We’ll have our eye on a Republican-backed ballot referendum to switch Kansas to judicial elections, the first of what both supporters and opponents see as a growing conservative push nationwide to remake courts so that they are more likely to support Republican policies. Its the latest effort by right-wing operatives in the state to undo … Read more
Legal battles over the measures are also raging in Arizona, Michigan, Montana, Nevada and Ohio. In some of these states, lawmakers have also introduced legislation that, experts say, would undercut the will of voters who passed the measures. Read more at The Guardian
Michigan Rep. Karl Bohnak (R-Deerton) has finally said what so many members of the GOP are too scared to say outright: they don’t support women’s bodily autonomy. Read more at Jezebel
“It’s gotten more expensive to provide care, it’s gotten more dangerous to provide care, and it’s just gotten, frankly, harder to provide care, when you’re expected to be in the clinic and then on the statehouse steps, and also speaking to your representatives and trying to find somebody who will fix your roof or paint … Read more
In Arizona, progressive groups are holding events and knocking on doors to make GOP-appointed state Supreme Court Justices Clint Bolick and Kathryn King the first in state history to lose a retention vote by reminding voters the pair ruled this year to uphold an 1864 law criminalizing nearly all abortions. Read more at Politico
“They’re not bringing it up, so I’m bringing it up,” she said. “I’m having to say to people: ‘Are you concerned about a national ban? Do you realize that if we don’t maintain the state legislature and supreme court, a Republican majority will actually go in and try to undo what Prop. 3, even though … Read more
In Ohio, Kansas and Michigan, for example, where abortion rights advocates won major victories in ballot measures over the past two years, anti-abortion groups and lawmakers are now turning their focus to blocking implementation of the initiatives by proposing bills and threatening lawsuits that would restrict the reproductive rights those elections protected. Read more at … Read more
“Keeping the Medicaid ban in place and keeping the 24-hour delay in place…disproportionately impacts people of the lowest means, people who have the least ability to return to clinic, who have the least ability to pay out of pocket for their health care,” said Dr. Halley Crissman, an OB/GYN in Ann Arbor who testified in … Read more
Right to Life sues to block Michigan’s voter-approved abortion rights law The lawsuit asks for a permanent injunction stopping enforcement of Proposal 3, which is now written into the state constitution as the “right to reproductive freedom.” Read more at The Detroit News Michigan Republicans Dig in on Abortion, Sue to Overturn Will of Voters … Read more
Abortion-rights advocates say the fight to stop voters from protecting access to the procedure looks a lot like the fight to restrict voting rights in general. Many of the same Republican lawmakers who supported laws limiting access to the ballot box also seek to prevent citizen-led drives to enshrine reproductive health care into state constitutions, … Read more
