“The court effectively forced women in this country to go to the polls to restore the right to choose,” President Biden said via video Wednesday as he signed an executive order aimed at helping Americans cross state lines for abortions. “They have no idea of the power of American women.”
In interviews, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Massachusetts, called on Democrats to be “strong” in their support for abortion access, and Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, the House Democratic campaign chairman, said the Kansas vote offered a “preliminary preview of upcoming attractions’ for Republicans. Congresswoman Elissa Slotkin, a Michigan Democrat in a hotly contested district, issued a statement saying abortion access “strikes at the heart of preserving personal liberty and ensuring that women, not the government, can make their own decisions destiny’.
Republicans said the midterm campaigns would be defined by Mr. Biden’s abysmal ratings and economic concerns.
Both Republicans and Democrats caution against confusing the results of the up-or-down vote question with how Americans will vote in November, when they weigh a long list of issues, personalities and their views on Democratic control of Washington.
“As we add candidates and a much more robust conversation on many other issues, this single issue is not going to produce the full national narrative that Democrats are hoping for,” said David Koehl, a veteran of Republican politics in nearby Iowa. Still, Mr. Kochel acknowledged the risks of Republican overreach as social conservatives push for a ban on abortion with few exceptions that polls generally show are unpopular.
“The base of the Republican Party is definitely ahead of voters in demanding abortion restrictions,” he said. “That’s the main lesson from Kansas.”
Read more about abortion issues in America
Polls have long shown that most Americans support at least some abortion rights. But abortion opponents are far more likely to let the issue determine their vote, leading to a gulf of passion between the two sides of the issue. Democrats had hoped that a Supreme Court decision this summer striking down the constitutional right to abortion would change that, as Republican-led states rushed to enact new restrictions and outright bans on the procedure took hold.
The Kansas vote was the most concrete evidence yet that a large swath of voters — including some Republicans who still support their party in November — were ready to back down. Kansas residents voted against the amendment in Johnson County — home to densely populated, moderate suburbs outside Kansas City — rejecting the measure by about 70 percent of the vote, a sign of the issue’s strength in suburban battlegrounds across the country. But the amendment was also rejected in more conservative districts as support for abortion rights overtook Mr. Biden’s 2020 performance almost everywhere.
After months of struggling with their own disengaged, if not demoralized, base, Democratic strategists and officials hoped the results would signal some sort of awakening. They argue that abortion rights are a powerful part of the effort to portray Republicans as extremists and make the 2022 election a bipartisan choice rather than a Democrat-only referendum.
“Republicans running for office have been quite open about their support for the abortion ban,” Senator Warren said. “It’s critical that Democrats make it equally clear that this is a key difference, and Democrats will advocate for letting the pregnant woman make the decision, not the government.”
A Kansas-style referendum would be rare this election year, with only four other states expected to put abortion rights directly to voters in November with measures to amend their constitutions: California, Michigan, Vermont and Kentucky. But the issue has already emerged as a defining debate in some key races, including in Michigan and Pennsylvania, where Democratic gubernatorial candidates have cast themselves as a bulwark against sweeping restrictions or bans on abortion. On Tuesday, Michigan Republicans nominated Tudor Dixon, a former conservative commentator who has opposed abortion in cases of rape and incest, for governor.
And in Pennsylvania, Doug Mastriano, the far-right Republican candidate for governor, said, “I don’t allow exceptions,” when asked if he believed in exceptions for rape, incest or the life of the mother. Gubernatorial races in states including Wisconsin and Georgia could also directly affect abortion rights.
Other tests of the effects of abortion on races come earlier. North of New York, Democrat running in a special House election this month, Pat Ryan, has made abortion rights a centerpiece of his campaign, casting the race as another measure of the strength of the issue this year.
“We need to step up and make sure our basic liberties are protected and protected,” said Mr. Ryan, the executive of Ulster County in New York, who watched the Kansas results closely.
Opponents of the Kansas referendum leaned on that “freedom” message with ads that cast the effort as nothing more than a government mandate — anathema to voters long distrustful of too much interference from Topeka and Washington — and sometimes without using the word “abortion ” at all.
Some of the messages were aimed at moderates, often suburban voters who switched between parties in recent elections. Strategists in both parties agreed that abortion rights could be highlighted to those voters, especially women, in the fall. Democrats also pointed to evidence that the issue could also boost turnout among their core voters.
After the Supreme Court decision, Democrats registered to vote faster than Republicans in Kansas, according to a note from Tom Bonnier, CEO of TargetSmart, a Democratic data firm. Mr. Bonier said his analysis shows that roughly 70 percent of Kansans who have signed up since the court’s decision are women.
“It’s remiss of us not to continue to focus on this issue until the end of this election season — and beyond,” said Tracy Seffle, a Democratic strategist. “What Democrats need to say is that for Americans, your bedroom is on the ballot this November.”
There’s been a heated debate inside the Democratic Party since Roe was overturned over how much to talk about abortion rights at a time of rising prices and a faltering economy — and it’s likely to intensify. There’s always the risk, some longtime strategists warn, of getting distracted by the issues that polls show still drive most Americans.
Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, said he understood the hesitation of party stalwarts.
“The energy is on the side of abortion rights,” he said. “For decades, that hasn’t been true, so it’s hard for some people who have gone through very difficult battles and very difficult circumstances to admit that the ground has shifted beneath them. But there is.”
He urged Democrats to ignore polls that show abortion is not a top-level issue, adding that “voters are taking a cue from leaders” and Democrats should discuss abortion access more. “When your pollster or your strategist says, ‘Take the abortion issue and move away from it,’ you should probably resist,” he said.
A Kaiser Family Foundation survey released this week found that the issue of abortion access has become more important to women between the ages of 18 and 49, with a 14 percentage point jump from February for those who say it will be very important to their vote in midterm elections, up to 73 percent.
That’s roughly equal to the share of voters overall who said inflation would be very important this fall — and a sign of how life-changing abortion has become for many women.
Still, Republicans said they won’t let their focus drift away from the issues they’ve been pushing for months.
“This fall, voters will consider abortion along with inflation, education, crime, national security and the feeling that no one in Democratic-controlled Washington listens to them or cares,” said Kellyanne Conway, a Republican, pollster and former senior Trump White House adviser.
Michael McAdams, communications director for the National Republican Congressional Committee, said if Democrats focus the fall campaign on abortion, they will ignore the economy and record high prices: “the No. 1 issue in every competitive district.”
One of the most embattled Democrats in the House, Rep. Tom Malinowski of New Jersey, agreed that “the economy is the defining issue for the people.”
“But there’s a connection here because voters want leaders to focus on fighting inflation, not banning abortion,” he said. Mr. Malinowski, who said he plans to promote abortion rights, said the results in Kansas reaffirmed for him the importance of abortion and the public’s desire to keep government out of such personal decisions.
“There is tremendous energy among voters and potential voters this fall to highlight that,” he said.
Peter Baker contributed reporting from Washington.
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