In August 2022, Kansans voted overwhelmingly to protect reproductive rights. Instead of following the will of the people, Republicans responded by pushing dozens of extreme anti-abortion laws that provide false, dangerous information to patients, restrict access to abortion, interfere with the doctor-patient relationship, and force doctors to provide private patient information to the government. They know voters do not agree with these extreme policies. Now, in an election year, they are trying to hide their records.

“Even after Kansans made their position clear, Republicans in the Legislature voted to restrict access to abortion or violate patient privacy dozens of times,” Ashley All, President of Kansas Coalition for Common Sense. “It is unacceptable that they would now try to hide their record on abortion to deceive voters and hold on to power.”

Johnson County Republicans backtrack after years of attacking abortion rights

Sherman Smith, Kansas Reflector

10.23.24

KEY QUOTE: “Legislators who championed the anti-abortion constitutional amendment that voters rejected in August 2022 responded by aggressively pursuing anti-abortion legislation. But now, faced with the threat of losing their seats, they have coopted the rallying cry of advocates for reproductive health rights, saying on their websites, in voter guides and on the campaign trail that the people spoke in August 2022 and they respect the decision.”

• “Johnson County voters would never know by reading campaign websites that Republicans who are seeking reelection there were among the most zealous opponents of abortion rights.”
• “Kansans agree that the government has no business interfering in the private medical decisions made by patients in consultation with their doctors and their families,” Ashley All, president of Kansas Coalition for Common Sense said. “Yet Republican legislators and candidates continue to believe they know better than us what is best for our families.”
• These politicians “fail to mention their votes just this year for legislation that would establish rights for an unborn child from the moment of conception, funnel millions of taxpayer dollars into anti-abortion programming, create a crime for “coercing” someone into terminating a pregnancy, and require women to answer invasive questions before obtaining an abortion.”
• After “Warren championed the anti-abortion amendment,” she continued to vote for extreme laws – even voting to override Governor Laura Kelly multiple times earlier this year. Now she is misleading voters and pretending that didn’t happen.
• Despite voting for the same extreme legislation earlier this year, Mike Thompson is now talking out both sides of his mouth. He “claims to have voted against a ban on abortion this year, even though there was no such vote in the Senate.”

###