![Pinterest](https://pinterest.com/pin/create/button/?url=https://uknews.evprotec.com/us-midterms-will-kentucky-deliver-another-shock-abortion-vote/&media=https://uknews.evprotec.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/127548649_leavesnoperson.jpg&description=Image caption, Pro-choice campaigner Beth Kuhn knocking on doorsThe high-stakes battle over abortion in the US is unfolding in Kentucky, where voters will decide whether the state constitution should remove all protection for abortion rights. The vote, like parallel initiatives in Michigan, California, Montana and Vermont, will be watched closely as a signal of Americans' attitudes toward abortion after the fall of Roe v Wade. Three days before the midterm elections, Deann Allen stood in the back room of a public library in Louisville, Kentucky's largest city. Pro-choice volunteers milled around her, chatting quietly, sharing advice and shuffling campaign pamphlets as they prepared for a day of canvassing. Wearing glasses, a bedazzled jean jacket and a tentative smile, Ms Allen hung towards the back. "It's my first time canvassing," she said, in a lilting southern accent. "I have two progressive daughters," she added, by way of explanation. For most of her life, Ms Allen, 62, was not a progressive. She grew up in the state's southeast Clay County, one of the poorest communities in the nation. From her family home she could see the family graveyard - generations of Republicans. "That was the joke growing up," said her daughter, Carolyn Allen, 31. "Our grandparents would roll over in their graves if you were anything less than Republican." But like Carolyn, Ms Allen is now a Democrat herself. In June, on the day that the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade - ending the nationwide guarantee to abortion access - she sat down and cried. "I remember the sixties and the seventies, the horror stories of the coat hangers and the illegal abortions. And so I left the Republican party." Then she paused. "No, they left me." On Tuesday, voters in Kentucky will decide whether the constitution should be altered to say explicitly there is no protection for abortion rights. The ballot measure - a single sentence called Amendment 2 - is nearly identical to the one roundly rejected){kind=link}
The high-stakes battle over abortion in the US is unfolding in Kentucky, where voters will decide whether the state constitution should remove all protection for abortion rights. The vote, like parallel initiatives in Michigan, California, Montana and Vermont, will be watched closely as a signal of Americans’ attitudes toward abortion after the fall of Roe v Wade.
Three days before the midterm elections, Deann Allen stood in the back room of a public library in Louisville, Kentucky’s largest city. Pro-choice volunteers milled around her, chatting quietly, sharing advice and shuffling campaign pamphlets as they prepared for a day of canvassing.
Wearing glasses, a bedazzled jean jacket and a tentative smile, Ms Allen hung towards the back. “It’s my first time canvassing,” she said, in a lilting southern accent. “I have two progressive daughters,” she added, by way of explanation.
For most of her life, Ms Allen, 62, was not a progressive. She grew up in the state’s southeast Clay County, one of the poorest communities in the nation. From her family home she could see the family graveyard – generations of Republicans.
“That was the joke growing up,” said her daughter, Carolyn Allen, 31. “Our grandparents would roll over in their graves if you were anything less than Republican.”