Last night in Kansas the voters spoke up about the right for women to make their own healthcare decisions without interference from politicians.  Turning out like never before, voters struck down Republican efforts to strike abortion rights from the state constitution and impose a strict ban that would cost lives.  This election was the bell cow for other states that were trying to do the same thing.  Had pro-choice efforts failed here, it would have cast a dark cloud over vast areas of the entire country as ideologues imposed their religion and dogma over tens of millions of women and their families.

More significant, Republican legislators cheated their asses off to get the result they wanted, making their loss even more sweet. Kansas Republicans had already put this measure onto the ballot for the PRIMARY election where no Democrats were running, hoping that they could ban abortion under the radar in a low turnout election.  After the SCOTUS stupidly and wrongly struck down Roe, that strategy went out the window, and Kansas became the focus of national attention.  That attention drew a turnout estimated at 54%, almost 20% higher than typical primaries, and more important, the measure was struck down in red areas of the state by almost 20% higher than Trump received in 2020.  What this tells us is that not only are abortion rights strongly supported by those who vote Democratic, it’s also supported by Republicans.

What happened last night is the logical result of gross overreach which always happens when politics are dominated by one party.  The Republicans should learn a lesson from this (but they won’t) that overplaying your hand can be costly.  With issues as important as Constitutional rights under threat, Americans who are normally asleep at the wheel wake up and actually vote.  We saw that during the Viet Nam war, after Watergate, after Bush’s foray into Iraq, with veteran’s healthcare just this week, and now women’s right to choose.

Hopefully this motivation to the polls sticks for the November mid-terms and beyond.  The only way our government works is for elected representatives to be held accountable to the voters for corruption and power grabs.  The GOP has proven itself to be irresponsible and callous to the needs of its voters.  It’s long past time for local, state, and federal governments to be brought back to actually representing the people.  ALL the people.