ACLU: timing threatens public vote on Missouri abortion law

Source: Associated Press


Summer Ballentine, Associated Press
Updated 3:35 pm CDT, Friday, July 12, 2019

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Timing threatens to stymie efforts to let the public vote on a new Missouri law banning abortions at eight weeks of pregnancy or later after the state Supreme Court on Friday refused to intervene to force the state's top election official to act quickly.

At issue is a push by the American Civil Liberties Union of Missouri to put the anti-abortion law on the 2020 ballot. ACLU attorneys now worry that if Republican Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft doesn't act fast to process the petition, the organization could be left with as little as two weeks to collect the more than 100,000 signatures need to put the law to a vote.

The ACLU had asked Supreme Court judges to force Ashcroft to certify a ballot title for the referendum by July 18 in order to give the organization enough time to collect signatures before the Aug. 28 deadline. But the Supreme Court on Friday decided that it won't weigh in on the case.

"It's pretty apparent that the secretary, with an assist from the attorney general, is trying to run down the clock so the people don't have a chance to vote," ACLU Acting Executive Director Tony Rothert said. "We were hoping to get a court order to get them to move expeditiously, but at this point it's on them to do their jobs in a way that protects the constitutional right of the people to have a referendum."

Read more: https://www.chron.com/news/us/article/ACLU-timing-threatens-public-vote-on-Missouri-14091579.php