Early Vote on Ohio Abortion Rights Measure Exceeds Expectations

Columbus, OH — With less than a week until Election Day for a crucial abortion rights ballot measure in Ohio, advocates for reproductive freedom are exceeding their get-out-the-vote goals and seeing record turnout for early voting.

In August, the pro-democracy One Person One Vote campaign knocked on more than 700,000 doors and made more than 2 million phone calls. Heading into the final weekend of campaigning for Issue 1, Ohioans United for Reproductive Rights is poised to exceed all of those numbers, with volunteer excitement at an all-time high heading into Election Day.

The early vote for the November election is also outpacing early returns from August. As of Wednesday, more than 680,000 Ohioans had already participated in early vote, including by voting or requesting a mail-in ballot. Of those, 498,000 people have already voted. At the same point last August (6 days out from the election), 420,000 people had voted.

“The enthusiasm for defending reproductive freedom and abortion rights in Ohio is incredibly inspiring and signals that voters are tired of waiting for their legislators to act,” said Kelly Hall, executive director of the Fairness Project. “Politicians may be unwilling to secure basic health care rights for Ohioans, but voters are clearly ready to step up and do the work to ensure no one is ever denied the reproductive care they need. The Fairness Project is so proud to support the Ohioans United for Reproductive Rights coalition as it heads into the final weekend of turning out Ohioans to vote YES on Issue 1.”

Next week, Ohio will be the fourth state where voters have had the opportunity to proactively defend reproductive rights via ballot measure since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. California, Vermont, and Michigan all passed similar proactive amendments in November 2022, and advocates in other states — including Arizona, Nevada, Colorado, and Florida — are already organizing to put measures on the ballot for 2024.

Continuing its work of defending reproductive access, the Fairness Project is supporting Ohioans United for Reproductive Rights in their effort to pass Issue 1. The Fairness Project also worked in 2022 to support the successful citizen-initiated Michigan Reproductive Freedom for All campaign as well as the legislatively referred measure supported by Vermont for Reproductive Freedom. It is currently working to support Arizona for Abortion Access as it works to collect nearly 400,000 signatures to qualify a ballot measure for 2024.

The Fairness Project was also part of the large and diverse coalition to defeat a proposal earlier this summer that would have allowed just 40% of voters to veto popular measures in Ohio. That attempt by right-wing extremists and special interests to entrench minority rule was rejected by voters in August.