The Republican backed-Issue 1 failed in Ohio on Tuesday, the latest defeat in elections in which abortion was the key issue for voters.
The ballot initiative sought to require a 60% affirmative vote to modify the state constitution by ballot initiative, rather than the current simple majority, ahead of a vote on an initiative to codify abortion rights in the state constitution in November. Since the overruling of Roe v. Wade in the 2022 Supreme Court decision Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, abortion has been a losing point for the GOP.
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Here is a look at four times Republicans failed in elections with abortion as the backdrop.
2022 Kansas referendum
The first test for abortion came less than two months after Dobbs, when officials in Kansas hoped to make clear that abortion was not a state constitutional right. The result in the safely Republican state was a shock to many anti-abortion advocates, as the referendum went down in a crushing 59%-40% defeat.
The initiative was billed as the “Value Them Both” amendment and would have paved the way for the state legislature to restrict abortion further than the in-place 22-week restrictions. While some dismissed the result as being a symptom of the ballot question being poorly written, later results would prove abortion was a problem for GOP-backed issues.
2022 Kentucky Amendment 2
Months after the Kansas election, anti-abortion advocates saw another defeat with Kentucky Amendment 2 in November 2022.
The Kentucky amendment would have amended the constitution to make clear there was no right to an abortion protected under the commonwealth's constitution.
"To protect human life, nothing in this Constitution shall be construed to secure or protect a right to abortion or require the funding of abortion," the amendment would have said.
The state Republican Party backed the initiative, while the state Democratic Party opposed the ballot measure. The measure narrowly failed in a Nov. 8, 2022, vote, 52%-47%.
2023 Wisconsin Supreme Court election
While not directly on the ballot, abortion played a key role in the defeat of the conservative candidate in the April 2023 Wisconsin Supreme Court election.
The state's high court flipped from a conservative majority to a liberal majority when Janet Protasiewicz defeated Daniel Kelly in the April 4 election. Protasiewicz made abortion a key issue in the race, as the Supreme Court of the state would likely have to rule on the legality of abortion law. Her bet on abortion rights paid off when she won 55%-44% in the election, a crushing defeat for the GOP and anti-abortion advocates.
2023 Ohio Issue 1
The latest defeat for anti-abortion advocates came with the failure of Issue 1 in Ohio, in which officials were seeking to make changes to the constitution more difficult than a simple majority.
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In several states, a 60% threshold is required to modify the constitution, and for the federal Constitution, two-thirds of multiple bodies of decision-makers are required to make an amendment. In Ohio, a simple majority is required to change the constitution, and voters rejected an attempt to raise that threshold to 60%.
The ballot question on amending the constitution came ahead of a November ballot question that seeks to enshrine a right to abortion in the Ohio Constitution. Because of the Tuesday vote, only a simple majority will be required to pass the ballot question this fall.