When Vance said abortion rights should be “left to the states,” he ignored an inconvenient fact – Mother Jones

Senator JD Vance (R-Ohio), Republican vice-presidential candidate, and Democratic vice-presidential candidate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz.Julia Démarée Nikhinson/AP

GOP Vice Presidential Candidate JD Vance has a refrain he likes to repeat when asked about his draconian anti-abortion positions and former President Donald Trump’s plans for reproductive rights: leave it to the states.

That’s basically what he said in his game against Minnesota. Gov. Tim Walz during the vice presidential debate Tuesday night when moderator Norah O’Donnell asked if he would create a federal pregnancy oversight agency. Vance said he would not create such an agency, but then continued: “The right way to handle this, as complicated as democracy is sometimes, is to let voters make these decisions, to let individual states define their abortion policy. »

In a way, Vance is right. In every state that has put the question of abortion rights to voters since 2022, when the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wadethe measure passed with flying colors. And that includes Vance’s home state of Ohio, as my colleague Madison Pauly previously reported.

But there is a problem. GOP continues to try to sabotage abortion rights ballot measures Before they even reach voters. They did it in Ohio last year, instituting a special election in August to try to raise the threshold for amending the state constitution, as we wrote at the time:

Ohio state Republicans attempted to change the rules before their voters had a chance to vote for abortion rights. In May, they passed a resolution forcing a statewide vote on whether to make it harder for future amendments to pass. They claimed their efforts, largely funded by far-right Illinois billionaire Richard Uihlein, were aimed at blocking interference from “out-of-state special interests.” But they specifically ensured that the vote on their This proposal came before the vote on abortion rights in November. To that end, they approved a bill this spring reinstating the August special election — which they had just eliminated on the grounds that the summer election had too low a turnout to be worth the cost. (“These unnecessary ‘off-cycle’ elections are not good for taxpayers, election officials, or the civic health of our state. It’s time for them to go!” Senate candidate LaRose previously argued.)

The effort – supported by Vance – was unsuccessful. A surprising A number of Ohioans turned out and defeated the attempt to thwart the abortion rights ballot measure, which ultimately came before voters in November and adopted by a wide margin. Now, access to abortion is protected in Ohio up to the point of fetal viability, typically around 24 weeks of gestation. The law also allows late-term abortions to protect the life and health of the pregnant person.

The Ohio GOP is not alone in its efforts to undermine ballot measures. As Madison wrote, Missouri Republicans unsuccessfully attempted to do the same thing with their state’s upcoming abortion ballot measure, as did South Dakota Republicans. In Florida, Governor Ron DeSantis and his cronies recently attempted to derail their state’s upcoming abortion rights vote, including potentially breaking the law and sending police to the homes of abortion rights supporters. abortion. As I recently reported:

The state Department of Health launched a web page spreading misinformation about Amendment 4, a ballot measure that emerged in November aimed at circumventing the state’s six-week abortion ban that the Court Supreme Court of Florida approved in April. If it gets the 60 percent vote required to pass, the amendment would guarantee the right to abortion before the point of fetal viability, which is generally understood to be around 24 weeks of gestation. But the state’s new web page — which DeSantis has since defended as a “public service announcement” — attacks the initiative with a litany of false claims, including that it “threatens women’s safety,” would “eliminate parental consent” for minors seeking abortions, and could “lead to unregulated and unsafe abortions” by allowing people without health care expertise to perform this procedure.

Meanwhile, in Kansas, where voters enshrined the right to abortion just two months later DobbsRepublicans have continually attempted to ban the procedure, including overriding Gov. Laura Kelly’s vetoes of four anti-abortion measures.

If, as Vance suggests, abortion policy were to be determined by a democratic process, it would be legal nationwide, which polls show is the preference of the majority of Americans. But without that, as Vance says, reproductive rights will be left to the states. And the Republican Party in these states shows no interest in letting voters have their say without a fight.