Abortion-focused US state supreme court races draw mixed results

Nov 6 (Reuters) - Republicans retained their majority on Ohio's top court and are leading in a race to unseat a sitting Democratic justice on North Carolina's following an election cycle in which Democrats had hoped the issue of abortion access would help liberal candidates secure seats on state supreme courts nationwide.

Democratic-backed candidates in Kentucky and Michigan won contests for seats on those states' respective high courts in which reproductive rights were a key issue. But Arizona voters declined to kick two Arizona Supreme Court justices who had upheld an 1864 abortion ban off the bench in a retention election, according to projections from Edison Research.

Those races were in the 33 states nationwide where supreme court seats were on the ballot in Tuesday's election either through competitive elections or votes to retain appointed jurists.

The mixed outcomes followed costly campaigns by groups that support abortion rights such as Planned Parenthood and the American Civil Liberties Union to influence the outcome of down-ballot races for state supreme courts.

The conservative-majority U.S. Supreme Court's 2022 reversal of its 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling, which had established a nationwide right to abortion, moved the fight over reproductive rights to the states, clearing the way for abortion bans in 13 conservative states and restrictions in others.

The decision raised the ...
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