Once again this week, voters in a conservative state turned out in unexpectedly
large numbers to reject a ballot measure designed to restrict abortion rights,
echoing what’s already happened in Kansas, Kentucky, Montana, Michigan and
so on.

This time, it was Ohio, where in November there will be a constitutional
amendment on the ballot to protect the right to an abortion and overturn the
state’s strict new abortion law. Since that is likely to pass, Republican state
legislators called a special election to try to pass a preemptive measure that
would have raised the bar to 60% to amend the state constitution. But it failed
miserably, with 57% voting against it, in a state where Donald Trump won 53% of
the vote in 2020.

That makes abortion rights supporters 7-for-7 in state ballot
measures around the country, including in California, since the U.S. Supreme
Court overturned Roe v Wade in the Dobbs decision last summer.

To dig into this trend a bit more, we are joined today on the KCBS Ring Central
Newsline by Dr. Anna Sampaio, Professor of Ethnic Studies and Political
Science at Santa Clara University.