Chris Lange, FISM News
With pressure mounting over unrelenting inflation ahead of the midterms, President Joe Biden is doubling down on his party’s central campaign focus: abortion rights.
Biden promised on Tuesday that his first priority next year will be to codify federal abortion rights if Democrats manage to hold onto their majority in both chambers of Congress during remarks at a DNC event held at the Howard Theatre in Washington.
The president once again slammed “extremist” Republicans whom he said want to go after Americans’ “right to use contraception,” a term Democrats have purposefully conflated with “abortion” in recent months in an apparent effort to blur the distinction between pregnancy prevention and termination.
Biden went on to promise that, if Democrats can add Senate seats and keep control of the House in next month’s general election, “the first bill that I will send to Congress will be to codify Roe v. Wade.” He also said he would veto any legislation by Republicans to institute a nationwide abortion ban, referring to Sen. Lindsey Graham’s (R-S.C.) proposed bill to ban abortions nationwide at 15 weeks.
“If Republicans get their way with a national ban, it won’t matter where you live in America,” Biden said. “So let me be very clear: If such a bill were to pass in the next several years, I’ll veto it. But we can’t let it pass in the first instance.”
Though Democrats have controlled both chambers of Congress since Biden took office, he said that the public must vote for Democrats next month in order to codify Roe v. Wade and prevent a national ban.
“Right now, we’re short a handful of votes,” Biden said. “If you care about the right to choose, then you got to vote. That’s why, in these midterm elections, it’s so critical to elect more Democratic senators to the United States Senate and more Democrats to keep control of the House of Representatives.”
Abortion has become the central focus of Democrats’ midterm campaign strategy in the wake of the Supreme Court’s July decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health that rolled back federal abortion rights.
Nevertheless, multiple polls suggest that the party’s expectations that repeal would give them a major boost in the midterms were misplaced. Even surveys conducted by Democratic pollsters and left-leaning news outlets have shown that the economy and inflation remain at the top of the list of voter concerns heading into the election, now less than three weeks away.
A Politico-Morning Consult poll released on Wednesday showed that eight in 10 voters said the economy will play a key role in how they vote.
Specifically, 81% of respondents said the economy will determine how they vote, followed closely by 80% who said the same about inflation. Crime came in as the third top concern at 64%. All three of the issues favor Republicans, who have campaigned heavily on each, particularly since the same poll shows that Republicans outrank Democrats in terms of which party voters trust most to handle these issues.
Meanwhile, a New York Times/Siena College survey released this week shows that only 5% of voters ranked abortion as their top concern in the midterms.
This article was partially informed by Axios and New York Post reports.