Trials Show Successful Ballot Initiatives Are Only the Beginning of Restoring Abortion Access |
The outcome of two trials in the coming weeks could shape what it will look like when voters overturn state abortion bans through future ballot initiatives.
Arizona and Missouri voters in November 2024 struck down their respective near-total abortion bans. Both states added abortion access up to fetal viability as a right in their constitutions, although Arizonans approved the amendment by a much wider margin than Missouri voters.
That was just the beginning of protracted legal battles.
Amy Myrick, senior counsel at the Center for Reproductive Rights, said ballot measures are a powerful and important step in returning abortion access to a state, but success on Election Day doesn’t mean the fight is over.
“State constitutions don’t automatically repeal laws,” Myrick said. “Sometimes, even if the state isn’t doing it, other groups or legislators will jump in to try to retain these restrictions.”
The trial over Arizona’s abortion restrictions wrapped up this week, Arizona Mirror reported. Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Gregory Como seemed unconvinced of the argument that certain laws around how abortion medication can be prescribed, waiting periods, and bans on abortions in cases of fetal abnormalities should remain enforceable.
A similar trial in Missouri will wrap up on Jan. 26 after hours of testimony about more than a dozen abortion restrictions state officials are seeking to preserve. The Republican supermajority state legislature is also putting a countermeasure to reinstate the abortion ban on the ballot in November, paired with a ban on gender-affirming care for minors.
Arizona and Missouri have what are known by abortion-rights advocates as Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers, or TRAP, laws passed by legislatures before the U.S. Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision in 2022. Even........