In putting the issue before voters on a mid-summer primary day, conservatives in Kansas were banking on a low-turnout affair that would pave the way for an abortion ban in a reliably red state.
What they got instead was a lopsided loss that preserved the status quo yet also changed a whole swath of calculations about 2022.
The push to allow lawmakers to ban abortion in Kansas backfired spectacularly. It woke up suburban voters and even those in conservative parts of the state who didn’t want to pursue something that was practically invited by the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade.
It also brought an explosion of activism that Democrats hope carries them through to the fall — in the few states where abortion will be directly on the ballot and the many more where the issue will be more indirectly at stake.