Next to the phrase “bad faith†in the dictionary should be the official portrait of Missouri Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft. Having been slapped down in court this week for his deliberately improper handling of a pending abortion-rights referendum, he now vows to appeal, even though he never had a case.
The obvious goal is and always has been to tie up the question in court long enough to potentially cause activists to miss deadlines for gathering signatures to get abortion rights on the Missouri ballot next year. Ashcroft apparently cares nothing about the fact that he is transparently misusing his official powers for his own political gain.
He clearly thinks voters in next year’s gubernatorial race won’t hold him accountable for this crass and cynical abuse of authority. They should.
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At issue is Missouri’s new abortion ban, enacted minutes after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last year. It bans abortion from the moment of conception in all cases, even rape and incest, with the sole exception of medical emergencies. Doctors who violate the ban can face up to 15 years in prison.
No state in America has a more draconian abortion law. And Ashcroft and his fellow right-wing Republicans have apparently come to understand that even in conservative Missouri, it may not survive a statewide referendum.
After all, of the seven states that have considered abortion-related issues on a statewide ballot since Roe fell, every single one — even the red states of Kansas and Kentucky — has come down strongly on the side of protecting reasonable abortion rights.
So Ashcroft, determined not to let Missouri voters have a clear up-or-down vote on the issue if he can help it, has been using his state-funded office to sabotage the current effort to get an abortion-rights referendum on the ballot.
As secretary of state, Ashcroft is responsible for crafting ballot language to describe the proposed referendum. Under state law, that language is required to be “neither intentionally argumentative nor likely to create prejudice either for or against the proposed measure.â€
Abortion-rights activists are proposing several different versions of the referendum, which contain various levels of detail as to when abortion might or might not be regulated by the state. But none is accurately described by the ballot language Ashcroft is trying to foist on the voters.
His proposed language — which, again, is required by law to be free of biased wording — would tell voters that the referendum allows for “dangerous, unregulated and unrestricted abortions†from “conception to live birth.â€
That’s not unbiased ballot language, it’s a right-wing campaign screed designed to appeal to the Republican base that Ashcroft is wooing in next year’s increasingly competitive GOP primary for governor.
Cole County Circuit Judge Jon Beetem saw right through it. In a ruling Monday, Beetem correctly found that Ashcroft’s language was “argumentative†and does not “fairly describe the purposes or probable effect†of the proposed ballot measures. Which is putting it mildly.
Beetem rewrote the language to offer voters a sober description of the proposals, including their protections for contraception and reproductive health care generally, which Ashcroft’s language ignored.
Each of six ballot summaries that Beetem re-wrote for the differently worded measures begins by telling voters the proposals would “establish a right to make decisions about reproductive health care, including abortion and contraceptives, with any government interference of that right presumed invalid.â€
That accurately describes the intent of the proposals, free of rhetorical hysteria. So Ashcroft is doubling down on the hysteria.
His vowed appeal of Beetem’s ruling will almost certainly end up at the same place, but it will further stall the referendum effort. Missouri taxpayers are funding this gross abuse of state powers and resources to thwart a fair vote on the issue. Voters shouldn’t forget that the next time Ashcroft’s name is on the ballot.