Democrats are trying to make the midterm elections a choice in two ways: a contrast with Republicans rather than simply a referendum on President Joe Biden and a contest defined by abortion rights.
From the White House down, Democrats are looking to use the Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision overturning Roe v. Wade and federal protection of legal abortion to defy the historical odds and retain their narrow congressional majorities.
Previewing Biden’s speech to a rally hosted by the Democratic National Committee, marking the president’s return to the campaign trail ahead of Labor Day, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre emphasized abortion. She said the administration remains “committed to restoring protections of Roe.” Jean-Pierre also framed the election as a “choice.”
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The polling on this strategy is ambiguous. On the one hand, Dobbs is among several factors narrowing the enthusiasm gap between Republicans and Democrats as November looms. On the other, abortion still does not appear to be voters’ biggest priority.
A poll by Echelon Insights, a Republican firm, found that when asked which issue is most important to their vote in November, respondents picked reducing inflation over protecting abortion rights by a 39-point margin. Nearly two-thirds of likely voters said inflation to just 27% who named abortion. Even among Democrats and Democratic-leaning voters, abortion just barely edged inflation, 48% to 46%.
Obviously, when people vote they are juggling many different concerns and motivations at once. However, when “protecting abortion rights” is put against “reducing inflation” as a driver of votes, taking on inflation leads with a 39-point margin. pic.twitter.com/YUBH58fh2G
— Echelon Insights (@EchelonInsights) August 25, 2022
“The key issue is always the state of the economy,” Republican strategist Bradley Blakeman said. “To win in November, Republicans need to focus on the economy and resist the temptation to speak to social issues that are tempting but not helpful to winning.”
In July, a Washington Post poll that found majority support for a federal abortion rights law and an even bigger percentage of people who said Roe’s reversal was a major blow to women’s rights concluded that anti-abortion voters were more enthusiastic about voting in November.
Nearly two-thirds of respondents who believed abortion should be illegal said they were certain to vote in the midterm elections, 11 points ahead of those who want abortion to be legal. Only 52% of those who considered Dobbs a big loss to women’s rights said they were certain to vote, compared to 70% who disagreed, suggesting single-issue abortion voters may still skew anti-abortion, as they often have since the 1980s.
At the same time, there are real-world election results that suggest abortion can energize Democrats and demoralize centrist Republicans. Democrats won a special election in New York in which they focused on abortion, while the GOP tried to make the race about inflation. A Kansas amendment removing the right to abortion from the state constitution went down to defeat by a substantial margin in a high-turnout red state election in which polls had shown the public sharply divided on regulating the procedure.
It may be the case that abortion doesn’t upend the red wave Republicans are counting on in November but does limit GOP pickup opportunities in pro-abortion rights areas. This could especially be a problem in flipping the 50-50 Senate, where Republicans are trying to take Democratic-held seats in places such as Colorado, New Hampshire, and Nevada.
The 1992 Supreme Court decision Planned Parenthood v. Casey upheld Roe’s core holding but incrementally expanded lawmakers’ ability to regulate abortion in areas where the anti-abortion position was popular — banning late-term abortions, requiring parental notification, informed consent for women, and 24-hour waiting periods. Dobbs enabled abortion opponents to defy public opinion on allowing the procedure early in pregnancy or in cases of rape and incest, though states remain free to enact more permissive policies.
Republicans are beginning to try to push back by noting Democrats still support abortion policies that are rejected by most voters. In a new ad, Blake Masters, the Republican challenger to Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ), attacked his support for expansive abortion legislation.
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Media coverage may make it easier for Democrats to characterize their abortion views. Last month, the Washington Post described a “federal law establishing the right to an abortion before a fetus can survive outside the womb, the standard the Supreme Court enshrined for nearly 50 years.” The bill congressional Democrats have attempted to pass goes further than that, as did Roe and Doe v. Bolton before Casey.
“We’ll be running against both the Democrats and the media on abortion until November,” said one Republican operative.
