PHOENIX — Abortion access was on the ballot Tuesday and voters supported it in seven of 10 states nationwide, giving an overwhelming win for the abortion rights movement since the matter became a states’ issue after the fall of Roe vs. Wade.
But the issue’s biggest proponent on a national ticket? She couldn’t win.
Vice President Kamala Harris, who made reproductive rights a cornerstone of her campaign, lost to former President Trump, who had repeatedly boasted about appointing the Supreme Court justices who were among the majority that scuttled Roe.
“People, I don’t think, felt they had to choose between Trump and their position on abortion,” said Mary Ziegler, a legal historian and author of several books on abortion, including the forthcoming book “Personhood: The New Civil War Over Reproduction.” “They thought they could have both.”
A mix of red, blue and swing states handily passed measures related to restoring abortion access or codifying it in their state constitutions. Unsurprisingly, the measures succeeded in Colorado, New York and Maryland. But they also passed in Arizona, Nevada and in deep-red Missouri and Montana.
A ballot measure in Florida failed, despite getting 57% of the vote — just shy of the 60% measure needed to pass. South Dakota and Nebraska voters declined to increase abortion access.
People attend an Arizona Democrats watch party on election night in Phoenix.
(Ross D. Franklin / Associated Press)
“I’m so excited that we won and — putting that into context of everything else that’s happened — I feel almost guilty,” said Chris Love, spokesperson for the “Arizona for Abortion Access” campaign.
The future of abortion access under a second Trump administration remains unclear. If Republicans win both chambers in Congress — they have already clinched the Senate — they could try to bring legislation to ban abortion nationwide.
Trump could also enforce the Comstock Act, a law restricting abortion-related materials that has been on the books since 1873, although it not been used for decades.
“Without question, Donald Trump is an existential threat to the health, well-being, privacy, and autonomy of women and pregnant people across the country,” Jodi Hicks, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California, said in a statement. “His reelection is a devastating blow to reproductive freedom.”
Trump could also put administrators who would move to restrict abortion access in charge of the Food and Drug Administration or the Department of Health and Human Services. Trump has said he would put Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — his onetime opponent turned supporter — in charge of health issues.
“Bobby, I love you looking at health,” Trump said at an event with Tucker Carlson last week at which Kennedy made an appearance. “I want you to take care of the women of this country, the men of this country and the children of this country.”
It’s also possible that Trump could decide to drop the issue of abortion altogether.
It could be “that he’s just like, ‘You know what? Forget it. Like, this whole abortion thing is an albatross, and I don’t want to deal with it, and I don’t really care anyway,’” Ziegler said. “But we just aren’t going to know.”
Abortion has animated the national political conversation for decades, but it took on new importance in the Dobbs vs. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case of 2022, when the Supreme Court — with three conservative justices appointed by Trump — overturned national abortion access protections under Roe. Suddenly, abortion access was thrust back into states’ hands, creating a patchwork of laws across the nation.
Abortion rights activists decried the move and quickly organized to put abortion measures on state ballots, winning measures in Kansas, Michigan and Ohio. The Dobbs decision is also widely credited with helping to stave off a “red wave” of victories in the 2022 midterm elections for Congress.
While Trump took credit for overturning Roe, he remained vague about where he stood on abortion in its aftermath. In April, he announced his position to “leave it to the states,” in essence abdicating a strong stance on abortion access. Antiabortion advocates — including many of his most ardent supporters among conservative evangelicals — pushed him to go further, advocating for a national abortion ban.
Many of his supporters expressed disappointment when he waffled over how he would vote in Florida’s repeal of a six-week abortion ban. When a reporter pressed Trump on Tuesday for how he voted on Florida’s abortion ballot measure that would prevent any laws restricting abortion until fetal viability, he snapped, “You should stop talking about that.”
Voters stand in line outside a polling place Tuesday in Phoenix.
(Matt York / Associated Press)
When Harris became the Democratic Party’s last-minute nominee after President Biden abruptly left the race after a disastrous debate performance in June, she made reproductive rights a central pillar of her campaign, hoping to capitalize on the momentum of the 2022 wins.
Unlike Biden — a Catholic who spoke less frequently about abortion as a candidate — Harris spoke forcefully and passionately. She labeled states’ laws limiting abortion access as “Trump abortion bans,” and painted her opponent as someone who “does not believe women should have the agency and authority to make decisions about their own.”
“We trust women,” she would tell her supporters at every campaign stop, eliciting some of their wildest cheers when she repeated her campaign promise: “It is my pledge to you, when Congress passes a bill to restore reproductive freedom — as the president of the United States, I will proudly sign it into law.”
But Harris glossed over the details of how abortion legislation could pass Congress. And the fuzziness around a national measure, coupled with the fact that many states had already moved to protect abortion access, left some voters unconvinced, Ziegler said.
“I think a lot of voters didn’t believe Trump’s states’ rights line. They didn’t understand what Harris could do,” Ziegler said. “And so then it was sort of like, ‘OK, well, I like Harris’ position on abortion better, but what is that going to change in my life? Like, if Trump wins, eggs aren’t going to cost as much, and gas isn’t going to cost as much, and that’s going to affect me.’”
People watch the vote count on a bill to repeal a Civil War-era abortion ban in the Arizona state Senate in May.
(Matt York / Associated Press)
Unfortunately for Democrats, Ziegler said, they fell into the trap of believing that support for abortion rights would translate into widespread wins. Republicans could still fall into a trap of believing that abortion bans are popular, she added.
“I think we can read this as saying that anger about what’s already happened on abortion wasn’t enough to bring Harris into office,” Ziegler said. “But I don’t think we can necessarily conclude that the abortion issue stopped being dangerous for Republicans.”