GOP-Led Abortion Bans Highlight Republicans’ Toxic Health Care Agenda, Going To Be A “Motivating Issue” In 2022

A new wave of reporting from the long weekend confirms that Texas’ six-week abortion ban and other GOP-led anti-abortion efforts “risk driving away voters the party needs” and “could very well be the tipping point” in the midterm elections.

Every Republican on the ballot “will be forced to defend the Texas law” and own their party’s toxic agenda on women’s reproductive health care. Democrats in key battleground states are already calling out the GOP’s ongoing efforts to try and strip away health care coverage from women and families, ensuring that this issue will be front and center in the 2022 Senate elections.

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Bloomberg: GOP-Led Abortion Bans Risk Driving Away Voters the Party Needs

• The law, and a possible reactive wave of abortion bans in other conservative states, risks driving away Americans who have stuck with Republicans because of economic issues just as the GOP begins its campaign to retake control of the House and Senate in the 2022 midterms.

• “Republicans are already hemorrhaging college-educated suburban voters,” said Sarah Longwell, publisher of the Bulwark, an anti-Donald Trump conservative news and opinion site. “This is an issue that further alienates that exact group of people.”

• Kyle Kondik, who tracks elections for the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics, said the far-right positioning of abortion laws being passed could further polarize voters on the issue.

The Atlantic: What the Texas Abortion Law Means for the Midterms

• Democrats have public opinion on their side: Abortion bans aren’t broadly popular in any state, and although the Texas law isn’t a full ban, it comes close—and it will allow Democrats to paint Republicans as hard-liners who are out of touch with public opinion. This issue could very well be the tipping point in districts that are heavily suburban, with a lot of educated women.

• The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee called the new law “a powerful reminder” of the midterms’ significance.

• Democrats have used anti-abortion advocates’ words against them before and found political success.

The Hill (Opinion): Press: Texas hands Democrats a great big gift

• Here’s the key: the Texas abortion law is not only bad public policy, it’s political suicide.

• What have Republicans adopted as their No. 1 issue to run on in 2022?  Abortion!

• Every Republican running for office in 2022, at every level, will be forced to defend the Texas law. Forced to explain why an Uber driver can be sued for driving a woman to the nearest health care clinic.

• This is insane. What are Republicans thinking? Given that women are now America’s largest voting bloc and a majority of suburban women abandoned the GOP to vote for Joe Biden in 2020, do Republicans really want to make outlawing abortion their No. 1 issue? Especially when, according to the latest surveys by the Pew Research Center, 59 percent of Americans believe abortion should be legal in all or most cases.

• By forcing Republicans to campaign as the anti-abortion party, Texas has given Democrats a huge gift.

Axios: Democrats’ next moves after a stunning SCOTUS loss on abortion

• Democrats say they’re itching for a political fight over abortion rights — and that it will help them in the 2022 midterms.

• Democrats say the sheer sweep of Texas’ law and the highly unusual way it’s written make it a juicy political target.

• They want to force centrist Republican senators to defend a law that they believe will draw substantial backlash, not only from the left.

Newsweek: Republicans Are Not Celebrating the Texas Abortion Law. Here’s Why

• Speaking to The Associated Press, Republican pollster Christine Matthews suggested that some GOP lawmakers may have decided against coming out in support of the measure in case it is used against them in next year’s midterms.

• “It is going to be a very motivating issue for women who haven’t typically been single-issue pro-choice voters,” Matthews said.

CNN: Opinion: The GOP’s Texas-sized mistake on abortion

• In Texas, the state legislature believes they will be rewarded by taking away rights granted under Roe v. Wade. What they have provided to Democrats is a golden opportunity to drive the gender gap to epic proportions.

• The Texas GOP has handed them an issue they will most certainly weaponize in any competitive district the GOP has in its sights.

• Texas Republicans have put the GOP on its spurs.

Washington Post: Analysis | Abortion, voting rights, guns and covid: Texas Republicans go all in

• The implications for midterm politics in 2022 are even more real, as well. The threat to abortion rights could motivate abortion rights supporters to turn out in higher numbers.

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