Will Arizona’s near-total abortion ban, which rewinds state statutes back to 1864, cost Republicans on election day?
“Morning Joe” anchor Mika Brzezinski thinks there’s a chance. A day after the shockingly retrograde ban was passed, she suggested that polls are already showing Donald Trump taking a hit.
“The short term is a disastrous picture for women. Politically, in the long term, I’m wondering how this plays out, because it seems like Donald Trump has self-destructed again,” she said on Wednesday.
The right to legal abortions has been a key election issue that has proven to be an Achilles’ heel for Republicans. As ABC News noted on Wednesday, “Voters have sided with abortion rights supporters every time the issue has been directly on the ballot since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the nationwide right to abortion.”
Brzezinski was referring to the latest Reuters/IPSOS polls, which closed on Monday, before Arizona’s ban was passed. However, the poll, which was published on Wednesday, did ask voters for thoughts on mifepristone after the Supreme Court began hearing arguments about the abortion medicine: The poll showed that most Americans, regardless of party affiliation, support women obtaining abortion medication.
Political analyst and former US senator from Missouri Claire McCaskill agreed that Trump’s shifting stance on abortion may hurt him.
“I want to make sure that we do not let Trump get away with somehow modifying his position. It was frustrating to me to watch network after network report as if it was fact that Donald Trump now thinks there should not be a national ban,” McCaskill said.
“These folks have one goal and that is to make sure government decides what women do when they are faced with a health decision. Government is in the bedroom,” she added. “People need to pay attention and not listen to anybody who says Donald Trump has softened his position on abortion.”
Trump’s comments from Tuesday’s ‘Real America’s Voice’ were then played, in which he says, “Some states are taking conservative views [on abortion rights], and some are less than conservative, but it’s back with the people.”
People who responded to the Reuters poll also expressed concern about Trump’s upcoming “hush money” trial in which he is accused of paying off porn star Stormy Daniels and lying about it. That trial starts Monday in New York.
