Abortion Access Rises as a Voting Issue and Motivator, Especially Among Democrats and Reproductive-Age Women

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Following the Supreme Court’s decision to end the constitutional right to an abortion, most voters (55%) now say access to abortion is “very important” to their vote in November’s midterm elections, up 9 percentage points since February prior to the decision, a new KFF Health Tracking Poll finds.

This heightened interest is greatest among key voter groups who largely want to guarantee access to abortion, including Democratic voters (77% now say abortion access is very important, up from 50% in February), Democratic women voters (82%, up from 55%), and women voters under 50 years old (73%, up from 59%). …

The Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs allows states to make laws about abortion in their state. The new survey finds that most (61%) of the public says they want their state to guarantee access to abortion, while a quarter (25%) want their states to ban it. CONTINUED

Kaiser Family Foundation

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A third major party? Don’t hold your breath

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Three groups — the Serve America Movement, the Renew America Movement and the Forward Party — have announced they are merging and plan to become a third party that will “soon seek state-by-state ballot access to run candidates in 2024 and beyond.” …

Tim Reid of Reuters, who first broke the news, described the party as “centrist,” adding that it “has no specific policies yet.” According to Reuters, the two pillars of the new party’s platform are to “reinvigorate a fair, flourishing economy” and to “give Americans more choices in elections, more confidence in a government that works, and more say in our future.”

The devil is always in the details in politics, and what we have here from the nation’s new major political party is a bunch of gobbledygook. I’m sure lots of voters will be excited by an agenda that includes “no specific policies yet” and from a party that promises to give us “more say in our future.” CONTINUED

Stuart Rothenberg, Roll Call

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Abortion Moves Up on “Most Important Problem” List

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When Americans are asked to name the most important problem facing the U.S., 8% of the resulting mentions focus on abortion. While not high on an absolute basis, this is the highest such percentage since Gallup began tracking mentions of abortion in 1984. Additionally, another 6% of Americans name a related issue — problems with the nation’s judicial system and courts.

Abortion ranks behind three other issues on the “most important” list in Gallup’s July 5-26 update. Inflation (17%) and dysfunctional government or bad leadership (17%) top the list, with another 12% of Americans making general complaints about the economy. In addition to specific mentions of inflation, 5% of respondents mention fuel and gas prices. CONTINUED

Frank Newport, Gallup

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Ipsos Global Trustworthiness Index: Doctors and scientists are seen as the world’s most trustworthy professions

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Across 28 countries around the world, a Global Country Average of 59% rate doctors as trustworthy, while 57% say the same about scientists, with teachers in third place at 52%. As in previous years, politicians are considered the least trustworthy with just twelve per cent considering them trusted. They are followed by government ministers (16%) and advertising executives (18%). CONTINUED

Michael Clemence & Nicolas Boyon, Ipsos

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How Republicans could still blow the 2022 midterm elections

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Sometimes polling trends meet your expectations. For example, you might expect a president’s approval rating to be low when we’re dealing with high inflation and negative growth in real disposable income per capita.

Sometimes, however, trends in public opinion are surprising. Even as President Joe Biden’s approval rating languishes south of 40%, Democrats aren’t just holding their own on the generic congressional ballot. They’re actually improving their position as Biden’s standing, if anything, gets worse. CONTINUED

Harry Enten, CNN

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Beyond approval numbers: GOP’s midterm prospects aren’t a sure thing

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One of the most reliable rules of American politics is that a president’s first-term midterm elections are bad for the president’s party. Since 1950, the president’s party has gained seats in the first midterm only once, in 2002, the first national election after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. …

Midterms are supposed to be referenda, a measure of whether voters are happy with the people in power. But right now, Biden and Trump and 2020 all loom over the year’s midterms. It may be that some voters see this midterm not as a referendum but as a choice between two not very palatable alternatives.

Add in a complicated issue environment and newly drawn congressional district lines and you have a recipe for a November that right now looks confusing and harder than usual to predict. CONTINUED

Dante Chinni, NBC News

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