Abortion rights could be on the ballot in Arkansas

Arkansas is one of 20 states that have severely restricted or completely outlawed abortion in the nearly two years since the overturning of Roe v. Wade. Some anti-abortion groups consider the state’s law one of the most restrictive in the nation.

But now, an effort is underway to change that and give Arkansas voters a chance to enshrine some abortion protections into the state Constitution. If the effort is successful, Arkansas could join a small number of other conservative states to put the issue before voters.

Activists are using a ballot measure to push for a change that has proven out of reach in the General Assembly.

The citizen-initiated constitutional amendment would legalize abortion through 18 weeks of pregnancy and in cases of rape, incest, fatal fetal anomaly and risk to the life or health of the mother.

Unlike many other Southern states, “Arkansas’ constitution is objectively among the easier to amend of all the state constitutions, because we have this direct democracy route,” said Janine Parry, a University of Arkansas political science professor.

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Gennie Diaz is the leader of Arkansas for Limited Government, the group working to get the item on the November ballot.

She said that before the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, and the dramatic upwelling of public support for abortion rights that came with it, this would have been virtually impossible.

“We could not have done it in our state pre-Dobbs,” she said, referring to the court case that led to Roe’s fall.

But in this unprecedented political moment, her group, Arkansans for Limited Government, which held a rally on Sunday at the state Capitol, is gaining traction for their amendment.

They’re forging ahead to certify their measure and put it directly to the voting public.

A national trend

Arkansas’ amendment is one of 12 potential ballot issues across the country seeking to protect or expand access to reproductive care in November—an additional five aim to restrict abortion.

These questions over whether to cement abortion rights will be the first since last year in Ohio, another red state, where a constitutional amendment protecting access to abortion passed 56.6% to 43.4%.

According to polling data from the Pew Research Center, Arkansas is among the top three most conservative states attempting to bring any kind of abortion-related item to the ballot this cycle, alongside Montana and South Dakota.

The people collecting the 91,000 required signatures for the Arkansas amendment are all volunteers. Diaz said they’ve trained around 350 so far. They’ve mostly been collecting signatures through online outreach by canvassing in public places, including in and outside of businesses that allow them to.

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They haven’t been going door to door so far, partly because, especially in rural areas, the distances make it inefficient. They’re also looking to avoid any possibility of confrontation with people opposed to their legislation.

If and when they get the signatures they need, the next step is submitting them to the state. “Every signature is scrutinized,” Diaz said, and checked against each person’s address and voter registration status.

If enough are rejected that the number of signatures falls below the threshold to be on the ballot, there’s a period when groups can “cure” them—or correct any mistakes that might have led to their disqualification.

Two groups in the state, Arkansas Right to Life and the Family Council, have mounted “decline to sign” campaigns against the abortion amendment. But Diaz said only five state lawmakers have taken a vocal stand against them.

‘Not a political statement’

Diaz and Arkansans for Limited Government have lowered their sights on what they see as an ideal amendment in the interest of giving it a better chance at passing.

“This policy that we’re proposing is not a political statement on abortion,” Diaz said. “We’re not saying, ‘Hey, the government cannot restrict abortion in any circumstance because a woman has an inherent right to choose.’”

“We believe that,” Diaz said, “but that is not policy that, from a pragmatic standpoint, will pass in Arkansas.”

The amendment would legalize abortion in some cases and provide certain exceptions.

Parry, the political science professor, characterized the amendment as relatively moderate. “They’re not shooting the moon here by any stretch,” she said. “They did some polling in advanced as I understand, and they decided to keep it in the really early months of pregnancy.”

Based on polling conducted by the university’s Arkansas Poll, which she directs, Parry believes the amendment will pass if it reaches the ballot.

Over the last few years, support for the abortion ban currently on the books in Arkansas, which has exceptions only for medical emergencies, has polled at between 15% and 20%.

Politically, she said she sees “even higher stakes for those who oppose” the abortion amendment than for those advocating for it.

Many of the amendment’s provisions see broad support — even “supermajorities,” she said — for protections for abortion in cases of fetal malformations and the health of the mother, for instance.

“We have that burden of convincing the majority of Arkansans that they are the majority,” Diaz said. “I think that there’s this fear that they’re alone in having a nuanced view, when they’re not.”

The amendment does not include exceptions for things like financial hardship, which Parry said do not have majority support. “They were sensitive to some of the nuance of public opinion when they wrote it,” she said.

County by county

For each type of issue — initiative, amendment or referendum — to get on the ballot, it has to get the signatures of a certain percentage of the last gubernatorial election’s turnout. Canvassers are required to collect that percentage statewide and across each of a required number of counties.

Act 236, which passed last year, is one of the major new changes to the process. It mandates that the signatures come from 50 of the state’s 75 counties rather than the 15 stipulated in the state constitution.

This will make it so groups looking to advance a ballot item can’t rely as heavily on dense population centers and will have to go farther afield into more sparsely populated, often more conservative, rural areas.

The law’s constitutionality is currently at the center of a court challenge brought by the League of Women Voters of Arkansas, which supports an initiative that would eliminate state sales tax on menstrual products and diapers. Their co-plaintiff is Republican state Sen. Bryan King, R-Green Forest, who said he stands behind another new initiative he hopes to see on the ballot in November, which would protect and strengthen the state’s Freedom of Information Act.

Parry said that Act 236 is intended to raise the bar for entry to put a measure on the ballot but has “increased the determination of people who want to circulate these signatures to get it right.”

It’s possible it will be struck down, and the required number of counties will revert to 15. “We won’t take the risk,” though, Diaz said. Arkansans for Limited Government is collecting as many as possible, just to be safe, and already has signatures from 65 counties.

Diaz is relatively upbeat about having to add 35 counties to her organizational map, though she maintains that Act 236 is unconstitutional.

She says it forces their hand to “build more organizing power in areas where we typically don’t have to concentrate.” It’s extra work, but “it’s doable.”

“I look at it as opportunity, because we need to be talking to Arkansans about this issue,” she said. “It needs to be done even if we weren’t trying to get something on the ballot.”

Her campaign is working with Healthcare Alliance for Reproductive Care, a group of doctors, nurses, hospital administrators and other providers who do outreach among their peers, counseling them on how to participate in supporting the amendment.

“We have a really high burden and a high responsibility to educate Arkansans in general about reproductive health,” she said, noting that Arkansas has no mandatory sex education in school.

Katie Clark, a League of Women Voters of Arkansas board member who leads an initiative campaign but is not directly involved in the lawsuit, said that if it’s done right, even a failed ballot item can be worth it for the exposure and public education.

A strong and conspicuous display of public support could even “effect change in future legislative sessions,” she said.