The Republican presidential field is deeply divided over abortion, and is failing to reach female voters who could be a decisive bloc in the 2024 presidential race.
This week’s debate in Milwaukee was a lively kickoff to the primary, even in the absence of frontrunner Donald Trump, but it also exposed the GOP’s weakness on the abortion issue in the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s decision last year in Dobbs to overturn the flawed Roe v. Wade precedent.
Many candidates, such as former Vice President Mike Pence, back a federal ban on abortion. North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, who has a solid pro-life record, disagreed, saying that conservatives ought not try to federalize abortion after arguing for a half-century that it was an issue that should be decided at the state level.
He pulled a Constitution from his pocket for emphasis: the Tenth Amendment reserves such issues to the states, and the people.
MILWAUKEE, WISCONSIN – AUGUST 23: Republican presidential candidates (L-R),U.S. Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) and North Dakota governor Doug Burgum participate in the first debate of the GOP primary season hosted by FOX News at the Fiserv Forum on August 23, 2023 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Eight presidential hopefuls squared off in the first Republican debate as former U.S. President Donald Trump, currently facing indictments in four locations, declined to participate in the event. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)
Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley took a pragmatic approach. Given the fact that there may never be 60 pro-life votes in the Senate to overcome a filibuster, she said Republicans should focus their efforts on the few areas where there is a national consensus on the issue, such as banning late-term abortions.
Nikki Haley, former ambassador to the United Nations and 2024 Republican presidential candidate, during the Republican primary presidential debate hosted by Fox News in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, US, on Wednesday, Aug. 23, 2023. Republican presidential contenders are facing off in their first debate of the primary season, minus frontrunner Donald Trump, who continues to lead his GOP rivals by a double-digit margin. Photographer: Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Pence mocked her answer, saying that “consensus” is the opposite of leadership, but he had no solution for the practical problems she raised.
Of all the answers, Burgum’s was perhaps the most interesting. But while it explained the limitations of any attempt to legislate abortion from D.C., it did not offer a way forward.
Conservatives need something to do with Dobbs other than pushing more pro-life laws — especially because they are losing on the issue, even in solidly Republican states.
Fear of losing a “right,” however illusory, is motivating women, especially single ones, to turn out for Democrats.
The problem is that Republicans discuss abortion in moralizing terms, or as if it is a problem to be solved.
Joel B. Pollak / Breitbart NewsThat is why many candidates, including female ones, speak in terms of 6-week deadlines, or abstract constitutional ideas.
Some conservatives want the focus to be on the radicalism of Democrats’ support for abortion until birth. But Democrats’ position wins — not because women want late-term abortions, but because they want to be in control of the decision.
Abortion has become a symbol for the freedom women want to determine their own fates. More than a particular legal formula, what female voters want to hear is that political leaders respect and understand that freedom — not that they want to regulate it.
Unless Republicans are proposing ways to help pay for child care — which might pay for itself by allowing women to reenter the tax-paying workforce — many women don’t want to hear their views at all.
What Republicans need to do is show empathy for women who might one day consider abortion, even though many conservatives, out of care for the life of the unborn child, find the very possibility of abortion to be abhorrent.
It is tough to show empathy when moral convictions are at stake: we want our most deeply-held principles to override our emotions. Yet empathy is the key to unlocking Democratic Party control of abortion and the votes it represents.
Empathy should go beyond pity for women who fall pregnant in difficult circumstances, which is where Democrats focus.
Conservatives can do better than that, by emphasizing motherhood — celebrating its beauty, but also showing that they understand the costs, sacrifices, and challenges that motherhood involves.
Ivanka Trump was mocked by conservatives in 2017 for promoting paid maternity leave, but it was arguably the best pro-life idea in a generation.
It may be tough, but Republicans need to learn something from their old nemesis, Barack Obama. In 2008, he dodged the question of when life begins (“above my pay grade”), and then governed as the most radically pro-choice president in American history.
But he also acknowledged the feelings of the other side, noting that the issue was “a core issue of faith.” And he also sought common ground, asking, “[H]ow do we reduce the number of abortions?”
The Republican equivalent would be to ask: “How do we make motherhood an easier choice?” Not just for single women facing “unwanted” pregnancies, but for married couples struggling to make ends meet.
That is where the entire Republican field, sans Trump, missed an opportunity in Milwaukee.
The most “electable” candidate may be the one who is bold enough to change the way the party talks about abortion and motherhood in a post-Dobbs era.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the new biography, Rhoda: ‘Comrade Kadalie, You Are Out of Order’. He is also the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
