Constitutional amendments postponed until 2025, Democrats say that is intentional

Virginia Senate Democrats voted Tuesday to postpone votes on amendments to the state constitution regarding abortion, the restoration of voting rights and same-sex marriage - platforms that propelled them into the majority during the 2023 election.

Lawmakers on the Senate Privileges and Elections Committee voted unanimously without debate to forgo amendment efforts until the 2025 session.

Amendments to enshrine access to abortion in the state's constitution, automatically restore voting rights to formerly incarcerated people, and repeal an obsolete ban on same-sex marriage were filed by Democratic lawmakers before the 2024 session began. A fourth amendment, to impose term limits on the executive branch, was filed by a Republican lawmaker.

"As the new chair of the committee responsible for these transformational constitutional amendments, I am laser focused on getting them before the voters and across the finish line as quickly as possible," Sen. Aaron Rouse, D - Virginia Beach, said. He noted that the committee's decision won't affect when the amendments are brought to voters.

Regardless, responses to the decision were mixed.

“We are very disappointed,” Lauren Coletta, senior advisor for Common Cause Virginia, a non-partisan voter advocacy group, said.

Joan Porte, president of the board of directors for League of Women Voters Virginia, said she was not surprised.

“I believe, and this is based on a gut instinct −I didn't speak to anyone about it − that they just want to have [the amendments] out there to build momentum” in 2025, she said.

The slow march of bureaucracy

Passing amendments to Virginia’s constitution can take years.

And Tuesday's Senate committee vote does not waste any time on passing the legislation, House Speaker Don Scott, D - Portsmouth, said in an interview with USA TODAY.

A constitutional amendment, often introduced to the Assembly during odd years, must first be passed by both chambers. Then, an intervening House of Delegates election must take place. Then, the amendment must be passed again by the General Assembly which could, by that time, have a new majority. If an amendment successfully runs the gauntlet, it’s then put to a referendum and voters get the final say.

The 2026 midterm election is the earliest the amendments would be able to go to voters as referenda, if they survive the General Assembly twice, regardless of whether the process starts in 2024 or 2025.

“We wanted our voters to know how important these issues are to us,” Scott said, on why the legislation was filed so early. “November 2025, they will be fresh on the voters’ minds and they’ll know if they elect a Democratic majority, these amendments are on the ballot.”

Scott said the amendments will be voted on in the Assembly during the first or second week of the 2025 session, and he hopes there will be another committee meeting by the end of 2024 to review the bills again.

“We’ve got a long way to go on this journey, the most important thing is that we deliver on what we said we would,” he said. “We are on schedule to get it done.”

Abortion - a key issue for voters

Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin pushed a 15-week ban on abortion ahead of the November 2023 election. Though Youngkin wasn’t on the ballot himself, he asked voters to send a Republican majority to the General Assembly to help pass that legislation. Instead, Democrats won a slim majority in both Assembly chambers in what was seen as a rebuke to his effort to limit access to abortion and a referendum on his administration.

“Virginia has always had abortion access but we have never had a codified right to abortion,” Breanna Diaz, a lawyer affiliated with the ACLU of Virginia who focuses on reproductive rights, said. Instead, access to abortion is laid out in state law and can be revised.

An amendment to enshrine access to abortion in Virginia’s constitution was prioritized by Democratic lawmakers and organizations after the 2022 U.S. Supreme Court Dobbs decision, which overturned Roe v. Wade. Since the Dobbs ruling, states across the country have offered patch-work access to abortion. Twenty-one states have banned or restricted access to abortion, Diaz said.

“After Dobbs, we knew it was critical to prioritize a [constitutional amendment] so it wasn’t left to the political whims of our legislators,” Diaz said.

While she was a state senator, U.S. Rep. Jennifer McClellan, D-Virginia, introduced a constitutional amendment in January 2023 to ensure access to abortion in Virginia. The measure passed the Democratic-controlled Senate but died in committee in the Republican controlled House in February.

Diaz is hopeful that the new amendment will make it through the General Assembly with a Democratic majority in place.

“We believe the voters are owed that opportunity to decide whether Virginia remains an abortion access state, not politicians,” she said.

This article originally appeared on The Progress-Index: Amendments to codify abortion access, restore voting rights delayed