Missourians reject Amendment 3, preserve abortion rights

Missouri residents voted overwhelmingly to maintain protections for reproductive healthcare on Tuesday.
All protections put in place by 2024’s Amendment 3 remain in place, “including but not limited to prenatal care, childbirth, postpartum care, birth control, abortion care, miscarriage care and respectful birthing conditions.”
“In 2024, Missourians made history by becoming the first state in the nation to defeat an abortion ban at the ballot box, and tonight we made history again with more than a million Missourians voting to defend that victory from politicians who tried to take our power away,” said Luz María Henríquez, executive director of the ACLU of Missouri.
Amendment 3 was a legislative effort intended to ban access to abortion care for the first 12 weeks of gestation except in the case of rape or incest.
The amendment promised care for ectopic pregnancies, miscarriages, the life of the mother and fetal anomalies throughout the pregnancy. The fetal anomaly provision only referred to cases where the fetus would not survive outside of the womb.
Amendment 3 was defeated by 55.3% of Missourians, a higher percentage than the 51.6% who backed enshrining reproductive rights in the Missouri Constitution in 2024. All the numbers are unofficial results.
This decision comes following a contentious history of access to abortion in the state.

After the 2022 U.S. Supreme Court decision to return the right to abortion to the states, Missouri enacted a trigger ban on abortion previously passed by the legislature.
The trigger ban placed a near-total ban on abortion in the state, with criminal and civil consequences for providing or receiving an abortion.
A citizen-led initiative in 2024 restored the right to reproductive healthcare in the state. It was decided by a 51.6% to 48.4% vote.
Republican legislators Rep. Ed Lewis, R-Moberly, and Sen. Adam Schnelting, R-St. Charles, led initiatives in both chambers to get abortion back on the ballot this fall.
They included an additional provision intended to enshrine an existing state ban on gender-affirming care for minors in the Missouri Constitution, including access to puberty blockers, hormone drugs and sex change surgeries. That provision was seen as an effort to attract more votes for the potential abortion ban.

In 2023, the Missouri General Assembly passed a law banning transgender care for minors; however, it is set to expire in August 2027 unless the legislature removes the sunset date. Legislators are expected to be voting on these provisions in 2027.
Most of the advertising in favor of Amendment 3 focused on the gender-affirming care issue.
“We’ve said it before, voters said it again tonight, and we’ll continue fighting until we are heard fully: Missourians do not want politicians interfering with our health care decisions,” said Margot Riphagen-Dunn, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Great Rivers Action. “Not with our abortions. Not with our gender-affirming care. Never with our bodies, our families or our futures.”