In Florida, this Tuesday, people were not only voting next president of the United Statesbut also two very important amendments: one to guarantee the right to abortion and another to legalize drug. However, none prosperedin a state where Donald Trump won comfortably.
The proposal to amend the state constitution and thus guarantee the right to abortion in Florida did not reach the 60% threshold necessary to move forward, becoming the first such ballot measure to fail since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the constitutional right to abortion in 2022.
Florida was one of ten states in which the issue of abortion also appeared on the ballot in Tuesday’s election. According to Edison Research, 57% of voters approved the measure – with 87% of votes counted – but by failing to reach 60% support, the ban on abortion after six weeks of pregnancywhich came into force in May, will remain in force. This ban has some exceptions.
Anti-abortionists celebrated the measure’s failure, and Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America President Marjorie Dannenfelser described it as “a momentous victory for life in Florida and across our country.” For her part, Anna Hochkammer, director of the Florida Women’s Freedom Coalition, which supported the measure, stressed that 57% remains the majority. “The fight continues because the women and girls of Florida continue to suffer,” she said.
Before Tuesday, as many as seven states had extended abortion rights directly to voters after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and the abortion rights campaigns won all of those votes.
The Democratic candidate, Kamala Harrisattempted to build support for measures passed Tuesday to amend state constitutions to enshrine the right to abortion. Democrats blame the Republican Party, led by Donald Trump, for the abortion bans that many of these measures seek to overturn.
More than a dozen states have banned abortion in all or most cases after the Supreme Court, with a conservative majority appointed by assetwould overturn the federal right to abortion. Trump himself, a Florida resident, had said that I would vote against of the ballot measure, after initially appearing to suggest he would vote for it.
The 10 states passing anti-abortion measures Tuesday, besides Florida, were Arizona, Nevada, Missouri, Montana, Colorado, South Dakota, Nebraska, New York and Maryland.
