Summary
Florida voters narrowly defeated an abortion-rights ballot initiative on Tuesday, preserving the state’s six-week abortion ban.
The measure’s defeat is a significant victory for Gov. Ron DeSantis ®, whose administration actively opposed the amendment through legal challenges, public agency ads, and investigations. The measure required a 60% supermajority to pass—the highest threshold in the U.S.—and would have protected abortion rights up to 24 weeks.
Florida is now the first state to reject an abortion rights amendment since Roe v. Wade was overturned, limiting abortion access across the Southern U.S.
Florida needed 60% yes to pass, higher than any previous measure got.
And they got some absolutely fucked description on the ballot (and past a lawsuit)
The proposed amendment would result in significantly more abortions and fewer live births per year in Florida. The increase in abortions could be even greater if the amendment invalidates laws requiring parental consent before minors undergo abortions and those ensuring only licensed physicians perform abortions. There is also uncertainty about whether the amendment will require the state to subsidize abortions with public funds. Litigation to resolve those and other uncertainties will result in additional costs to the state government and state courts that will negatively impact the state budget. An increase in abortions may negatively affect the growth of state and local revenues over time. Because the fiscal impact of increased abortions on state and local revenues and costs cannot be estimated with precision, the total impact of the proposed amendment is indeterminate. THE FINANCIAL IMPACT OF THIS AMENDMENT CANNOT BE DETERMINED DUE TO AMBIGUITIES AND UNCERTAINTIES SURROUNDING THE AMENDMENT’S IMPACT.
Pretty drunk at this point tonight I don’t even like Harris but if Trump wins tonight I ain’t gonna remember the rest of the night
I’m with ya. I feel like im watching the broncos-seahawks Superbowl where in the first drive Peyton looks like he doesn’t know where he is.
What the fuck is going on in Florida? Was the wording confusing or something? It’s such an outlier compared to even other conservative states with similar ballot measures.
Edit: I just read about the 60% threshold, and thanks to who’s who pointed it out.
wtf man…yeah enjoy your “victory”.
You should have seen the non stop ads for the pro life movement…blatant lies and fear mongering. I don’t understand how that level of misinformation is legal to put in an ad.
It’s because the measure needed 60% to pass, and “only” managed 57.4%…
…tyranny of the minority reins in Florida.
Also, the governor practiced some pretty aggressive voter intimidation. Cops straight up knocking on supporters doors. Dude is scum.
No, nothing confusing, it was just designed to fail by the state. Amendments take a 60% supermajority in Florida. This bill only got 57%.
Fuck the will of the people!
They should take a page from Oklahoma…
Medical marijuana passes at around 55%… “Okay. The people have spoken. Guess we’re doin’ marijuana now.”
No, no, that would be too democratic. Listening to the outcome of an election sounds like some communist bullshit.
The right listens to the will of the people when it favors them. Otherwise it’s all cheating and rigged.
Well, they and many of their foreign friends do a ton to manufacture the will of the people as well. When wages have stagnated for 50 years and housing gets more expensive, it’s easy to convince idiots that “a break from tradition” is the cause of their woes rather than corporate greed. Because criticizing corporate greed is communism, and we’ve wired into our society that it’s “america vs communism” which really just means “america for corporations”
It’s such an outlier compared to even other conservative states with similar ballot measures.
It’s not an outlier. The difference is:
the measure required a 60% supermajority to pass
- Florida got 57.4% in favor.
- Kansas’s amendment passed with 59.16%
- Ohio’s amendment passed with 56.6%. (And a couple months earlier, we rejected an “emergency” amendment in a special election to require a 60% majority for all future amendments)
Yep, that’s what I was missing. Thanks for the clarification.
Florida is a solidly red state in which Trump is winning by a 13 point margin with most of the votes counted. The amendment has 57% to Trump’s 56.2% at the time of this comment.
Some states require a simple majority, but Florida’s ballot measures require 60%.
Gotta love those Pro-Choice/Trump votes.
That’s what people don’t understand. Pro-choice isn’t a single-issue vote whereas pro-life is. That’s why the GOP embraces the pro-lofe movement. They don’t give the slightest damn about “unborn children” - they just want those sweet, sweet, guaranteed voters.
An abortion-rights centered campaign is general election poison because the pro-lofe voters will all vote against it, and the pro-choice voters aren’t single-issue voters.
Look at it this way: if Trump were pro-choice and Harris were pro-life, but the candidates were otherwise unchanged, how many leftists would flip their vote to Trump? Because millions of pro-life voters would flip.
And this is made even worse when abortion is also its own separate item on the ballot, completely negating any sliver of advantage that could possibly be gained by a candidate by making abortion a central issue, since any right-leaning pro-choice voter can have it both ways.
It got 57% of the vote…so 57% people are decidedly pro choice but still voted against Harris for an anti choice candidate.
one way to look at this is that billionaires have been effective at branding democrats as like satan worshipping demons. The two greatest barriers to democracy in america are citizens united and the electoral college.
I tried. Twice. I sent a petition to get it on the ballot, and then I voted for it. Sorry the rest of the people in this state sucks so much.
Don’t worry, Trump will cut the migrant workers out of the construction field, so your home insurance costs are going to rise, those were low before right?
As if I can afford to own my home, lol
Touche. Lol
Fuck my Daughter!
-Family Value Republicans trying to Save The Children!
Excellent job, Florida. Please keep attracting more red hats to your state.
Disney gonna leave.
So, I just found out about the 60%. Did someone thing to have them vote on a law to make abortion illegal for any reason? I figured that would fail and help make it legal.
