How did Missouri abortion rights win? Nonpartisan 'freedom' campaign powered victory

The victory of Missouri Amendment 3, which overturns the state’s abortion ban, began across the border in Kansas.

Weeks after the U.S. Supreme Court ended the federal right to abortion, Kansas voters in August 2022 rejected a state constitutional amendment that would have allowed lawmakers to ban abortion. Abortion rights supporters emphasized freedom from government interference and women’s personal autonomy.

It worked — and created a playbook for convincing voters in conservative states to affirm abortion rights on the ballot.

Two years later, Missouri voters took their turn. Amendment 3, a sweeping measure that protects abortion access and enshrines a right to reproductive freedom in the state constitution, passed on Tuesday after receiving 53.7% of the vote, according to unofficial results.

Messaging that leaned into themes related to freedom and autonomy that had proven effective in Kansas and elsewhere, a priority on a nonpartisan campaign and a massive financial advantage all helped drive Amendment 3 supporters to victory, producing a pivotal moment in Missouri history. The vote once again legalizes abortion after state officials swiftly imposed a ban moments after the end of Roe v. Wade.

Missourians for Constitutional Freedom, the main campaign supporting the amendment, framed abortion as a personal choice best left in the hands of doctors, patients and families. They excoriated Missouri’s current ban for its lack of exceptions for rape and incest and said politicians had meddled in reproductive affairs for far too long.

“First of all, I think the government overreach resonates because it’s so real. It’s not hypothetical that having politicians make what are extremely personal decisions for you or remove the ability to make those decisions is happening right now in health care settings in Missouri and it wasn’t happening in Kansas yet, but it was real that it might happen,” Emily Wales, director of Planned Parenthood Great Plains Votes, said in the final days before the vote.

Missourians for Constitutional Freedom went as far as borrowing its name from the group that successfully fought the Kansas amendment, Kansans for Constitutional Freedom. Missourians for Constitutional Freedom also had the same campaign manager, Rachel Sweet, as Kansans for Constitutional Freedom.

The Missouri campaign featured a range of ads that made different appeals to voters. They included one featuring an ad and another featuring a Christian woman who both planned to vote yes — an effort to counteract religious opposition. In others, doctors described how the ban had affected their work.

The ads also included individuals and families sharing stories of decisions to get abortions, often in heartbreaking circumstances. In one ad, a woman identified as a mom from Kansas City spoke about leaving Missouri to obtain an abortion after learning of a fetal anomaly.

While the Missouri vote involved restoring abortion rights and the Kansas vote centered on protecting abortion rights, the parallels between the two campaigns were clear.

“Kansans across the political spectrum believe in personal liberty and freedom,” Sweet said immediately after the 2022 Kansas vote. Earlier this month, she sounded a similar note, describing Amendment 3 as about “protecting the health, safety, and freedom of Missouri women and their families.”

On Monday, Sweet said in a statement that the campaign had emphasized “that this amendment is about the freedom to make deeply personal health care decisions without political interference.”

‘Freedom’ message

Amendment 3 recognizes a “fundamental right to reproductive freedom,” which the measure defines as the right to make decisions “about all matters relating to reproductive health care, including but not limited to prenatal care, childbirth, postpartum care, birth control, abortion care, miscarriage care, and respectful birthing conditions.”

The measure prohibits the General Assembly from banning abortion until fetal viability, defined in the measure as the point in pregnancy when there’s a significant chance the fetus can survive outside the womb without extraordinary medical measures.

The amendment allows but does not require, lawmakers to restrict abortion after viability; Republicans in the General Assembly will almost certainly pass a ban on abortions late in pregnancy when its annual legislative session begins in January.

Any post-viability ban would be required to allow at least three exceptions — for the life, physical and mental health of the woman.

The pro-Amendment 3 campaign went to pains to distance itself from partisan politics, a task made difficult by the fact that the state Democratic and Republican parties took opposing positions on the amendment.

Democrats, hoping to ride the coattails of voter enthusiasm generated by Amendment 3, spoke strongly in favor of abortion rights. Many of their candidates, including their nominee for governor, House Minority Leader Crystal Quade, regularly said they supported the measure.

Major Republicans voiced opposition, with the GOP nominee for governor, Lt. Gov. Mike Kehoe, calling the measure extreme. Still, some Republicans attempted a delicate balance between opposing the proposal and avoiding alienating conservative and moderate voters who might support it.

Amendment 3 supporters steered clear of all of that.

Wales said that in other states where abortion rights have won the ballot, it’s been primarily because it wasn’t a partisan issue.

“People, at the end of the day, do not want the government involved in their medical decisions,” Wales said. “And you can identify as a Republican, an independent, a Democrat — you just don’t want the government telling you what to do and you trust doctors to be the guide.”

An urban-rural divide exists in Missouri and doesn’t necessarily correlate with whether individuals support or oppose abortion rights, said James Harris, a Jefferson City-based Republican consultant. While the state’s metro areas lean Democratic, its rural areas are heavily Republican — with potentially more libertarian attitudes toward government power.

“It might be that there was, within the ‘yes’ vote, a segment that wondered or did not believe that maybe it was the role of government to say whether an individual may or may not have an abortion,” Harris said.

“I think many people, lawmakers, will believe that Missourians were maybe hoodwinked,” he said. “They didn’t understand what all was in the amendment.”

Cash advantage

Missourians for Constitutional Freedom also enjoyed a significant financial advantage. The group raised more than $30 million, including contributions from former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

Opposition groups fell behind. One of the groups, Vote No on 3, had raised roughly $456,000 by the end of September.

Since then, the group has received several high-dollar donations, including $157,000 from D. John Sauer, a former solicitor general of Missouri who serves on former President Donald Trump’s legal team. The Concord Fund, a group tied to the conservative activist Leonard Leo, gave $1 million in the final days of the race.

Missouri Stands with Women, another group opposing the effort, had raised nearly $212,000 through the end of September.

“I think the pro-life community and organizations seemed a little splintered,” Harris said. “I think there’s probably 100,000 signs around the states and say, vote no on 3, but I think there’s probably six or seven different iterations of those and not a clear, coherent message on what all was in Amendment 3.”

Opponents made a variety of arguments against the measure, from appeals about the morality of abortion to warnings that Amendment 3 specifically was too extreme to allegations that it would allow gender transition surgeries for minors without parental consent, an outcome legal and medical experts say is unlikely.

None of those messages proved effective enough. Public polls in August and September showed Amendment 3 winning an outright majority.

A mid-September survey of likely voters by Emerson College Polling and The Hill found 58% of respondents support Amendment 3, compared to 30% who oppose it. At that time, 12% were undecided. The results were also roughly reflected in an August survey by Saint Louis University and YouGov.

“I think there is majority support, certainly, for maintaining abortion rights the way they had been before the Dobbs decision,” said Peverill Squire, a political science professor at the University of Missouri.

“And I think, again, it put the Yes on 3 campaign on the side of personal freedom and liberty, which usually has been commandeered by more conservative forces. But this time, it worked in favor of a more progressive issue.”

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