By Fredreka Schouten, CNN

(CNN) — In 2018, Toni Easter held a party in her yard in St. Louis to promote what would become a successful ballot initiative on redistricting — only to see it overturned when Republican lawmakers in Missouri put a competing initiative on the ballot.

Then last year, she collected signatures in the successful effort to enshrine abortion rights in the Missouri Constitution. This year, the legislature approved a new referendum to try to reverse it.

“Our civil rights are being taken away,” said Easter, a retired fashion industry executive and co-founder of Respect Missouri Voters. Her group is working to put another measure on the Missouri ballot in 2026, one that would bar the state’s lawmakers from overturning citizen-approved initiatives.

Liberal activists in

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