Melissa Ohden was born alive at 31 weeks after a saline abortion meant to kill her.
A new University of Pittsburgh study claims voters would happily back abortion with no limits at all.
Pro-abortion writer Jessica Valenti is celebrating, but one number inside the study tells a very different story.
Abortion Survivor Melissa Ohden Was Born Alive at 31 Weeks
Ohden now lives in Missouri and founded the Abortion Survivors Network.
On a pro-life webcast in October, she warned that the 2024 amendment locked abortion up to viability into Missouri's constitution.
In her view, Missourians never signed up for what was done to her and her birth mother.
At 31 weeks, Ohden was well past viability.
The no-limit ballot language Valenti now wants would leave a baby that age with no protection at all.
The Pittsburgh Abortion Poll Jessica Valenti Calls a Green Light for No Limits
Valenti is one of the loudest pro-abortion voices online, writing the Abortion, Every Day Substack she launched after Dobbs.
Her 2024 book, Abortion: Our Bodies, Their Lies, and the Truths We Use to Win, is a messaging playbook for abortion activists.
On October 14, she rolled out the Pittsburgh study to her readers like a winning lottery ticket.
Researchers Greer Donley, Dana Loll and Tamar Krishnamurti tested three hypothetical ballot measures – one with a strict viability limit, one adding a health exception and one with no gestational limit.
Support came in at 67 percent, 68 percent and 66 percent, with no statistically significant difference.
Valenti's takeaway was simple – the pro-abortion movement should stop agreeing to viability limits.
Look at how the researchers got their numbers.
They used 1,841 paid respondents from Prolific, an online survey platform, who read ballot language and said how they would vote.
No campaign, no opposing ads and no months of debate about what an unlimited abortion amendment actually allows.
An eye-popping 92.6 percent claimed to be registered voters, compared with roughly 74 percent nationally.
Only 23 percent identified as pro-life, less than half the share who sided with abortion.
Republican Support Dropped Ten Points When the Abortion Viability Limit Disappeared
Dig past the topline and the study tells on itself.
Among Republicans, the measure with a viability limit and a health exception drew 47 percent support.
Strip out the limit, and Republican support fell to 37 percent.
In Missouri in 2024, Amendment 3 passed 51.6 percent to 48.4 percent, with a viability provision as its selling point.
Run the math.
If Republicans made up just a third of that electorate, a 10-point drop among them shaves more than three points off the statewide total – enough to sink the 2024 amendment.
The researchers admit they never measured how opposing campaign messages would move voters, and concede a national online panel cannot capture any single state.
Gallup Abortion Poll Shows Americans Reject Late-Term Abortion Up to Birth
Real-world polling tells the truth.
In 2023, Gallup found 70 percent of Americans wanted third-trimester abortion outlawed, and only 22 percent supported it.
Gallup's 2026 survey found just 33 percent of Americans support abortion with no restrictions.
The share who want abortion illegal in all circumstances climbed to 17 percent, up from 13 percent in 2025.
That is not a nation demanding abortion up to the moment of birth.
Missouri Amendment 3 Puts the No-Limits Abortion Theory to a Real Vote
Missouri voters get the real test on November 3.
The 2026 version of Amendment 3 would repeal the 2024 abortion amendment and allow abortion only for medical emergencies, fetal anomalies, and rape or incest through 12 weeks.
It would also require parental consent for minors seeking abortions, ban the sale of fetal organs and tissue, and bar gender transition procedures for minors.
A Saint Louis University and YouGov poll taken in August found 43 percent backing the measure and 44 percent opposed, with 13 percent undecided.
Missouri Gov. Mike Kehoe is backing it, saying "we protect mothers; we defend our children."
No Prolific panel is casting ballots in that race.
Fetal Viability Is a Moving Line, Not the Moment a Baby Counts
The Pittsburgh authors argue viability lacks a solid moral justification.
Pro-lifers agree – just not the way they mean it.
Viability is a line drawn by technology, and it keeps moving earlier.
Nash Keen survived at 21 weeks in Iowa, weeks before the point most viability laws assume a baby can live.
Melissa Ohden did not become human the day she survived a saline abortion, and she knows exactly what that abortion was for.
It "was intended to end my life but I survived," she said.
If Jessica Valenti believes Americans want abortion through all nine months, she should urge Missouri's abortion campaign to say so in every ad before November 3.
Sources:
- Raimundo Rojas, "No, Americans Don't Want to Kill Babies in Abortions Up to Birth," LifeNews, October 16, 2026.
- Nancy Flanders, "Pro-Life Webcast Urges 'YES' Vote on Missouri's Amendment 3," Live Action, October 10, 2026.
- Nicole Hunt, "New Poll Shows Nearly Two-Thirds of Americans Reject Unrestricted Abortion," Daily Citizen, June 19, 2026.
- The Federalist, "Poll: Majority of Americans Still Reject Democrats' Unlimited Abortion Agenda," The Federalist, June 16, 2023.
- Missouri Independent, "Latest Missouri Poll Finds Another Razor Thin Margin Ahead of November Vote on Abortion," Missouri Independent, September 11, 2026.
- Melanie Wilcox, "World's Most Premature Baby Born at 21 Weeks Celebrates His First Birthday," LifeNews, July 24, 2025.
