California voters guarantee abortion rights in state constitution

OAKLAND, Calif. — California voters agreed Tuesday to enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution, a widely anticipated result that represents a repudiation of efforts to restrict the procedure following the Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v. Wade.

Proposition 1 easily passed in a state where lawmakers passed measures to improve access to abortion after the June decision.

"Tonight we celebrate reproductive freedom, and that loud clear message that abortion is and forever will be protected in California," Senate President Pro Tem Toni Atkins (D-San Diego) said at an event in Sacramento celebrating the passage. "History has shown us that human rights must be enshrined in our constitution so that no extremist wielding power can infringe upon them."

California was one of three states — along with Vermont and Michigan — where voters approved measures to establish a right to abortion and reproductive freedom in their onstitutions.

The ballot measure caps a yearlong effort to pass more than a dozen legislative and budget reforms that protect providers and patients, and offer help to those coming from other states for abortion services.

Gov. Gavin Newsom, who easily won his own race for reelection, said he was proud of the results.

“We have governors that won their reelections tonight in other states that are banning books, that are banning speech, that are banning abortion,” Newsom said. “And here we are in California moving in a completely different direction,” Newsom said. “That’s a deep point of pride.”

State lawmakers introduced the measure on the heels of POLITICO’s report of the Supreme Court draft opinion overturning Roe v. Wade, a decision the court formally issued in June. It declares that the state “shall not deny or interfere with an individual’s reproductive freedom in their most intimate decisions, which includes their fundamental right to choose to have an abortion and their fundamental right to choose or refuse contraceptives.”

Abortion is also on the ballot in Kentucky and Montana, but those states are seeking opposite remedies, with Kentucky asking voters to exclude the right to abortion in its constitution, while Montana’s “born alive” measure would declare an embryo or fetus a legal person and require doctors to provide resuscitation for infants born at any stage of development.

Kansas provided an early signal of voter frustration with the Supreme Court’s ruling when 59 percent of voters in August rejected an amendment that would have allowed the state’s lawmakers to ban the procedure.

Polls in California have indicated the majority of voters — upwards of 71 percent — were likely to approve Proposition 1. But supporters felt nothing less than a decisive victory would send the right message.

"We know other states are looking at California. And it's why we worked so hard to send that message and not just not just narrowly passed this, but overwhelmingly passed this initiative," said Jodi Hicks, Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California president and CEO.

Gavin Newsomspent more than $2 million on ads urging voters to vote for Prop 1. The campaign’s largest funder, however, was the Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria with a $5 million donation.

The governor, who didn’t break a sweat over his own reelection bid, has cut television ads and paid for billboards to advertise California as a state that supports abortion and all forms of reproductive health. Planned Parenthood has also sponsored media campaigns to support the measure and held rallies throughout the state.

The opposition campaign from anti-abortion groups, including the California Catholic Conference and the California Republican Party, has argued the measure isn’t necessary to protect abortion rights and that it would remove all abortion restrictions. Currently, abortion is limited after viability, or around 23 weeks, unless the life or health of the mother is in danger.

“Unlike current state law, Prop 1 contains no limits on abortion, allowing taxpayer-funded, late-term abortions at any time, for any reason, up to the moment of birth — even if the baby is healthy and the life of the mother is not threatened,” the official No on Prop 1 website states.

Prop 1 proponents, including state Attorney General Rob Bonta and other legal experts, dispute that argument, arguing that Prop 1 adds abortion and contraception protections to the constitution, but makes no other changes.

Cary Franklin, a constitutional law professor at the University of California, Los Angeles School of Law, called opponents’ claims that the amendment would take away the state’s ability to regulate abortion “incorrect and simply absurd.”

“The California Constitution guarantees liberty, but that doesn't mean absolute liberty. You still have to drive the speed limit, you still have to pay your taxes,” she said, adding that the U.S. Constitution's Second Amendment protections for the right to bear arms doesn’t mean a four-year-old can buy a gun. “Constitutional rights,” she said, “are not absolute rights.”

Lara Korte and Sakura Cannestra contributed to this report.