freedom also reached out to voters in more rural and conservative parts of the state, Sweet said. An abortion rights rally in western Kansas earlier this week featured horses, a Dolly Parton playlist and T-shirts featuring a pink womb with a cowboy hat on it. The slogan? “Vote Neigh.”
Alejandro Rangel-López, 21, a Dodge City resident and event organizer, said the Vote Neigh campaign was designed as a fun way to reach younger rural voters. They did well, he said. “No” voters won the state’s populous urban counties, but some smaller rural counties, such as Saline and Geary, also showed results.
“These victories happen because young people are motivated and tired of seeing the same thing over and over again,” he said. “When you challenge us to shape what our campaigns look like, have fun and move away from traditional rhetoric, we will deliver.”
University of Kansas law professor Stephen McAllister, a former clerk for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas who served as the U.S. attorney for Kansas after being appointed by President Donald Trump, said the activism against abortion in Kansas began in earnest in 1991, during the summer of 1991. Mercy protests in Wichita. At the same time protesters were lying in the streets, chaining themselves to fences and being arrested outside abortion clinics, the movement was also recruiting Republican candidates, he said.
In the following years, abortion advocates achieved several victories in the Kansas state legislature, including a 24-hour waiting period, the parental notification law, and restrictions on late-term abortions.
“This was the birth of an interest group that captured the Republican Party in a way that never reflected the view of the majority of Kansans,” McAllister said. “Now that Kansas populism has had a chance to express itself, it has made clear that the will of the people has been captured by a vested interest in the Republican legislature. There is a disconnect between the majority will and the position of the party”.
In 2019, the state Supreme Court ruled that the Kansas Constitution protects the “right to personal autonomy” that “allows a woman to make her own decisions about her body, health, family formation and family life, decisions that may include whether or not to continue pregnancy.” Abortion in Kansas is currently legal during the first 22 weeks of pregnancy.
Republicans in the state legislature originally tried to put a constitutional amendment that would overturn those protections on the ballot in 2020. When they finally succeeded last year, abortion rights organizers were ready, according to Cassie Woolworth, 57-year-old president of Johnson. South County Chapter of Democratic Women. His group began warning voters of the upcoming ballot initiative even during last year’s election cycle.
During the year-long campaign on the amendment, both sides have accused each other of misinformation, with “Vote No” Kansans for Constitutional Freedom claiming on street signs and messages that the amendment would lead to a ban total abortion (state legislators would have had to pass a law banning abortion). The “Vote Yes” coalition Value Them Both claimed that the laws they worked for have been overturned by the 2019 Supreme Court ruling (also not technically true, according to McAllister).
A misleading text sent by a political action committee led by Tim Huelskamp, a former Republican congressman from Kansas, further inflamed the race.
The two parties spent about the same amount on airwaves and social media for a combined total of $11 million, according to reports filed with the Kansas Commission on Governmental Ethics. The Catholic Church has spent nearly $2.5 million in support of Value Them Both, while Planned Parenthood spent $1.4 million in opposition.
Kansans for Constitutional Freedom was also supported by the Sixteen Thirty Fund, its top donor, which gave $1.38 million. In recent years, Sixteen Thirty has become a powerhouse for left-wing causes. Organized as a nonprofit, which means it is exempt from disclosing its donors, the fund spent $410 million nationwide in 2020, the latest year for which a tax return is available .
The fund, administered by for-profit consulting firm Arabella Advisers, says it advocates for causes such as voter access, pay equity, health care and gun control. In 2020, he was a major donor to outside spending groups trained to defeat Donald Trump. His spokesman did not immediately return a request for comment.
While abortion rights forces popped their champagne at the victory party on Tuesday, the Value Them Both coalition called the result a “temporary setback” in a statement on Twitter, saying the battle it was far from over. The group blamed a “disinformation attack by far-left organizations that spent millions of dollars out of state to spread lies about the Value Them Both Amendment.”
“Our fight dedicated to valuing women and babies is far from over,” said the group’s statement, which promised “we will be back.”
Scott Clement and Isaac Stanley-Becker contributed to this report.