This is great news for women in AZ. That said, it also means that AZ isn’t going to be an easy win for Dems in Nov. People won’t be voting on an immediate need to secure abortion rights in their state.
The abortion access measure needs about 384,000 valid signatures from Arizona voters by 3 July to make the ballot and has reported collecting more than 500,000 so far. But the state applies strict scrutiny to citizens’ initiatives, with intense requirements for each signature and the people collecting them. In recent years, groups have sued, at times successfully, to remove signatures for various reasons in attempts to keep measures from reaching the ballot.
“We know the Republicans in the next three months are going to do everything in their power to try to take that initiative off the ballot,” the former Democratic lawmaker and congressional candidate Raquel Terán said at an abortion rights rally last Friday. “So we should not count on just half a million – we need to turn in a million signatures or more. Do not stop. We cannot stop, nor take any signature for granted.”
The issue is alive and well, this is just a tiny positive that reiterates the point that a sweeping change is needed to prevent further fuckery.
This is great news for women in AZ. That said, it also means that AZ isn’t going to be an easy win for Dems in Nov. People won’t be voting on an immediate need to secure abortion rights in their state.
There will be an abortion amendment initiative on the Arizona ballot.
The issue is alive and well, this is just a tiny positive that reiterates the point that a sweeping change is needed to prevent further fuckery.
There’s a ballot initiative to add abortion access to the Constitution so I don’t think it’s going to make much of a difference for turnout.