Montanans Securing Reproductive Rights (MSRR), a group that includes Planned Parenthood Advocates of Montana (the political arm of Planned Parenthood Montana), the American Civil Liberties Union of Montana, and Forward Montana, has filed a lawsuit over the language in a pro-abortion ballot.
The pro-abortion group is attempting to get Ballot Issue #14 onto November’s ballot, which would create a state constitutional right to abortion and which the office of Attorney General Austin Knudsen attempted to stop. Knudsen said the proposed ballot statement was “legally insufficient.” However, earlier this month the Montana Supreme Court cleared the way for the proposal to move forward, saying the AG’s office was incorrect in its assessment.
Regardless, the proposal’s ballot statement still had to be finalized by Knudsen before going through a legislative committee meeting that would allow supporters to begin collecting the more than 60,000 signatures needed by June 21.
On Monday, Knudsen sent Secretary of State Christi Jacobsen a new proposed ballot statement that altered MSRR’s original ballot statement. The pro-abortion groups called Knudsen’s wording “confusing, argumentative, and prejudicial.” MSRR is now suing to stop it, asking that the state Supreme Court send the original ballot statement to Jacobsen and overrule the one submitted by Knudsen.
The pro-abortion groups’ original statement read:
CI-___ affirms the right to make and carry out decisions about one’s own pregnancy, including the right to abortion, in the Montana Constitution. This constitutional amendment prohibits the government from denying or burdening the right to abortion before fetal viability. Additionally, the amendment ensures that the government cannot deny or burden access to an abortion when it is necessary to protect the pregnant patient’s life or health. CI-___ prevents the government from punishing patients, healthcare providers, or anyone who assists someone in seeking reproductive care, including abortion care.
Knudsen argued that this proposed ballot statement does not comply with MCA, §§ 13-27-212, which ensures such a “statement of purpose and implication expresses the true and impartial explanation of the proposal in plain, easily understood language. The statement of purpose and implication may not be argumentative or written so as to create prejudice for or against the issue.”
Knudsen appears to believe that the statement — written by groups with a financial stake in expanding abortion in Montana — fails to state its true intent, which is to ensure abortion is legal and accessible throughout all 40 weeks of pregnancy.
While it uses the wording “abortion before fetal viability,” it also states that the “government cannot deny or burden access to an abortion” to protect a patient’s health, which has been long construed by abortion businesses to include a woman’s financial and familial health, not just physical. This language would lead voters to believe abortion would only be legal until the arbitrary age of viability — which abortionists have called a “medical construct” with “no particular gestational age” — when, in fact, the killing of preborn children would become a protected ‘right’ throughout pregnancy.
Knudsen told Jacobsen that the original statement “fails to give voters an accurate understanding of how the proposed initiative will change current law.” Knudsen offered a different statement which reads:
CI-*** amends the Montana Constitution to allow post-viability abortions up to birth and prohibits any State requirement for parental notice for a minor’s girl’s abortion. CI-*** leaves “fetal viability” and “extraordinary medical measures” to the subjective judgment of an abortion provider rather than objective legal or medical standards. CI-*** prohibits the State, or the people by referendum, from enacting health and safety regulations related to pregnancy care, except upon a narrow set of compelling interests. CI-*** eliminates the State’s compelling interest in preserving prenatal life. The State or the people may not enforce post-viability abortion regulations if an abortion provider subjectively deems the procedure necessary. CI-*** prohibits the State and the people from enforcing medical malpractice standards against providers for harms caused in providing pregnancy/abortion care. CI-*** may increase the number of taxpayer-funded abortions.
MSRR claims that Knudsen’s ballot language is an attempt to delay the group’s efforts to gather signatures. It asked the court for an expedited ruling and for it to order Knudsen to respond to the emergency petition by Friday. It also asked the court to rule on whether to allow Knudsen’s ballot language to move forward or to rule in favor of the original pro-abortion language by April 10.
