This election day, Coloradans resoundingly reaffirmed our shared values on abortion rights across geographic and partisan lines. Coloradans voted YES on Amendment 79 by an overwhelming 62% of the vote, enshrining abortion rights in our state’s Constitution and removing a discriminatory ban on insurance coverage for abortion care.
We won across the state, from metro Denver and Aurora to Garfield County and Pueblo. We won a majority in six of eight Congressional Districts (CD), including red CD 3 and swing CD 8, surpassing the 55% threshold in five of those districts. We even surpassed our margins in defeating a 2020 abortion ban, which is tough to do with a YES vote—and again, we outperformed the top of the ticket.
We did it on our own, powered by grassroots advocacy.
From the start, our campaign was Colorado driven. It was Cobalt, COLOR, New Era Colorado, Progress Now Colorado and the Interfaith Alliance of Colorado who made Amendment 79 happen. A year ago, when our statewide coalition filed our proposal, we saw an outpouring of support. Over 1,000 trained volunteers helped us turn in 225,000+ signatures from registered Colorado voters—one of the highest numbers in our state’s history. With nearly three times our goal, and nearly double the amount required, we qualified for the November ballot.
We ran a campaign for Coloradans by Coloradans. We received endorsements from over 125+ organizations and 190+ high-ranking state leaders from faith communities, the Latine community, the Black community, teachers, healthcare providers, and more.
This victory isn’t just about safeguarding rights; it’s a concrete step towards expanding reproductive freedom. Since the 1980s, Colorado’s ban denied its state employees, Medicaid recipients, and others on state-run plans access to vital reproductive healthcare, disproportionately impacting low-income families and communities of color in Colorado. Amendment 79 changes that.
By allowing state healthcare plans to cover abortion services once again, Colorado is ensuring over 1.7 million residents—or 30 percent of our state’s population—are no longer impeded by the insurance coverage ban. This step not only addresses longstanding racial and economic disparities but also solidifies Colorado’s commitment to protecting bodily autonomy in the face of national and local threats to reproductive freedom.
Just a few weeks before this election, against the will of the community, some members of Pueblo’s city council again attempted to ban abortion. Amendment 79 cements what we’ve known all along: Coloradans, across party lines, believe the government has no place in our personal, private healthcare decisions.
At the forefront of our campaign were the lived experiences of Coloradans who bravely shared their stories and personified the need to pass Amendment 79. When voters went to the ballot box on November 5th, it was the stories of their friends, families, and community members who they voted to protect.
The job is not over. Passing Amendment 79 was the first step. Now, we turn our attention towards implementation, led by our teams at Cobalt and COLOR, to ensure that our hard-won victory translates into real change for all Coloradans. We are working with legislators to implement these protections further, turning our votes into policy and marking our will for reproductive freedom.
Thanks to your votes, Amendment 79 is a promise that abortion will be safe and accessible in Colorado once and for all. Colorado will continue to be a beacon of hope for the rest of the country.
Dusti Gurule is the President and CEO of Colorado Organization for Latina Opportunity and Reproductive Rights (COLOR), a community-rooted organization that works to enable Latine individuals and their families to lead safe, healthy, and self-determined lives. Karen Middleton is the President of COBALT, a Colorado nonprofit that helps patients access abortion care. They are both co-chairs of Coloradans for Protecting Reproductive Freedom.
