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Experts And Advocates Confident Voters Will Reject 'Sneaky' Anti-Abortion Ballot Measures

Experts And Advocates Confident Voters Will Reject 'Sneaky' Anti-Abortion Ballot Measures
Rahel Gebreyes
By 

Editor, HuffPost Video

On Nov. 4, Americans will have some serious choices to make, particularly with respect to women’s reproductive rights.

Colorado, Tennessee and North Dakota have received national attention for the “personhood” ballot measures that aim to legally define life as starting at conception. The Tennessee measure would amend the state constitution to read, "Nothing in this Constitution secures or protects a right to abortion or requires the funding of an abortion."

If passed, these measures could extend legal rights to fertilized eggs -- severely restricting abortion rights and access to birth control. Experts and advocates are confident voters are aware of the extreme consequences of implicating such measures, and will vote against them.

“What’s at stake here is women’s ability to make their own personal and private decisions without government interference,” Jennifer Dalven, director of the ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project, told HuffPost Live. “Make no mistake about it, what these laws are trying to do is trying to make it illegal for a woman to have an abortion, to make it a crime for a woman to have an abortion.”

Colorado voters have overwhelmingly rejected similar measures at least twice before. In 2008 and again in 2010, personhood measures that sought to change Colorado's constitutional definition of a person were struck down. This time around, the measure has been reintroduced with an additional goal: to allow prosecutors to file charges on anyone who commits violence against a fetus, under the Colorado Wrongful Death Act.

With each reemergence of the measure, anti-abortion groups "make the ballot a little more sneaky [and] a little more misleading" to conceal the true intentions behind them, Dalven warned.

“But voters are smarter than that,” she continued. “And when voters know what’s really going on, they reject them time and again.”

Watch the full HuffPost Live conversation about the upcoming midterm election here.

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Before You Go

Texas
AP
After State Sen. Wendy Davis' (D) "filibuster heard 'round the world," Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) in July signed into law a package of abortion restrictions that has already shut down clinics across the state. The new law bans abortions 20 weeks after fertilization and requires all clinics to become ambulatory surgical centers -- in effect, mini hospitals -- even if they do not provide surgical abortions. The law also mandates that abortion providers have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of the clinic and requires them to administer the abortion-inducing medication RU-486 in person, rather than allow women to take it at home.
North Dakota
AP
North Dakota Gov. Jack Dalrymple (R) signed a trio of abortion restrictions into law in March that makes the state one of the most difficult places to access abortion care in the country. One of the laws bans abortion as soon as the fetal heartbeat is detected, which can be as early as six weeks into a pregnancy. The other two require abortion physicians to have admitting privileges at local hospitals and ban abortions that are based on the gender of the fetus.
Ohio
Getty
The Ohio state legislature found a new way to shut down abortion clinics this year: it passed a law requiring clinics to have a patient transfer agreement with a local hospital in case of an emergency. But public hospitals are banned from entering into those agreements in Ohio, making it nearly impossible for many clinics to comply. The restrictions are already closing down abortion clinics in the state.
North Carolina
AP
North Carolina lawmakers stealthily buried a bundle of anti-abortion measures into an unrelated motorcycle safety bill this year and passed it before the public had time to object. The law eliminates insurance coverage of abortions for public employees and in the federal health care law's public exchanges. It also imposes sweeping new restrictions on abortion clinics that are expected to make it difficult for them to continue operating.
Michigan
AP
Michigan lawmakers used a rare and archaic procedural move to pass a law this month banning all insurance plans in the state from covering abortion unless the woman's life is in danger. The law, nicknamed the "rape insurance" bill by opponents, will force women and employers to purchase a separate abortion rider if they would like the procedure covered, even in cases of rape and incest.
Arkansas
AP
Arkansas lawmakers voted this year to override Gov. Mike Beebe's (D) veto on a bill banning abortions after 12 weeks of pregnancy. The law directly challenges the Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade, which protects a woman's right to have an abortion until the fetus is viable (generally considered to be around 22 weeks). A federal judge has temporarily blocked it from going into effect while legal challenges are pending.
Indiana
AP
Indiana Gov. Mike Pence (R) signed a bill this year requiring Indiana abortion clinics that only dispense the abortion-inducing medication RU-486 to meet the same physical standards as surgical facilities. It also forces women to undergo ultrasounds before receiving the drug. The law was intended to target a Planned Parenthood clinic in Lafayette, Ind. But the clinic will remain open, for now, because a U.S. District Judge temporarily blocked the law in November.
Kansas
Getty
Kansas legislators passed a sweeping anti-abortion bill this year that declares life begins "at fertilization" and prohibits abortion providers like Planned Parenthood from being involved in public school sex education classes. The bill also requires doctors to tell women that abortion is linked to breast cancer, although the National Cancer Institute concluded ten years ago that there is no causal relationship between the two.
Wisconsin
AP
Gov. Scott Walker (R) quietly signed a Republican-backed bill in July that mandates ultrasounds before abortions and requires doctors who perform abortions to have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals. A federal judge temporarily blocked the admitting privileges requirement after opponents showed it would effectively shut down two of the four abortion clinics in the state.
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