Placeholder while loading item actions
California is on the verge of becoming one of the first states in the nation to explicitly enshrine the right to abortion and contraception in its constitution after lawmakers voted Monday in favor of a constitutional amendment, putting the issue to the November vote.
The amendment is part of a series of legislative efforts in liberal states with the aim of consolidating reproductive rights following the Supreme Court decision that overturned last week. Roe against Wade. California, which has been advertised as a sanctuary for people seeking abortions, is trying to pave the way.
The bill tabling the proposed amendment passed easily in the state legislature, where Democrats have a super-majority, and voters will now consider it during the general election. A large majority of Californians have said they oppose the demolition Roe, and the amendment is expected to be approved. It does not require the signature of Governor Gavin Newsom (D), who supports the measure.
If enacted, the amendment will affirm the abortion rights already protected by current legislation. The California constitution, like those of several other states, includes a right to privacy that the courts have interpreted as protection for abortion. But last month the draft opinion of the was leaked Roe The decision prompted lawmakers to clearly specify a safeguard of reproductive rights.
“California stands firm on the right of people to access abortion care,” Toni G. Atkins (D), pro tempore president of the state Senate, said in an interview. “This is what we want to make sure explicitly that it remains the case, regardless of who is in charge, whoever the judge is.… I don’t want people to think we are safe here just because we have a constitution that guarantees the right to intimacy, it does not say abortion ”.
Roe’s disappearance marks a new stage in the state-by-state battle for abortion
The California Council on the Future of Abortion, an alliance of abortion rights advocacy groups, applauded Monday’s vote.
“California must continue to take all possible steps to protect access to abortion,” the alliance said in a statement, which described the effort as “the response our state needs now to address this moment.” of national crisis “.
A similar constitutional amendment will also appear on the ballots of Vermont, the first state to submit this proposal.
Along with the amendment, California leaders have recently announced a series of initiatives focused on offsetting the Supreme Court ruling and the increasingly aggressive effort by conservative states to restrict access to abortion.
California’s proposed budget for next year includes more than $ 200 million for reproductive health care services. And on Friday, Newsom signed legal protections for abortion providers who care for patients traveling from places where the procedure is now prohibited. He also announced a partnership with Washington Gov. Jay Inslee and Oregon Gov. Kate Brown to make the West Coast a safe haven for abortion care, promising to protect patients and providers. out-of-state civil and criminal actions.
“This is not the America we know,” Newsom later said Roe the decision was published. “And it’s not the California way.”
California currently has some of the most protective abortion policies, advocates say, and local leaders have been preparing for months for an influx of patients from other states in a post-Roe world, where anti-abortion legislation will affect about half of the country. Between 8,000 and 16,000 more people will travel to California to receive abortion care each year as a result of the new restrictions, a statistical model from the UCLA Center for Reproductive Health, Law and Policy predicted. Most will likely go to Los Angeles County.
In Los Angeles over the weekend, hundreds of protesters marched through the city center, from City Hall to a freeway exit ramp, with signs saying “Abort the court” and “Autonomy” corporeal is a human right. ” The furious demonstrations, which took place across the state, underscored broad support for abortion rights in California. In a survey last year, the California Institute of Public Policy found that 77 percent of adults did not want Roe annulled, including nearly 60 percent of Republicans surveyed.
Still, several lawmakers, religious groups and advocacy organizations were celebrating the court’s decision and denouncing the proposed constitutional amendment.
The California Family Council, an anti-abortion group based in Fresno, presented an opposition argument to the bill and wrote, “Life is a human right for all lives, no matter how small or in what development phase. Equality begins in the womb and this bill completely ignores this fact. ” After the legislature voted to add the question to the November vote, council chairman Jonathan Keller said in a statement that it was “extreme, even for a state like California.”
Abortion is prohibited in these states. The others will follow.
Republican Assembly leader James Gallagher, a father of four, including twins who were born 10 weeks earlier, argued in a pre-vote speech that the proposed amendment does not restrict late abortions, a statement that the supporters of the law rejected. , saying it does not change the current state law on fetal viability.
“They were alive and they were a person, they are people, and our law must begin to recognize that,” Gallagher said of his twins. “And that’s why today I can’t support this constitutional amendment, so it’s missing: it doesn’t say anything about their rights.”
Atkins, the legislator who introduced the bill, ran a reproductive health center in San Diego before her public service career, and said the amendment should telegraph to the state and country that California is committed to ensuring access to reproductive care.
“As someone who has been in the trenches, who has seen it, it is an affirmation of our values and an affirmation of tranquility” for those seeking abortions, Atkins said, no matter where they live.
“We will be here if others come,” he added. “And others are already coming.”