Abortion was supposed to be the winning issue for Democrats this year. The Supreme Court’s June decision to overturn Roe v. Wade was deeply unpopular. And Democrats from President Biden on down have made abortion central to their messaging.
The anger over the Supreme Court’s ruling — and the ensuing abortion bans in a number of states — is real and persistent. But Jon Ward writes that in races all over the country, abortion is an issue on which Democrats suddenly might be in a tough spot.
On abortion, the debates over the last week really did reveal something: Democrats were put on the defensive on this issue that they have seen as one of their biggest assets this cycle.
Arizona gubernatorial candidate Katie Hobbs, a Democrat, was the most glaring example of this. Democrats are increasingly worried that Hobbs, the former secretary of state, has proven to be a weak candidate. Hobbs has even refused to debate Republican candidate Kari Lake.
But during an appearance on CNN Sunday morning, just after Lake did an interview with the same network, TV reporter Dana Bash asked Hobbs five times whether she would “support any legal limits on abortion in Arizona.”
Hobbs would not answer the question, saying only that late-term abortions are “incredibly, extremely rare” and occur only if “there’s something that’s gone incredibly wrong in the pregnancy.”
“Politicians do not belong in that decision,” Hobbs said.
Other Democrats took the same approach when asked if they approved any limits on abortion. Warnock was asked the question, and simply said, “I trust women more than I trust politicians.”
In Ohio, Senate candidate Rep. Tim Ryan, who a decade ago was on the board of Democrats for Life — an anti-abortion group — said that “government has no place in this matter.”
Republicans have pounced on this in recent days and weeks. A spokesman for the Republican Governors Association tweeted that Hobbs’ answer amounted to support for “abortion up to the moment of birth.”
Read Ward’s full story here.
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