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The residents of the US state of Ohio have voted to ensure the right to abortion in the state constitution. US President Joe Biden welcomes the defeat of abortion opponents in the Republican-controlled state.
With a little more than half of the votes counted, American media, including CNN and ABC News, state that the “yes” side is winning.
Ohio thus becomes the seventh state in the United States where voters voted to protect the right to abortion after the United States Supreme Court last year overturned the right to abortion guaranteed by the Roe v. Wade ruling from 1973.
The issue is important to Democrats, who hope it will energize voters to help President Joe Biden to the White House in next year’s presidential election.
Biden welcomes
The result of the referendum in Ohio, where Donald Trump was the strongest in the 2020 presidential election, is welcomed by President Joe Biden.
“Tonight, Americans voted again to protect their basic freedoms – and democracy won,” President Biden wrote in a statement, emphasizing that voters rejected attempts by Trump-friendly Republicans to introduce “extreme abortion bans that put women’s health and lives at risk.”
Before the Ohio referendum, voters in California, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Montana and Vermont, among others, have voted to protect or deny proposals that undermine abortion rights in the states.
Next year
Voters in Arizona and Missouri, among others, are expected to vote on similar protections for abortion rights next year.
Also at stake in Ohio was a state law passed by Republicans in 2019, which bans most abortions after fetal heart activity is detected – with no exceptions for rape or incest. That law had not become law due to appeals, but is now expected to be scrapped in favor of the constitutional amendment that won support.