Editor’s Note: This is part of a series of conversations about voter-initiated efforts to restore abortion access across the country.
Colorado is one of five states to have confirmed an abortion-related question on the ballot in November. Many of the proposed amendments (Florida, Maryland, Nevada and South Dakota have also confirmed, while qualification efforts continue in states like Arizona, Arkansas, Missouri and Montana) would restore access to abortion, whereas Colorado’s would expand access.
Forty years ago, the Centennial State banned using public insurance to pay for an abortion, which the ballot initiative’s campaign committee, Coloradans for Protecting Reproductive Freedom, says affects nearly 1 million people in the state, disproportionately those who have lower incomes and are minorities or state workers.
The committee comprises a coalition of longtime progressive advocacy groups in Colorado, who are working together to mobilize voters. Dusti Gurule is a co-chair of the committee, as well as president and CEO of one of the coalition’s members, Colorado Organization for Latina Opportunity and Reproductive Rights, which has also been working on an effort to expand contraceptive access to people in the state who are undocumented. The nonprofit’s mission is “to enable Latinx individuals and their families to lead safe, healthy, and self-determined lives.”
Gurule worked in the Obama White House as a regional representative within the U.S. Department of Labor before becoming CEO of COLOR in 2017. Last month she was inducted into the Colorado Women’s Hall of Fame. The Colorado native talked to States Newsroom about the abortion amendment’s prospects — she is confident it will pass — and why Latinos are overwhelmingly showing support for it.
The following interview has been edited and condensed.
States Newsroom: How would Colorado’s amendment, if it passes, impact people living in the state?
Dusti Gurule: Our estimations of both state employees, city employees who use a state insurance system — so, firefighters, teachers, all of those folks — plus the numbers of people on Medicaid, it’s about 800,000 people. There are also a large number of our community who are Medicaid-eligible but haven’t applied for Medicaid for other reasons, and or they were rolled off. There’s no solid numbers, but that’s a lot of people who right now don’t have the ability to have their abortion paid for if they need one. And Colorado is supposed to be such a — I mean we are a model state when it comes to abortion rights, but accessibility, we’re not there yet.
SN: In the broader Coloradans for Protecting Reproductive Freedom coalition, what has been COLOR’s role?
DG: Our work engages the Latino community. That’s really where our focus is. I’ve also been raising money for the campaign and raising money for our 501(c)(4). COLOR Action Fund is targeting about 170,000 Latino households in the state, and we’ll be running our own persuasion campaign for the Yes — we don’t have the number yet, so right now, we’re calling it Abortion Access for All.
SN: What are you finding about what Latinos in Colorado think about abortion and this ballot initiative?
DG: We do know — because our fourth annual Colorado Latino Policy Agenda, the poll that we do in partnership with Voces Unidas — we’re in the field now, and we’re starting to get some preliminary numbers around our ballot measure. We’re close to 60% approval, which I knew we would be, because we’ve been polling our community on the issue of protecting and expanding abortion care and protecting and expanding reproductive health and rights, and we know that more than half of our community is with us.
SN: What have been some of your interesting findings doing this outreach and polling?
DG: We also are doing some intentional outreach with Latino faith communities. We have a faith-aware manager, Isabela [Rosales] is her name. She put together this amazing presentation about how liberation theology is related to reproductive justice, how there’s not a huge gap between those two, and how talking to our community about social justice and equity, if you talk about it that way to communities of faith, then they’re with us.
There’s this myth that all the Latinos that are religious, they’re anti-choice. That’s not true. Part of our polling shows Latinos who identify as Catholic, there’s still a large proportion of them who believe people should have the right to have an abortion.
SN: What are some other reproductive-health access issues in Colorado?
DG: While it’s legal here — we passed that state statute, the Reproductive Health Equity Act, which [enshrined the right to an abortion and other reproductive rights in the state constitution] — there aren’t enough providers. Along the Denver metro corridor, I-25 corridor, there’s places for people to get care, but there are clinic deserts throughout other parts of Colorado. There are some people on the eastern part of the state who have to drive hours.
The work that we do at COLOR with the Spanish-speaking community and through our partnership with Voces Unidas, depending what country of origin some of our community have come from, they may not be aware that abortion is legal here. Or if it is, where would they even go? What would they do? So we’re still trying to dig into some of that.
SN: What are some of this amendment campaign’s challenges?
DG: Our ballot is going to be really long. So, we’re going to have a ballot guide. We’re going to have community conversations. In addition to our field programming, we’re going to run a huge digital program. We’re going to send mail, we’re going to knock on doors, but we’re also going to do different community conversations, to just talk through what the ballot measures are. That’s how we build community, that’s how community trusts us, listens to us, leans on us for information about this ballot, about the ballot measure when we say how important it is to remove this barrier to abortion care for people who can’t afford it. Everyone’s insurance should cover the full range of health care.
[Another challenge is that] our turnout rates for our primary election, our state primary election [in March], were pretty low, pretty sad. They were lower than they have been for a few cycles. But this was [before President Joe Biden decided to end his reelection bid]. We don’t normally endorse in the presidential, but I do think having [Vice President] Kamala [Harris] as the [not-yet-confirmed] nominee for the Democrats has really added a lot of excitement and engagement. I think a lot of our younger staff are excited now.
SN: You’re hearing excitement for Harris?
DG: Yes. Not any candidate is going to be the perfect person, but I think for us, it’s the same approach that we take with our [referring to COLOR Action Fund, the group’s (c)(4)] state-level endorsements — where is the door open for those conversations in relationship-building, and not being taken for granted and not being completely out of touch with values. Not one candidate is going to do everything we want them to do, but I think having that opportunity, that representation, like to have a woman of color is pretty f***ing amazing. Pardon my French.