Will Ohio Vote No on Radical Abortion Amendment? – The American Spectator

COLUMBUS, OHIO — In 2023, the Left isn’t just pro-abortion; it’s threatening to take away parents’ rights to make medical decisions for their underage children.

On Wednesday, voters will begin casting the first ballots in the battle for life and parental rights currently being waged in the state — one closely watched (and heavily funded) by many of the most radical forces in the country. Ohio’s election is a test run for the kind of changes Democrats and radical liberals want to make in states across the country.

Issue 1 — not to be confused with the similarly named Issue 1 that Ohioans rejected in August, which would have changed the threshold of votes necessary to pass a constitutional amendment — would add a radical clause to the Buckeye State’s Constitution and establish an individual’s “right” to “reproductive medical treatment.” Think abortion up to birth, hormone treatment, and transgender surgery, all without regard to age and performed without parental consent. (RELATED by Aubrey Gulick: Pro-Abortion Activists Sue Ohio Officials Over Ballot Language: ‘Unborn Child’ vs. ‘Fetus’)

In a prepared statement given to an NBC affiliate in Cleveland, state Sen. Michele Reynolds and state Rep. Melanie Miller said:

It’s an extreme attempt to create abortion-on-demand and to eliminate reasonable health and safety standards for pregnant women. It ends parental notification and excludes parents from their child’s medical decisions….

[It] allows for-profit abortion providers, like Planned Parenthood, to self-regulate and perform abortions up to viability and beyond at the sole discretion of the abortionist.

This is why, when thousands of Ohioans gathered in the state’s Capitol last Friday, Oct. 6, for the second annual state March for Life, the scene was filled with a sense of urgency and a belief that forces around the nation were watching.

Marching for Life and Parental Rights

The looming vote was clearly on everyone’s minds at the march. During the preceding rally, speaker after speaker urged the crowd to “vote no” on Issue 1 and to join the effort to knock on doors or make phone calls to as many Ohioans as possible.

“Events like today, with Ohio’s March for Life that filled the courtyard and filled downtown Columbus, shows that we have an energy here. We have the energy that is tied with wanting the good of others,” state Rep. Adams Mathews told The American Spectator. “When we bring that into the political realm, we’re assured victory.”

Busses full of supporters from around the state poured in throughout the morning. During the march, some groups prayed the rosary aloud while others sang hymns. Attendees, most of whom were Christian, told The American Spectator that they were there not only to speak out against abortion but also to defend the parental rights threatened by Issue 1.

Watch the VIDEO!

More Extreme Than Roe

Just days before thousands of Ohioans descended on Columbus to defend life, Ohioans United for Reproductive Rights — the coalition behind the “Vote Yes on Issue One” campaign — released a 30-second ad featuring a couple who left the state to obtain an abortion for their unborn child, who had been diagnosed with limb body wall complex.

“We had to leave the state in order to get the care that I needed,” Beth says in the video. “Because the law in Ohio is broken, voting yes on Issue 1 is the only way to fix this.”

The video fails to inform its audience that the reason the couple had to leave the state had nothing to do with Ohio’s abortion ban. Beth is an employee of a state-run hospital, and according to state law, state-provided health insurance does not cover abortion unless the mother’s life is in danger. (RELATED: Democrats Are Telling Unmitigated Lies in Ohio)

The larger lie claims that Issue 1 is simply about ensuring abortion access in the case of emergency when, in fact, not only would the constitutional amendment enshrine abortion in the state’s constitution, but it would also take away parents’ rights to make medical decisions for the reproductive health of their underage children, including but not limited to abortion, hormone therapy, and transgender surgeries.

Mathews, who represents District 56, just north of Cincinnati, Ohio, told The American Spectator:

Wherever people are, we’re getting out the message that Issue 1 is too extreme for Ohio and that Ohio knows how to be pro-life in a way that protects families, protects mothers, and protects babies and that everyone could agree on…. [Abortion] is a threat to the dignity of each and every one of us; we all have inherent dignity given to us, and we want to be that pro-life generation that stands with others … the only way we’ve gotten to the place we are is because people feel alone. They feel isolated. The abortion industry exists to make them feel isolated so that they think they can’t do it on their own.

Not only would Issue 1 make it legal for individuals to obtain abortions, but it would also “[c]reate legal protections for any person or entity that assists a person with receiving reproductive medical treatment”; “[g]rant a pregnant woman’s treating physician the authority to determine, on a case-by-case basis, whether an unborn child is viable”; and “[a]lways allow an unborn child to be aborted at any stage of pregnancy, regardless of viability.” (READ MORE: Abortionist Remains Free While Biden Admin Convicts Pro-life Heroes)

According to Attorney General Dave Yost’s office, the amendment is more radical than Roe v. Wade or Planned Parenthood v. Casey; it would effectively make legislation that limited abortion under Roe ineffective and unconstitutional.

Ever since the U.S. Supreme Court returned the abortion issue to the states with Dobbs, pro-life Americans have found themselves in a new stage of the battle for life — one that involves calling strangers who live minutes away from them and knocking on their neighbors’ doors. The debate over abortion is no longer just a national issue for the courts; it’s a local one.