Are the abortion extremists Republican or Dem? Yes

Ever since Roe v. Wade was overruled last year, abortion politics have decisively favored Democrats.

In every state where abortion rights have been on the ballot, including Republican strongholds like Kentucky and Kansas, voters have defeated the antiabortion position.

The most recent victory for supporters of abortion rights came earlier this month in Ohio, where voters handily defeated a ballot question that didn't even mention abortion — it concerned the level of support required to amend the state's constitution — but was understood to be backed by abortion opponents.

In last fall's midterm elections, the widely predicted "red wave" never materialized, in significant part because the abortion issue hurt Republicans. Voters even flipped control of the Wisconsin Supreme Court from right to left, electing a judge who had campaigned on a platform of explicit support for abortion rights.

This string of losses was surely not what Republicans were hoping for in the wake of Roe's reversal in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, though it is what some in the antiabortion camp, your humble correspondent included, had predicted. "The thought of overturning Roe fills Democrats with alarm, but it shouldn't," I remarked in a 2018 column. "Return abortion to the democratic arena, and Democrats might be surprised at how much they stand to gain."

Similarly, more than a year before Dobbs was decided, I explained why "a post-Roe world is apt to be less congenial to the GOP that craves it, and not nearly as challenging to the Democratic Party that doesn't."

Many Republicans are now struggling to find their footing on the abortion issue, navigating between the strong and sincere opposition to virtually all abortions among the party's base while trying not to write off general election voters who support moderate abortion rights. So it stands to reason that abortion was the most discussed issue during the Republican presidential candidates' debate in Milwaukee last week. It also stands to reason that several of the candidates were at pains to remind viewers of just how extreme the Democratic position on abortion is.

That extremism is commonly ignored, downplayed, or denied by the mainstream media. But there is no question that, within the ranks of the Democratic Party and its allies, support for the right to legally end a pregnancy is close to absolute — "abortion on demand and without apology," as the signs at countless abortion-rights rallies have often proclaimed.

In 2004, the Democratic Party platform famously declared that "abortion should be safe, legal, and rare." As a candidate for president four years later, then-Senator Hillary Clinton underscored that formulation, adding: "By rare, I mean rare."

But "rare" has since been edited out of the party's abortion plank. Today, open praise for abortion — not merely the right to choose but abortion itself — has become common in activist circles. "We're not just pro-choice," tweeted the Women's March last fall. "We are proudly, unapologetically pro-abortion." The Massachusetts chapter of Planned Parenthood urges supporters "to go beyond choice language when we're talking about abortion."

Use of the term "pro-choice" is "hurtful to people who've had abortions," it argues, because it implies that abortion isn't objectively a good thing. When Senator Ed Markey attended President Biden's State of the Union address this year, he wore a large pro-abortion pin on his suit jacket. It spelled out the word "ABORTION" in large gold letters, with the first "O" surrounding a heart. Several times during the Republican debate, mention was made of the fact that Democrats want "to allow abortion all the way up to the moment of birth." That was Florida Governor Ron DeSantis's wording, but the same basic point was made by Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina and former Arkansas governor Asa Hutchinson. It was also made by one of the debate moderators, Fox News host Martha MacCallum, who observed that there are "about five" states "that allow abortion up until the time of birth."

That is admittedly a provocative way to characterize the Democrats' extreme abortion posture, and several on the left rushed to refute it. "No one supports abortion up until birth," former White House press secretary (and current MSNBC talking head) Jen Psaki tweeted indignantly. The reliably liberal FactCheck.org called the claim "misleading," while The New York Times accused the GOP candidates of "falsely" stating the Democratic position.

But there is nothing false about it. The Democratic Party categorically affirms an unlimited right to abortion. "We believe unequivocally . . . that every woman should be able to access high-quality reproductive health care services, including safe and legal abortion," the 2020 Democratic platform states. It calls explicitly for the abolition of every existing legal limitation on abortion ("repeal the Title X domestic gag rule . . . restore federal funding for Planned Parenthood . . . fight to overturn federal and state laws that create barriers to reproductive health and rights . . . repeal the Hyde Amendment . . . protect and codify the right to reproductive freedom"). There is not a single legal limitation on abortion that most Democratic Party leaders and activists would accept.

The proposed Women's Health Protection Act, the legislation to "codify Roe" backed by most congressional Democrats, would establish a nationwide right to abortion, overriding all state laws banning abortion at any stage. The bill provides that abortion would be lawful even after fetal viability, so long as a "health care provider" — which need not be a doctor — determines that ending the pregnancy is necessary to preserve the "life or health" of the mother. That was the standard created under Roe v. Wade. But in the companion case of Doe v. Bolton decided the same day, the justices ruled that "health" could refer to any consideration — "physical, emotional, psychological, familial." Under such a limitless definition, the exception swallowed the rule, making abortion lawful at any stage of pregnancy.

No, Democrats do not say in so many words that they endorse abortion through all nine months of pregnancy. But just try to find a progressive leader or Democratic candidate who will specify the legal limits on abortion they do endorse. Their refusal to accept any restriction on "choice," no matter how measured, is the counterpart to hard-liners in the GOP who would make it virtually impossible to terminate any pregnancy. When Biden advertises that he is "bringing Roe back," that is what he means.

Most voters are not in either extremist camp. I'm pro-life, but I acknowledge that Democrats have good reason to point out just how far some Republicans will go to prevent any and all abortions. It makes just as much sense for Republicans to point out how far Democrats will go to protect any and all abortions.

Jeff Jacoby is a columnist for The Boston Globe, from which this is reprinted with permission."