Abortion-rights coalition launches campaign against Missouri’s Amendment 3

The campaign opposing a November ballot measure that would reinstate Missouri’s abortion ban formally launched Wednesday, arguing Republican lawmakers are trying to overturn the 2024 vote that ended the state’s near-total ban through a “bait and switch” measure.

The coalition, called Stop the Ban Missouri, has already amassed nearly $2 million. Its first ad leans heavily into the idea that voters are being asked to revisit a decision they made less than two years ago.

“In America and here in Missouri, we believe our vote is sacred. That the people are the ones who decide. And in 2024, the people of Missouri decided to stop Missouri’s abortion ban,” a voiceover in the ad says.. “But now, politicians are trying to overturn the will of the people and ban abortion again.”

The proposed amendment, drafted and approved for the ballot by lawmakers in 2025, was a direct response to a citizen-led reproductive rights amendment that narrowly passed in 2024. That vote made Missouri the first state to overturn a near-total abortion ban through a public vote. 

The 2024 measure was listed as Amendment 3. The new proposal will also appear on the ballot as Amendment 3. 

If approved in November, the amendment to Missouri’s constitution would ban nearly all abortions, with limited exceptions for medical emergencies and for survivors of rape or incest. It would also add a ban on gender-affirming care for minors to the constitution, something that is already barred under a 2023 state law. 

“We know, in this ballot measure, politicians are playing tricky games and trying to confuse Missouri voters,” said Tori Schafer, a spokesperson for Stop the Ban and an attorney with the ACLU of Missouri. “And we need to educate voters about the bottom line, and the bottom line here is clear: The new amendment 3 is an abortion ban that takes away a woman’s right to make her own medical decisions and instead puts it in the hands of politicians and lawyers.”

Supporters of the amendment argue it would restore abortion restrictions removed by the 2024 vote while preserving exceptions for medical emergencies, fetal anomalies and survivors of rape or incest. The campaign backing the measure, Her Health, Her Future, has also said the amendment is necessary to protect parental consent, clinic regulations and the proposed ban on gender transition procedures for minors.

“The Her Health, Her Future PAC was launched with one clear and unwavering mission,” said Mike Hafner, who was an advisor to Kehoe’s gubernatorial campaign and who is now a campaign advisor for the PAC, said last fall. “To defend the dignity of human life and ensure Missourians have the knowledge and necessary tools to stand boldly for the unborn.”

Missouri became the first state to enforce a near-total abortion ban after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022, when a 2019 trigger law took effect. The following year, more than 11,500 Missourians left the state to obtain abortions legally in Kansas and Illinois.

Since the 2024 reproductive rights amendment passed, Missourians can again legally access procedural abortions at Planned Parenthood clinics in Kansas City, Columbia and St. Louis. Medication abortion is legal but remains inaccessible pending a state court decision on what regulations on abortion and abortion providers are now unconstitutional under the reproductive rights amendment. 

Schafer said in the last year the campaign has heard from many Missourians angered that abortion is back on the ballot. 

“Truthfully, the energy is really high because in the fight for reproductive freedom, we know that this has been going on for decades and decades,” she said. “Since the 1970s with Roe, politicians in Missouri and special interests have been trying to take this right away from Missouri voters. So we are, unfortunately, used to this fight, and we are ready for it.”

The Stop the Ban coalition is made up of Abortion Action Missouri, the ACLU of Missouri, Action St. Louis Power Project, Beacon Reproductive Health Network, Planned Parenthood Great Plains Votes, Planned Parenthood Great Rivers Action, PROMO and the Fairness Project.

Hoping to overcome a narrow loss in 2024, anti-abortion leaders launched Her Health, Her Future last September. Backers include Gov. Mike Kehoe and First Lady Claudia Kehoe, who serves as campaign treasurer, as well as other top Republican elected officials. 

So far, that campaign has raised nearly $500,000. 

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At the Midwest March for Life in Jefferson City this spring, campaign signs for Her Health, Her Future dotted the Capitol lawn. They read: “Yes on 3 Ban Transgender Surgeries for Minors.”

That message points to one of the central fights over the November amendment: whether voters will view it primarily as an abortion measure, as a restriction on gender-affirming care for minors, or both.

A recent poll by Saint Louis University and YouGov showed 60% of Missourians support abortion access in the first eight weeks of pregnancy. It also found 67% of Missourians oppose gender transition medications for minors and 73% oppose gender transition surgeries for minors.

The poll also found the proposed Amendment 3 ahead but without a majority, with 47% support, 40% opposition and 12% undecided.

Critics of the amendment have pointed to the addition of the gender-affirming care ban as “ballot candy” to draw support for an abortion ban that might otherwise be more difficult to pass.

“Unfortunately politicians are trying to trick Missouri voters into banning abortion by combining these two separate topics,” Schafer said. “And so, we’ll be talking to voters about that, and I think that voters will feel confident in voting ‘no’ in November, given that information.”

Missourians will see the following on the November ballot:

“Shall the Missouri Constitution be amended to:

• Repeal the 2024 voter-approved Amendment providing reproductive healthcare rights, including abortion through fetal viability;
• Allow abortions for rape and incest (under twelve-weeks’ gestation), emergencies, and fetal anomalies;
• Allow legislation regulating abortion;
• Ensure parental consent for minors’ abortions;
• Prohibit gender transition procedures for minors?”

The ballot language was finalized by Missouri’s Western District Court of Appeals in December after the court determined previous ballot language drafted by Republican Secretary of State Denny Hoskins failed to sufficiently inform voters that a “yes” vote would repeal abortion rights. 

While Gov. Mike Kehoe could have placed abortion on the August ballot, he kept it as part of the November general election. 

“Missourians are used to having to tell politicians in Jefferson City what they want by using the ballot measure process,” Schafer said. “And so we know Missourians are with us, and we already said no to abortion ban just two years ago, and we’re confident that Missourians will defeat this new abortion ban by voting no on Amendment 3 in November.”