By Marianne Dhenin

This article was originally published by Truthout

Grassroots canvassers are hitting the streets to urge voters to defend abortion rights in their states this November.

It has been four years since the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization eliminated the federal constitutional right to abortion, leaving people in the U.S. to navigate a confusing patchwork of abortion protections, restrictions, and outright bans depending on jurisdiction. Organizers have ramped up efforts to improve access since the ruling, and thanks to that work, measures to protect and ensure reproductive freedoms are expected to be on the ballot in three states come November: Idaho, Nevada, and Virginia.

“When Idaho’s trigger ban went into effect in August of 2022, people needed to talk about it, and we came together informally and then eventually [there was] the idea that, ‘Hey, we need to draft a ballot initiative. We need to raise money for some attorneys. We need to get our act together,’” Melanie Folwell, executive director of Idahoans United for Women and Families, told Truthout. That organization was founded soon after and has led the campaign to get the Idaho Reproductive Freedom and Privacy Act Initiative on the ballot this year. The initiative would decriminalize abortion and provide that “every person has the right to … make personal decisions about reproductive health care,” including abortion, contraception, and more.

Idaho was one of 13 states with trigger bans on the books when Dobbs came down. Those bans were passed after the Supreme Court’s 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade upheld a constitutional right to abortion, meaning they could not be enforced as long as that decision stood. But when Roe was overturned, the bans came into effect.

Other restrictions and bans have followed Dobbs as the Trump administration and right-wing lawmakers move to eliminate reproductive health care. Nationwide, 30 states now have bans, hostile legislation, or lack reproductive rights protections, according to the Center for Reproductive Rights.

Effects of Idaho’s Abortion Ban

When Idaho’s ban first came into effect, it prohibited abortion with exceptions for the life of the pregnant person and some survivors of rape and incest. Then in 2023, the state’s Republican supermajority narrowed the rape and incest exceptions to apply only during the first trimester. Today, the ban is among the strictest in the nation.

Most Idahoans who need access to an abortion are now forced to travel out of state, including some pregnant patients facing medical emergencies. Access to other reproductive health care has also become more difficult as OB-GYNs leave, feeling it no longer safe to practice in a state with a near-total abortion ban that includes criminal and civil liabilities for providers found in violation of the law. Some hospital labor and delivery departments have shuttered altogether — including, Folwell said, the one where she gave birth to her daughter about two decades ago.

As maternity care deserts worsen across Idaho, so-called crisis pregnancy centers are moving into the gaps. Those fake clinics are meant to look like real health centers, but they operate without medical licensing and aim to scare, shame, or pressure visitors out of accessing abortion care.

Other states with abortion bans have experienced similar consequences.

“Access to reproductive health care has been so relentlessly politicized for power and influence and gain for decades now in this state, and unfortunately, women in Idaho, and people looking to grow a family, plan a family, [or] just be a person in Idaho are finding that the impacts of all that political football are very personal,” Folwell told Truthout.

Hundreds of Idahoans stepped up to collect the signatures required to move the abortion-decriminalizing Idaho Reproductive Freedom and Privacy Act Initiative forward.

More than 105,000 Idahoans (or about 10 percent of the state’s voting population) signed — well over the required 6 percent. Officials have until June 30 to certify the number of valid signatures before the initiative can be officially placed on the November ballot.

Struggles for Abortion Rights in Virginia and Nevada

Similar efforts are ongoing in Virginia and Nevada, where constitutional amendments protecting abortion have already been put on the states’ respective ballots. In Nevada, Question 6, or the Right to Abortion Initiative, would ensure access to abortion until the point of “fetal viability,” generally estimated to be around 24 weeks. It is the second time Question 6 will appear on ballots; under state law, a ballot measure must pass twice to become a part of the state constitution. In 2024, it passed with 64 percent of the vote.

“This campaign was a grassroots-led effort powered by state partners, activists, and our over 50,000 battle-born members,” Reproductive Freedom for All Director of State Campaigns Caroline Mello Roberson said in a press release when Question 6 first passed in 2024. “We’re excited to continue working to ensure that reproductive freedom is a reality for all Nevada families and lock our rights into law in 2026.”

Meanwhile, if passed, the Virginia Right to Reproductive Freedom Amendment would establish “the right to make and effectuate one’s own decisions about all matters related to one’s pregnancy.” Passing the amendment would also make Virginia the only state in the South with abortion protections. Currently, most Southern states enforce either a total ban on abortion or bans beginning at six or 12 weeks.

“Anybody in Florida, anybody in Tennessee, they would have to drive to Virginia to get the access they need, and that is not an easy thing to do. But I think it’s also meaningful to be able to perhaps provide that not just for Virginians but also for people in the South,” Sara Sanatkar, canvass and field manager at Repro Rising, told Truthout. Repro Rising is one of several Virginia organizations in Virginians for Reproductive Freedom, the coalition leading the campaign for a state constitutional amendment that would protect abortion rights. That coalition also came together in response to Dobbs.

Canvassers Mobilize a Grassroots Upswell for Abortion Rights

Though the political climates differ between the three states expected to vote on reproductive freedom this November, canvassers hitting the streets to mobilize community members are carrying similar messages. Organizers told Truthout that people relate to personal stories from their neighbors about how access to reproductive health care or restrictions placed on it has shaped their lives. They also tend to agree that decisions around reproductive health care should remain between an individual and their loved ones.

“We can all agree that when it’s time to make a difficult decision about your future, your health, your life, your hopes and your dreams, that decision should be made at your kitchen table with your people and not with the government, not with a politician, with a seat at that table,” Folwell told Truthout. “That is a message that resonates broadly across all kinds of people, across all kinds of places.”

The canvassing taking shape now in Idaho, Virginia, and Nevada is just the current leg in marathon organizing efforts. Passing legislation to better protect abortion rights has been a goal for advocates and organizers since the Supreme Court agreed to take up Dobbs, and the campaigns that grew into this year’s ballot measures coalesced soon after and are rooted in organizing relationships that run even deeper. But those leading the campaigns warn organizers elsewhere not to be discouraged by the time it takes to make change.

“We’ve seen over and over again, and not just in really progressive states, when voters have the opportunity to make their voices heard on reproductive freedom, they do,” Han Jones, campaign manager with Virginians for Reproductive Freedom, told Truthout. “I would encourage folks to take the long road that it sometimes is and keep working because this is something that people want, and it’s something that we can fight for.”

Hannah Servedio, director of organizing at Virginians for Reproductive Freedom, told Truthout that advice goes for anyone concerned about the rollbacks of reproductive rights across the country. Each of the reproductive rights ballot measures slated for this November started with community members coming together and committing to change.

“You don’t need the title of ‘organizer’ to be an organizer,” they said. “You can just decide that you’d like to work with other people who care about this issue and organize your community — you can take that role on for yourself.”

Now, with only months left in the final leg of their campaigns, organizers in Idaho, Nevada, and Virginia are hard at work ensuring their yearslong efforts will pay off come Election Day.

Mary Olivia Rentner, communications director at Virginians for Reproductive Freedom, told Truthout that though the work is tireless, it never stops feeling fulfilling: “To have this moment where there is actionable change happening, where we can actually see the future of our Commonwealth being shaped by people who aren’t going to let our rights be taken away, who are going to protect the care that is life-saving and life-changing, and protect the doctors and nurses who provide it, it brings me a lot of hope about the differences that we can make within our communities, within our state, and within the country.”

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