A proposed amendment to enshrine access to abortion in the Nevada constitution is one step closer to appearing on the November 2024 ballot, after a coalition of reproductive rights advocates on Monday presented to state officials the required number of signatures.
State authorities will now review the signatures and You have until July 8th to fully certify the change proposed for voting.
Nevadans for Reproductive Freedom, the group leading the effort, announced that it had collected more than 200,000 signatures from registered voters – far more than the 103,000 needed to move forward with the process of qualifying its proposal on the ballot.
The group said it also met the requirement that the total exceed a certain number of signatures in each of the state’s four congressional districts.
The group faced a June 26 deadline to submit signatures.
“Nevadans for Reproductive Freedom will deliver more than 200,000 signatures, nearly double the amount needed to qualify for the November ballot,” the group said in a statement. “This represents a major milestone in the campaign to enshrine the right to abortion in the state constitution.”
In Nevada, abortion is legal until the 24th week of pregnancy. But fearing that such rights could be undone in the future, reproductive rights advocates sought to put on the ballot a constitutional amendment that would enshrine similar language — protecting the right to abortion up to fetal viability — to make it nearly impossible for lawmakers to ever eliminate the protections.
But even if the measure passes in November, voters will need to approve it again in 2026, before Nevada’s constitution is formally amended under state law.
The ballot measure could help boost Democratic turnout in the swing state, which hosts competitive races for president and U.S. Senate.
Nevada is one of 11 states where organizers seek to enshrine the right to abortion in state constitutions through citizen-led ballot initiatives. The measures are officially on the ballot in Colorado, Maryland, Florida and South Dakota.
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