Democrats unite to focus on reproductive rights as Republicans stumble on abortion issue | US elections 2024

As Kamala Harris and Donald Trump prepare to meet on the debate stage in Philadelphia, the fight over abortion rights has become the centerpiece of the 2024 presidential campaign – for the first time since the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade.

At the convention last month, Democrats detailed the harrowing stories of women who have been put in medical danger by Roe abortion bans in their states. Last week, the Harris team launched a 50-stop “reproductive freedom” bus tour through several swing states, starting in Trump's “backyard,” miles from the former president's Mar-a-Lago residence in South Florida.

And this weekend, days before the first – and perhaps only – prime-time presidential debate at which the issue is likely to come up, the Harris team has launched three new TV ads reminding voters that Trump keeps taking credit for his role in eliminating the 50-year-old constitutional right to abortion. The message is blunt: Because of Trump, one in three women of childbearing age now lives in a state where abortion is banned or significantly restricted. And it could get worse, they warn, if Trump wins a second term.

“Donald Trump is a fundamental threat to reproductive freedom – and you don't have to take our word for it – Trump said it himself,” Lauren Hitt, a spokeswoman for the Harris-Walz campaign, said in a statement. “Vice President Harris and Governor Walz are fighting to restore reproductive freedom in all 50 states because they trust women to make the right choices for their families.”

In the hotly contested race for the White House, the issue of abortion remains a glaring weak point for the Republican candidate.

“You know it's an important issue because Trump is trying to change his position,” said Celinda Lake, a veteran Democratic pollster.

During his candidacy, Trump took contradictory positions on the abortion issue, from boasting about appointing three of the nine Supreme Court justices whose votes were crucial in overturning Roe to complaining that Republican extremism on the issue had cost his party electoral victories.

​He recently appeared to support a referendum to expand abortion rights in his adopted state of Florida, but then announced a day later – after sparking a fierce reaction from prominent conservative groups – that he would vote against it. He had also previously indicated that he would support a federal 15-week abortion ban, but then insisted that the issue should be left to the states. His campaign has said that Trump would not sign a national abortion ban as president.

Although the economy remains the top issue for voters in November, a New York Times/Siena College poll released in August found that a growing share of voters in swing states, particularly women, say abortion will be central to their decision. Among women under 45, abortion has replaced the economy as the top issue.

In the final months of the campaign, Democrats are seeking to capitalize on the continued anger over the loss of federal abortion protections, especially among women and young people, to agree on a program that would protect remaining access to abortion and the availability of reproductive health care, including contraception and fertility treatments such as in vitro fertilization (IVF).

Lake said in polls and focus groups that abortion rights remain a particularly important issue for women and that the issue is helping to widen the gender gap between Harris and Trump. Harris' vocal support for abortion rights has not only mobilized young voters, a core Democratic constituency, but also helps mobilize independent women and, as Lake put it, “older women who remember when abortion was illegal and who don't believe that the idea of ​​locking up doctors to investigate miscarriages, [and] “Abolishing contraception and IVF is a good idea.”

Trump, who has long feared that Republican-led efforts to ban abortion and restrict access to reproductive care could threaten his chances of winning the White House, has sought to change his approach on the issue in recent weeks. During a town hall meeting in the battleground state of Wisconsin, he spoke out in favor of a plan that would have the state or insurance companies cover the cost of in-vitro fertility treatment – a form of fertility assistance that can cost tens of thousands of dollars and that some in the anti-abortion movement want to see restricted.

“We want to make babies in this country, don’t we?” Trump said.

Democrats criticized the proposal, citing the Republican's track record and the positions of his vice-presidential colleague JD Vance, and called it disingenuous.

Trump has “more positions on reproductive rights than he has wives,” said Ana Navarro, a TV personality and anti-Trump Republican, last week at the kickoff of the Harris campaign bus tour in Florida.

Democrats have used the abortion issue to score key victories in the 2022 midterm elections. Mobilization efforts around abortion rights generated high turnout and enthusiasm, helped the party maintain control of the Senate and limited Republican gains in the House. In Michigan, Democrats secured a triple-whammy when the state's voters overwhelmingly supported a ballot initiative enshrining abortion rights in the state constitution.

“It's taking the message to the people, talking to women, health care providers and our families, that's how we were able to have such a historic result in our 2022 election here in Michigan,” said the state's governor, Gretchen Whitmer, a co-chair of Harris' campaign, in an MSNBC interview this week. “But even for Michiganders, New Yorkers and Floridians, it's important to know what's at stake if Trump becomes president for a second time.”

Some Republicans have argued that the effectiveness of abortion rights would wane in a turbulent presidential election, but Lake believes the opposite may be true.

Abortion rights are a priority for young voters, who are more likely to vote in a presidential election year. Constitutional amendments guaranteeing abortion rights are on the ballot in 10 states this fall, including swing states like Arizona and Nevada, as well as Florida, once a presidential frontrunner that has leaned Republican in recent election cycles.

“We are the belly of the beast here in the state of Florida,” said Nikki Fried, chair of the Florida Democratic Party. “We are the state that has made drastic progress on abortion. Two years ago we had unrestricted access, and today we have one of the most extreme abortion bans in the country.”

Democrats in Florida hope that former Representative Debbie Mucarsel-Powell's initiative will give a boost in their fight against incumbent Republican Senator Rick Scott. In the battle for the majority in the Senate, measures to protect abortion rights will also include the endangered Democratic incumbents Jon Tester of Montana and Jacky Rosen of Nevada.

Fried, who attended the Harris campaign kickoff in Palm Beach County last week, said the referendum has helped draw attention to the state – and is mobilizing voters of all political stripes.

“If they can take away access to reproductive health care, what's next?” she asked. “What other kinds of rights have we made progress on that would be reversed if Trump is re-elected?”

The state's referendum would repeal the state's unpopular six-week ban and guarantee the right to abortion “before viability,” usually around 24 weeks of pregnancy. A poll released in mid-August found 56% of Sunshine State voters support the proposed change, just under the 60% threshold needed to become law. Still, it received more support than Trump, who led Harris in the state 51% to 47%, according to the poll.

Abortion remains Harris' top issue, with a 15-point lead over Trump in a nationwide New York Times-Siena College poll of likely voters. But there have also been signs that Trump's mixed signals have clouded the picture on the issue. Nearly half of independent voters do not believe the former president would enact a national abortion ban, according to the poll released Sunday.

Still, the Republican candidate must contend with his base, particularly evangelicals and other conservative Christians who expect Trump as president to further restrict access to abortion.

Kristan Hawkins, president of the well-known anti-abortion group Students for Life of America, recently told the Guardian that young conservatives were “shocked and saddened that someone they thought was pro-life or who had always represented pro-life values ​​would backtrack.”

Tuesday's presidential debate in Philadelphia offers Harris one of the most important opportunities to draw a sharp contrast with Trump on the abortion issue, and reproductive rights supporters expect Harris to challenge the former president over his attempts to change his position on the issue.

“I hope Vice President Harris makes it crystal clear to the tens of millions of people watching that leaving things to the states is not a moderate position – it's extreme,” said Rob Davidson, a Michigan-based emergency physician and executive director of the Committee to Protect Health Care, a left-leaning coalition of doctors and medical professionals that recently endorsed Harris.

Davidson said voters would also like to hear Harris outline her vision for expanding access to reproductive health care.

“We know what Trump did,” he said. “What will we do in the future?”