With the 2024 general election less than 40 days away and early voting starting even sooner in Ohio, reproductive rights advocates argue that access to both abortion and birth control is on the ballot this year—though maybe more indirectly than it was in 2023 for Ohioans.
Several organizations came together Thursday morning to inflate a 20-foot intrauterine device (IUD) outside of Columbus City Hall and share that same message.
Leaders with Planned Parenthood and Red Wine and Blue, a suburban women's coalition, and a local Methodist deaconess delivered remarks as part of the World Contraception Day presentation. At times, the humming of a generator inflating the towering white IUD, which goes by Freeda Womb, overtook their voices.
Rep. Latyna Humphrey (D-Columbus) said although Issue 1 in 2023 codified abortion rights in the Ohio constitution, she believes federal and state politicians across the aisle won’t protect them.
“If you care about reproductive rights, that is on the line,” Humphrey said in an interview. “Yes, we passed Issue 1, but as I said, my colleagues will always find a hole, a way to poke holes into something.”
The issue has been central to U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown's reelection effort this cycle as he faces off against challenger Bernie Moreno. Brown, the Democratic incumbent, signed onto a Senate proposal backing federal birth control protections that Republicans blocked earlier this year.
And over the last week, Moreno has caught heat for comments about middle-aged and older women not needing abortions and that the Founding Fathers would have murdered abortion rights backers. A spokesperson for his campaign defended the former as “a tongue-in-cheek joke.”
“It's disgusting that Democrats and their friends in the left wing media constantly treat all women as if they're automatically single issue voters on abortion who don't have other concerns,” the spokesperson said in part.
Jen Perez, the state director for Red Wine and Blue, said that some women are single-issue voting.
“That issue is freedom,” Perez said Thursday. “Freedom from the government being involved in my medical decisions, freedom from politicians having a say on if and when I have a family, freedom from having elected officials controlling my body.”
Aside from the closely-watched race for Senate, the Ohio Supreme Court will likely eventually decide whether existing GOP-backed state laws limiting the practice should remain on the books. The same advocates, including Abortion Forward, have endorsed the Democratic slate of candidates, while anti-abortion Right to Life Ohio endorsed the Republican one.
