New York’s Prop 1 Is a Trojan Horse

I smell a rat, and it’s not in the subway system. It’s New York’s Proposition 1, an Election Day ballot measure that pretends to fight for equality but in fact does the opposite.

The ACLU of New York is touting the bill as a means of codifying abortion rights. But the word abortion doesn’t appear anywhere on the ballot. Here’s the language of the proposition, sponsored by Democratic state senator Liz Krueger, that New Yorkers will see on their ballots:

Adds anti-discrimination provisions to State Constitution. Covers ethnicity, national origin, age, disability, and sex, including sexual orientation, gender identity, and pregnancy. Also covers reproductive healthcare and autonomy. A “YES” vote puts these protections against discrimination in the New York State Constitution. A “NO” vote leaves these protections out of the State Constitution.

This seems like boilerplate equal rights language, but experts say Prop 1 is a Trojan horse that will actually allow discrimination. Biological women, Asian and white students, and even parents could find themselves falling afoul of the law. (The New York bill is even called the Equal Rights Amendment—in a possibly cynical play on the ERA passed by the U.S. Congress in 1972.)

“It’s really shameful that they would try to mislead New Yorkers in such a profound way,” said Bobbie Anne Cox, a New York civil rights attorney who has spoken out against Prop 1.

How will this happen? The language of the ballot only summarizes Prop 1. If you read the bill in full, you’ll have a better idea how it would be applied:

No person shall be denied the equal protection of the laws of this state or any subdivision thereof. No person shall, because of race, color, ethnicity, national origin, age, disability, creed [or], religion, or sex, including sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, pregnancy, pregnancy outcomes, and reproductive healthcare and autonomy, be subjected to any discrimination in [his or her] their civil rights by any other person or by any firm, corporation, or institution, or by the state or any agency or subdivision of the state, pursuant to law.

Note the words gender identity and gender expression. Cox says if Prop 1 becomes law, it could overturn local edicts banning biological males from women’s sports and open the door to further encroachment upon single-sex spaces, including women’s prisons.

And if you’re a parent, the addition of age as a protected category could allow your child to transition without your consent, Cox said. “If you’re allowed to make your own medical decisions without parental consent, without parental knowledge, then right there, the government is driving a wedge between the child and the parent,” she added.

And that’s not all. Here’s the rest of the bill:

Nothing in this section shall invalidate or prevent the adoption of any law, regulation, program, or practice that is designed to prevent or dismantle discrimination on the basis of a characteristic listed in this section, nor shall any characteristic listed in this section be interpreted to interfere with, limit, or deny the civil rights of any person based upon any other characteristic identified in this section.

Programs “designed to prevent or dismantle discrimination” is another way of saying DEI: diversity, equity, and inclusion policies in which employers or schools favor marginalized people over those chosen by merit.

So if you’re a white or Asian student seeking admission to one of New York City’s specialized high schools, Prop 1 would allow less qualified applicants who are black, Hispanic, or Native American to take your spot, Cox said.

“Paragraph B says the government can create programs or pass laws or make regulations that can discriminate against you, as long as they’re doing it in the name of fixing or reversing a past discrimination,” Cox added.

Prop 1 may seem well-intentioned—it promises to outlaw discrimination against women based on their reproductive decisions, including abortion, for example. But laws that protect against this already exist, like the Pregnancy Discrimination Act—which has been broadly applied to fight discrimination on the basis of a woman’s choice to abort a pregnancy. And New York State has already made abortion the law of the land. 

Rather than cracking down on discrimination, experts told me, Prop 1 will legalize it, weaponizing the very concept of equal protection against those considered more privileged. 

“It’s a backdoor around the political process, and in that regard, it’s antidemocratic,” said John Ketcham, a legal policy fellow at the Manhattan Institute.

So why would state legislators couch pro-discrimination language in a rallying cry for abortion rights? Either they’re incompetent, or they think you won’t read the fine print.

As I said, I smell a rat. But whether you think New York’s lawmakers are sneaky or stupid is beside the point. If you really care about equality, consider voting No on Prop 1 to defend our actual constitutional rights.

Josh Code is an editorial assistant at The Free Press. Follow him on X @writes__code. And for more on lawfare in the United States, read KC Johnson’s piece, “Biden’s Civil Rights Rollback.”

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