“Today, Nevadans for Reproductive Freedom filed for a petition initiative to put the right to reproductive freedom on the ballot for Nevadans in 2024. The effort seeks to give Nevada voters an opportunity to codify their fundamental right to reproductive freedom in the state constitution after the loss of federal abortion protections in the summer of 2022. Advocates of the effort must collect 103,000 signatures by June 2024 in order to qualify for the ballot in November 2024. If passed next year by voters, the measure would automatically appear again on the 2026 general election ballot for final passage,” says a Thursday press release from Nevadans for Reproductive Freedom.
Expect a possible effort by Trump and Trump-aligned groups to try to oppose it. Not because of the politics of the measure – if anything they’re probably going to stay as far away from abortion as possible – but because having it on the same ballot is a serious threat to Donald’s path back to the White House. Nevada will be extremely tight in 2024 and anything that turns out pro-choice voters is a minus for MAGA. It might be marginally less of a motivator given Nevada isn’t anything like Texas or Arkansas in that there’s no current restrictions on abortion in the Silver State, per NARAL’s map.
The same can’t be said about neighboring Arizona, where a 15-week ban is now in effect and last month a coalition won approval to begin collecting the 383,923 signatures needed by July 3, 2024 to get a proposed constitutional amendment on the November ballot. Trump reportedly freaked out ahead of the 2020 election over a legal weed measure in Arizona, fearing the effect on turnout. The measure passed by a far wider margin (655,018 votes) than Trump’s loss to Biden (10,457).
Last year’s abortion ballot measure in Michigan, which Republicans tried and failed to stop, was credited for helping Dems Gretchen Whitmer, Jocelyn Benson, and Dana Nessel run up the score over their MAGA opponents in the gubernatorial, Secretary of State, and Attorney General elections.