Missouri Supreme Court to decide whether an abortion-rights amendment goes before voters

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Missouri's Supreme Court will hear arguments Tuesday over whether an abortion-rights amendment should go before voters this year.

At issue is a proposal to enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution, along with the right for individuals to make other reproductive health care decisions. If enacted, the measure is widely expected to undo the state's 2022 near-total abortion ban.

The proposal had been slated for the November ballot. But Republican Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft decertified the measure Monday, removing it from the ballot himself, following a county circuit judge’s ruling Friday that sided with abortion opponents and several Republican lawmakers who sought to have the amendment taken off the ballot.

Monday’s move by Ashcroft, who opposes abortion, is largely symbolic. The Supreme Court is expected to have the final say on the measure and faces a 5 p.m. Tuesday deadline to make changes to the November ballot. That gives the court mere hours to issue a ruling after the morning hearing.

The amendment is part of a national push to have voters weigh in on abortion since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022. Missouri banned almost all abortions immediately after.

At least nine other states will consider constitutional amendments enshrining abortion rights, including Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Maryland, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada and South Dakota. Most would guarantee a right to abortion until fetal viability and allow it later for the health of the pregnant woman, which is what the Missouri proposal would do.

New York also has a ballot measure that proponents say would protect abortion rights, though there’s a dispute about its impact.

Voting on the polarizing issue could draw more people to the polls, potentially impacting results for the presidency in swing states, control of Congress and the outcomes for closely contested state offices. Missouri Democrats, for instance, hope to get a boost from abortion-rights supporters during the November election.

Legal fights have sprung up across the country over whether to allow voters to decide these questions — and over the exact wording used on the ballots and explanatory material. In August, Arkansas’ highest court upheld a decision to keep an abortion-rights ballot initiative off the state’s November ballot, agreeing with election officials that the group behind the measure did not properly submit documentation regarding the signature gatherers it hired.

The legal challenge to Missouri's proposed amendment hinges on a state law requiring campaigns to inform voters during the petition signature-gathering process about any laws that proposed amendments would overturn.

Lawyers for the plaintiffs wrote in a court brief that Missouri's abortion-rights campaign “defrauded potential signers by failing to disclose any of the many, many provisions” of Missouri law it proposes to repeal, including the state's current ban.

Lawyers for Missourians for Constitutional Freedom, the abortion-rights campaign, wrote that the case is about “whether the people’s right to engage in direct democracy will be protected.”

“The circuit court’s decision threatens to grind our system of constitutional initiative petition to a halt at the last minute,” the attorneys wrote. “Hundreds of thousands have exercised their power as citizens, and want their fellow Missourians to vote on whether to change the Constitution with regard to abortion rights.”

Voters in all seven states that have had abortion questions on their ballots since Roe was overturned have sided with abortion-rights supporters.