In the News

The panelists include Love, ACLU of Missouri’s Luz María Henríquez, Ohio Organizing Collaborative’s Prentiss Haney, who spearheaded the successful abortion access measure in Ohio, and the ballot measure fundraising/consulting group Fairness Project’s Kelly Hall, who has won over 30 ballot measures in multiple states.

The largest donations so far include $1 million from the Sixteen Thirty Fund and $500,000 from the Fairness Project. The 501c4 nonprofits are based outside of Missouri and do not have to disclose their donors. Both organizations contributed to Missouri’s successful 2020 Medicaid expansion initiative petition campaign.

The Fairness Project, a nonprofit dedicated to using ballot measures to circumvent deadlocks in legal change, spearheaded the movement to expand Medicaid through state ballot initiatives.

The campaign has received large contributions from national groups, including $1 million from Sixteen Thirty Fund, a progressive nonprofit based in Washington, D.C., and $500,000 from The Fairness Project, another Washington-based nonprofit.

But the largest donation so far was a $500,000 check from the Fairness Project, a 501c4 nonprofit that does not have to disclose its donors. The organization helps bankroll ballot measures across the country, including Missouri’s successful 2020 Medicaid expansion initiative petition.

“It’s hard to overstate the momentum, the wind that’s at the back of abortion rights advocates using ballot measures to pass constitutional amendments,” said Kelly Hall, executive director of the Fairness Project, a group that supports state ballot measure efforts.

“What we have learned from this growing drumbeat of opposition to citizen-initiated ballot measures from elected officials is that they continue to innovate, they continue to get more creative at how they want to deny voters the opportunity to vote on these questions,” said Kelly Hall, executive director of the Fairness Project.

Kelly Hall, the executive director of the Fairness Project, which promotes progressive ballot measures in red and purple states, told me, “A victory in Ohio really does tell all of us in the abortion-rights movement that this is possible almost everywhere.”