America’s Abortion Quandary

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The abortion debate in America is often framed as a legal binary, with “pro-life” people on one side, seeking to restrict abortion’s availability, and “pro-choice” people on the other, opposing government restrictions on abortion.

But as the country approaches what could be a watershed moment in the history of abortion laws and policies, relatively few Americans on either side of the debate take an absolutist view on the legality of abortion – either supporting or opposing it at all times, regardless of circumstances.

A new Pew Research Center survey explores in detail the nuances of the public’s attitudes on this issue. The survey was conducted March 7-13, 2022 – after the Supreme Court’s oral arguments on a case this term challenging the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that established a federal right to abortion, but before the May 2 publication of a leaked draft of a Supreme Court majority opinion that suggests the court is poised to strike down Roe. CONTINUED

Pew Research Center

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McLaughlin Poll: Biden’s High Disapproval the Same and Eroding His Political Base

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Our national poll of 1,000 likely voters conducted between April 22, to 26, shows that over the past four months President Joe Biden’s low approval rating and high disapproval rating has remained the same since January – approve 41%, disapprove 57%.

Joe Biden’s ratings crashed after his surrender of Afghanistan, dove to new lows in January, and stayed there. It’s so sad that Joe Biden’s ratings have fallen. No matter what he does, he can’t get up.

Most distressing for Democrats is that Joe Biden’s ratings are eroding in his political base creating a path for Republicans to maximize their base, win the center and attract Democratic voters. CONTINUED

John McLaughlin & Jim McLaughlin, McLaughlin & Associates

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More bad news for Biden: More Americans are blaming him for the state of the economy

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Sometimes understanding political opinion is complicated. For example, electoral observers will be trying to comprehend the rise of Donald Trump in American politics for years to come.

The story of public opinion ahead of the 2022 midterms, on other hand, is, at this point, an easy one to understand: “It’s the economy, stupid,” and unless the economy improves, President Joe Biden and the Democrats are in major trouble.

Take a look at our latest CNN poll conducted by SSRS. The No. 1 issue is the economy, and nothing else is even close. Half of all respondents (50%) said it was the most important issue. The next closest was the war between Russia and Ukraine at 14%. CONTINUED

Harry Enten, CNN

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The Politics of Overturning Roe Are Bad for Republicans

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… Roe infuriated pro-life Americans and made pro-choice Americans complacent. Republican candidates could use the issue to rile up their base without risking an electoral backlash. But if Roe goes down, Americans who want to keep abortion legal will have to vote that way. And those Americans are a political majority.

Polls taken in the last six months paint a clear picture of the coming storm. Few Americans expected Roe to be overturned, and most didn’t want the Court to do it. The numbers vary, but the pattern is consistent: Between half and two-thirds of the public wants to keep Roe, and Roe supporters outnumber Roe opponents by about 2-to-1. …

Meanwhile, pro-choicers have a message with enormous resonance: that abortion policy is fundamentally about who gets to decide whether to end a pregnancy, not about which decision is made. CONTINUED

William Saletan, The Bulwark

Recent polls: Abortion

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CNN Poll: Most Americans say now is not the time to end Trump-era Title 42 border policy

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Most Americans say now is not the time to end a pandemic-era border restriction that the Biden administration hoped to drop this month, but those who say it ought to continue are divided over how long it should remain in place, according to a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS.

The policy, known as Title 42, was put in place by the Trump administration early in the coronavirus pandemic. It allows US border officials to immediately turn migrants who have reached the United States, including those seeking asylum, back to Mexico or their home countries because of the public health crisis. While a majority of the public (56%) favors allowing migrants from Central American countries to seek asylum, fewer (45%) say asylum claims should take priority over efforts to limit the number of people seeking to enter the country. CONTINUED

Ariel Edwards-Levy & Jennifer Agiesta, CNN

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America’s Blue-Red Divide Is About to Get Starker

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The draft Supreme Court opinion overturning the constitutional right to abortion presents a major setback for reproductive freedom in America and offers a potential jolt to the upcoming midterm elections. But it also illuminates another, deeper phenomenon in American politics: the urgency and ambition of the Republican drive to lock into law the cultural priorities of its preponderantly white, Christian, and older electoral coalition at a moment of rapid demographic change.

The fundamental divide in our politics today is between those voters and places most comfortable with the demographic and cultural changes remaking 21st-century America and those most hostile to them—what I’ve called the Democratic “coalition of transformation” and the Republican “coalition of restoration.” A decision overturning Roe v. Wade—especially on the sweeping grounds in Justice Samuel Alito’s draft opinion that was leaked to Politico—would sharpen the confrontation between these two coalitions.

Alito’s draft, if finalized, would place the GOP-appointed Supreme Court majority firmly on a collision course with the priorities and preferences of the racially and culturally diverse younger generations born since 1980, who now constitute a majority of all Americans and who overwhelmingly support abortion rights. It would amplify the already accelerating divergence in the basic civil rights and liberties available to red-state versus blue-state Americans—and not just regarding abortion. It would also solidify the transition toward a political system in which culture, not class, is the principal dividing line between the parties. CONTINUED

Ronald Brownstein, The Atlantic

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