There are still 13 months to campaign before Missouri residents will be called back to voting booths to decide the fate of abortion rights, exactly two years after voters legalized the procedure.
But this time, efforts both supporting and opposing the proposed constitutional amendment are getting a head start.
The 2026 ballot measure, which was approved by the Republican supermajority of lawmakers in May, would repeal the constitutional right to an abortion but allow exceptions for medical emergencies, fatal fetal anomalies and for survivors of rape and incest in the first 12 weeks of gestation.
In the past week, the campaign opposing the proposed amendment, called Stop the Ban, raised nearly $850,000. (Prior to that — as of a quarterly finance report published in July — it raised $500, all through individual donations of $100 or less.)
The contributions include six-figure donations from several of the main financial backers of the 2024 abortion rights campaign, including The Fairness Project based in Washington, D.C., Abortion Action Missouri, Planned Parenthood Great Rivers Action, Planned Parenthood Great Plains Votes and Global Impact Social Welfare Fund, a Virginia-based nonprofit.
Campaigns are required to report contributions over $5,000 within 48 hours of receiving them. Any smaller donation is made public as part of quarterly finance reports through the Missouri Ethics Commission.
The 2024 abortion-rights amendment was spearheaded by a campaign called Missourians for Constitutional Freedom, which included the ACLU of Missouri, Planned Parenthood, Abortion Action Missouri, the Fairness Project and Action STL.
A new campaign called Stop the Ban, formed in May to oppose the 2026 abortion ban amendment, also includes PROMO Missouri, a statewide LGBTQ advocacy organization.
The campaign in a statement Friday accused Missouri Republicans of attempting to overturn the will of the people, a message that’s been echoed by Democrats in the statehouse and attorneys for abortion rights groups in courthouses in Jefferson City and Kansas City as legal battles over abortion access continue.
“Missourians won’t let that happen,” campaign leaders said.” We’re building a grassroots effort to fight for what we know Missourians from every corner of our state and every political party want: the freedom to make our own decisions for ourselves and our families.”
Stop the Ban will be up against a new campaign launched this month called Her Health, Her Future. That PAC is backed by the governor’s office.
Claudia Kehoe, wife of Missouri Governor Mike Kehoe, is the campaign’s treasurer. Her education and career includes a background in banking and finance.
“We think it’s important to protect innocent life,” the governor said last week. “This measure will go on the ballot in November of ‘26, and so I’m excited that (Claudia) wanted to continue what her heart believes in. And that’s her mission, to protect the unborn.”
House parties
Abortion Action Missouri began laying the foundation for this latest grassroots campaign last week when the organization hosted more than a dozen house parties across the state to talk about abortion.
Among the hosts was Maryellen Picker, a retired 76-year-old school teacher who on Thursday evening gathered 16 women in the living room of her Clayton home.
Decades earlier, Picker’s sister had an abortion at the age of 16. They were living in Missouri, but their mother had to fly with her sister to New York to have the procedure.
“The stigma was horrible, and I don’t want it to be like that,” Picker told 30-year-old Lena Woods as they broke into small groups to talk about abortion.
Woods, who volunteers as a clinic escort, said while the 2024 election felt like a “huge hill” to climb, the path to victory was clear to her.
“Last time I felt like we were guaranteed to win,” she said.
This time around, facing a new gerrymandered map and ongoing legal battles over the ballot language, it feels different.
“This time I’m like, ‘oh no, I need to do more,’” Woods said.
The woman lounged barefoot on mismatched chairs and a long couch beneath pieces of abstract art, sipping on wine and cucumber water for what Jess Dewes, 51, a volunteer with Abortion Action Missouri, called a “power party.”
Dewes asked what brought everyone together that evening.
Anger, one woman said. Fear, added another.
“They’re counting on us being tired and counting on us quitting,” Dewes said.
“Because we are already a very gerrymandered state, we have very little power right now in Jefferson City,” she added. “The supermajority in Missouri, they have a lot of power right now. They’ve got a lot of people, they’ve got a lot of money, they’ve got a lot of political strongholds. So building power is our best way to take back some of the control that we’ve lost so that we don’t keep voting and then winning and then losing again.”
Before they parted ways, Dewes reminded the women to ditch the “Yes on 3” merch that proliferated the St. Louis area last year and still remains in some yards. This elicited groans as some of the women learned that the new legislative proposal is called Amendment 3, the same name held by the previous abortion rights amendment.
Most of the women gathered at Picker’s home were over the age of 50.
Dewes said they match the demographics of many of the volunteers she’s worked with in signature gathering efforts for the abortion rights campaign. Many looked old enough to be her mother.
“Their anger about having to fight for it again is so multidimensional, and their purpose is tied to generations,” Dewes said.
Mallory Schwarz, executive director of Abortion Action Missouri, said the goal is to grow the abortion rights movement “block by block.”
“This harnessed so much attention last year and so much energy, and people are mad that they went immediately to interfere and overturn the will of the people.”
Helping fuel this effort, she said, is the legislature’s decision to repeal voter-approved paid sick leave earlier this year. Months later, the Republican supermajority gerrymandered the state’s congressional map in an attempt to take voting power away from Kansas City’s Democratic stronghold.
While Stop the Ban has raised almost $1 million, as of Monday, Her Health, Her Future has received one reportable donation: $50,000 from Drury Displays Inc., a St. Louis based digital billboard advertising company.
Mike Hafner, a former advisor to Kehoe’s gubernatorial campaign who is now an advisor for Her Health, Her Future, said the campaign is focused early on fundraising.
“Our opposition has proven to be very well-funded and very well-organized,” Hafner told The Independent last week, saying the campaign hopes to avoid the same fundraising gulf that existed last year.
Ahead of the November 2024 election, the campaign in support of the abortion rights amendment raised more than $31.5 million. At the same time, fundraising efforts among the anti abortion movement were split among a handful of campaigns totaling less than $4 million in donations.
Abortion access remains fragmented in Missouri as courts decide what abortion restrictions should remain in place under the 2024 abortion rights amendment. As of Monday, procedural abortions were available by appointment at Planned Parenthood clinics in Kansas City, Columbia and St. Louis. Medication abortion remained inaccessible.
