Trump-backed candidates prevail in U.S. midterm primaries; Kansas votes to preserve abortion rights

FILE PHOTO: Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt speaks to Reuters after a news conference to announce an antitrust probe into big tech companies that focuses on Alphabet's Google, outside the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, U.S., September 9, 2019. REUTERS/Bryan Pietsch

(Reuters) -Republican voters on Tuesday chose a raft of candidates supporting Donald Trump's 2020 election falsehoods in multiple party primaries for the November general election - a stark display of the former president's grip on his party.

In Kansas, abortion rights activists celebrated a major victory when voters overwhelmingly rejected a ballot initiative that would have endangered abortion access in the first statewide electoral test since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.