Fox News was criticized after the network downplayed the news Kansas voters overwhelmingly rejected efforts to restrict reproductive rights in the state by moving to enshrine them in the state's constitution.
Fox network personalities assured their forced birth advocate viewers that reproductive rights advocates had spent a considerable amount of money "to make sure that amendment failed."
The network went so far as to suggest pro-birth efforts are more likely to succeed "when they're incremental," adding it's a "reminder" Roe v. Wade was overturned and the decision about whether or not people who can give birth have abortion access is now a matter of "state's rights."
You can hear what they said in the video below.
The news marked a great loss for the conservative movement that has sought to roll back reproductive rights even further in the weeks since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the 1973 landmark decision that once protected a person's right to choose reproductive healthcare without excessive government restriction.
Fox News was criticized for downplaying the significance of the moment.
Kansas voters secured a win for reproductive rights activists after voting to enshrine reproductive rights in the state constitution, the result of an effort to ensure the state—typically Republican and conservative—remains a safe haven for abortion in the Midwest.
Shortly after the voting result was announced, Democratic President Joe Biden said it "makes clear what we know: the majority of Americans agree that women should have access to abortion and should have the right to make their own healthcare decisions."
Kansas Democratic United States Representative Sherice Davids called the vote a win for families.
Dinah Sikes, a Democratic state Senator, hailed the decision saying it is "breathtaking that women’s voices were heard and we care about women’s health."
Sikes said that she thought the vote would be quite close and acknowledged that "we were close in a lot of rural areas and that really made the difference."
