New York voters passed a ballot measure on Tuesday that will enshrine the Left’s radical social agenda into the state constitution, ensuring biological males are allowed to compete against women in competitive sports and making it much more difficult for the state to enforce federal law against illegal immigrants, among other progressive initiatives.
Proposition One, a ballot measure designed to significantly expand New York’s constitutional anti-discrimination protections, passed easily with roughly 70 percent of the vote when the Associated Press called it. While the amendment grants progressives a wide-ranging wishlist of social reforms, supporters of the measure largely focused on the protection it affords for abortion rights.
“Abortion is health care, health care is a human right — and that right is finally enshrined in the New York State constitution,” New York governor Kathy Hochul (D) said on X.
Progressive activist groups such as the New York civil liberties union, the state’s ACLU chapter, hailed the victory as a win for inclusion and women’s rights.
“NY’s constitution will now protect our reproductive freedoms, including abortion, and protect every New Yorker from government discrimination, regardless of gender, age, ethnicity, pregnancy status, disability status, or whether someone is LGBT,” said New Yorkers for Equal Rights, the coalition of left-wing organizations backing the amendment.
The ballot initiative will add “ethnicity, national origin, age, disability” and “sex, including sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, pregnancy, pregnancy outcomes, and reproductive healthcare and autonomy” to the New York constitution’s equal-protection clause.
The vague anti-discrimination language will likely be interpreted to protect the right of male students to participate in women and girl’s sports, as National Review previously reported. The amendment will also empower progressive groups to pursue litigation to erode parental rights, permitting confused children to receive puberty blockers without parental consent and enabling males to play sports against women and girls.
Republicans attempted to fight Proposition One by focusing on transgender athletes and illegal immigration, but the campaign appears to have failed in comparison to the Democratic offensive on abortion.
The proposal will defang efforts to enforce immigration law and could even be used to help illegal immigrants gain access to welfare benefits formerly reserved for citizens, critics warn.
The wave of illegal immigration under President Joe Biden became a major issue when migrants flooded New York City, straining the city’s resources and spilling over into neighboring areas.
Transgender-identifying males playing women’s sports has become a national issue because of the proliferation of men joining women’s leagues and dominating the competition, to the point where women’s safety is being jeopardized and records are being smashed.
A reliably blue state, New York is poised to vote for Vice President Kamala Harris easily over former president Donald Trump. But, New York has a handful of ultra-competitive House districts where Democrats are seeking to capitalize on abortion and anti-Trump sentiment. The New York House races will be pivotal for determining whether Republicans hold onto their narrow majority or Democrats flip the chamber.