Nevada reproductive rights advocates mobilize for Rosen’s reelection, ballot initiative

Laura Campbell has experienced both a miscarriage and an abortion — difficult experiences she said her doctors helped her through.

She fears that if Sen. Jacky Rosen,D-Nev., isn’t reelected in November that abortion restrictions could be tightened across the U.S. and in Nevada to put women facing similar health challenges at risk.

“I can’t believe I have to be in the position to tell my story to get people to understand,” said Campbell, the Nevada NOW Director of Actions, during an event hosted by Rosen. “But if that’s what it takes, that’s what it takes.”

Rosen applauded local and national abortion advocates for their work and laid out a path to enshrining into law more reproductive health care protections during a roundtable with several movement leaders Thursday in Las Vegas.

Rosen hosted the roundtable with three major Nevada-based leaders for women’s reproductive care and Jessica Mackler, president of the national group EMILY’s List. The organization is an almost 40-year-old PAC that helps support pro-choice women who are running for offices through fundraising and other resources.

Mackler said Nevada had long been a battleground state, but one where women running for office and candidates EMILY’s List supports have largely succeeded. Nevada is one of four states with two female U.S. senators — Rosen and Catherine Cortez Masto. With Rosen up for reelection and a statewide reproductive rights ballot initiative on the table in November, the group is honing in on their support.

“Nevada is one of our greatest success stories,” Mackler said.

Since the U.S. Supreme Court in 2022 overturned the landmark Roe v. Wade decision, several Republican-controlled state legislatures have tightened abortion restrictions or imposed outright bans.

Nevada voters in 1990 approved a ballot question allowing for an abortion within the first 24 weeks of a pregnancy. The question further stated that the statute “will remain in effect and cannot be changed, except by a direct vote of the people.”

That means to change the law, opponents of abortion would have to launch a new statewide ballot initiative, collect the required number of signatures from registered voters across the state and then win a majority of votes in two successive general elections.

Nevadans for Reproductive Freedom launched a campaign in February to raise the bar higher. The group gathered the required signatures for a ballot question codifying the right to an abortion into the Nevada Constitution. That question will be on the ballot in November.

“What I admire about Nevada is the resiliency to find community solutions,” said Raquel Cruz-Juárez, senior director of constituency campaigns at Planned Parenthood Federation of America, during the meeting.

Republicans have started backing away from talking about abortion restrictions as Election Day nears. Conservatives like Rosen’s Republican opponent Sam Brown and vice presidential candidate JD Vance have tried to shirk previous comments they’ve made about abortion.

Even former President Donald Trump, who held a lengthy news conference Thursday, said he felt abortion was no longer a “big factor” in elections. But Rosen said such denial solely comes from the GOP’s realization that the issue has turned away voters from the GOP, and that constituents must recognize the shift.

“We can’t trust a word they’re saying, now that it’s an election year,” Rosen said.

Brown’s record on abortion, which has shifted from him being publicly amicable to national bans during previous races to disavowing a ban all together, is something Mackler said speaks for itself.

The EMILY’s List president also said organizers planned on emphasizing that record to keep voters informed.

“We have a decade’s worth of Sam Brown’s record — when you put that in front of voters, they’re not just turned off by where he stands on the issue, they’re pissed off that he would dare to do that to them,” Mackler said.

But excitement is growing among the liberal base in the state and nationally, especially in the wake of the Harris-Walz campaign announcements, with donations and campaign involvement surging. For local reproductive care advocates, that means seizing on the positive energy at every level of the ballot.

“There is momentum when people are seeing politicians run not just for their own personal gain, like Sam Brown, but people that genuinely care for us,” Cruz-Juárez said.

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