What we can learn about abortion politics from Kansas' shocking rejection of new restrictions

(Image credit: Illustrated | Gettyimages)

published 5 August 2022

Kansas voters on Tuesday resoundingly rejected a proposed amendment that would have removed the right to abortion from the state constitution.

The amendment's success would have allowed the Republican-dominated state Legislature to ban or severely limit abortion rights following the U.S. Supreme Court's overturning of Roe v. Wade in June. Its rejection, by a margin of 59 percent to 41 percent, shocked not just the amendment's supporters — who had expected to win in the reliably conservative state, in a primary with little else to draw Democrats to the polls — but also those working to defeat it.

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"The Roe earthquake is real," David Siders, Adam Wren, and Zach Montellaro write at Politico. "It would have been a victory for Democrats and abortion rights activists if they'd even kept it close in Kansas," but instead they got a wipe-out. "And if the politics of Roe proved fraught for Republicans in Kansas," they add, "it's going to be even more treacherous for the GOP in swing-ier, more moderate swaths of the country."

This wasn't a narrow victory in terms of political geography, either. The turnout far exceeded expectations, and the measure went down to defeat not just in the more liberal urban areas but also in the suburbs and many rural counties — including 14 that backed former President Donald Trump in 2020. Voter registration soared after the Supreme Court struck down Roe, and 70 percent of those newly registered Kansas voters were women, according to Democratic voter-data analyst Tom Bonier.

Democrats took the amendment's sound defeat as a positive sign that, in a year they face strong headwinds approaching the November election, the assault on abortion rights could motivate Democratic-leaning voters to flock to the polls. "The enthusiasm gap — which normally favors the party out of power — is now closing, and there was no greater example of that than in Kansas yesterday," Patrick Gaspard, CEO of the Center for American Progress Action Fund, said Wednesday. "This could be a signal for what's to come."

The decisive rejection of the anti-abortion amendment in deep-red Kansas certainly shook up the midterm landscape, "galvanizing Democrats and underscoring for Republicans the risks of overreaching on one of the most emotionally charged matters in American politics," The New York Times reports. But "both Republicans and Democrats caution against conflating the results of an up-or-down ballot question with how Americans will vote in November."

The Kansas vote affirms the "near-universal consensus" by strategists from both parties "that Roe will likely help Democrats at the margins in November, energizing base Democrats and improving the party's standing with independents and suburban women," Politico's Siders, Wren, and Montellaro report, but in this "bleak midterm election landscape for Democrats," it "almost certainly won't be enough to keep Republicans from winning the House."

"Yes, Kansas shocked the nation Tuesday night," and the "unexpectedly resounding no vote" was a "huge setback for a briefly triumphant conservative movement" still basking in the glow of Roe's demise, Joel Mathis writes in The Wichita Eagle. And sure, "Democrats nationwide are suddenly heartened after a gloomy year, ready to take the battle to their Republican counterparts in this fall's midterm elections," but "a word of caution: Tuesday's win for abortion rights probably won't matter for too long."

"If we've learned anything in 2022 about the pro-life movement in America — and in Kansas — it's that it never, ever gives up," Mathis writes. Abortion opponents "believe that abortion is literally murder," and "there is no reason to believe that pro-life activists in Kansas will simply accept the will of the voters — no matter how clearly expressed — and move on" after "one measly election."

"Kansas voters — underestimated by shocked liberals across the country — stood against the erosion of personal freedom," Sarah Smarsh writes in the Times. That wasn't a surprise to "many red-state moderates and progressives, who live with excruciating awareness of the gulf between their decent communities and the far-right extremists gerrymandering, voter-suppressing, and dark-moneying their way into state and local office."

The results in Kansas "reveal that conservative politicians bent on controlling women and pregnant people with draconian abortion bans are out of step with their electorates, a majority of whom are capable of nuance often concealed by our two-party system," Smarsh argues. The only way we'll get sane abortion politics is by joining arms and working together, and "as we brace together for this post-Roe season, take heart: In the first battle, Kansas held the line."

"Now, though, a bipartisan group of senators — led by Tim Kaine (D-Va.) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) — has introduced a more modest measure that would codify federal abortion protections formerly provided by Roe," the Post adds. It doesn't give either side everything it wants, but "we urge Democrats to get behind this bipartisan effort. And Republicans should ask themselves if they want to face voters in three months having opposed abortions rights that — as was demonstrated in Kansas — are strongly supported by most Americans."

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.