The pro-abortion “war on women” theme may finally be over – at least if pro-abortion candidates’ talking points are anything to go by.
The Wall Street Journal reported that candidates funded by Emily’s List – a political action committee devoted solely to electing pro-abortion female Democrats – are keeping mum on the abortion issue this election cycle, in marked contrast to 2012’s heated pro-choice rhetoric.
Part of the reason for the shift seems to be geographical – most of 2014’s competitive races are in the South, where pro-life voters outnumber abortion supporters by nearly ten percent. Of the $9.4 million Emily’s List has spent so far this election cycle, $4.3 million went to Southern candidates. In fact, the pro-abortion PAC is the largest single contributor to four separate candidates in the South. But that money hasn’t bought much in the way of positive press for legalized abortion – in fact, the candidates who’ve received the most money from Emily’s List don’t seem willing to talk about abortion at all.
According to the WSJ, not a single one of Emily's List's statewide candidates in Southern states mention their pro-choice views in either TV advertisements or the ‘issues’ portion of their websites. That includes Texas State Sen. Wendy Davis, the would-be Texas governor who shot from obscurity to national infamy practically overnight after filibustering a bill banning abortions after 20 weeks and requiring abortion facilities to maintain the same safety standards as other surgical centers.
In the weeks following her rise to fame, Davis praised abortion as “sacred ground” and a guarantor of “liberty, the freedom to choose what your future will hold.” But as her approval numbers plummeted among Texas women, she took to calling herself “pro-life” and has kept her campaign website and interviews free of any mention of abortion.
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Another Emily’s List-funded candidate, Sen. Kay Hagan of North Carolina, is still talking about the “war on women,” but with a twist: She’s pivoted from defending abortion-on-demand and free contraceptives to complaining about educational budget cuts and corporate welfare.
In a TV ad funded by Emily’s List, a pregnant woman is shown pushing a shopping cart and musing about how her money doesn’t go far when “a baby is on the way.” A voiceover then accuses Republican challenger Thom Tiller, the current Speaker of the North Carolina House of Representatives, of having “cut almost $500 million from education,” while protecting “tax breaks for yachts and jets.” (The Washington Post’s fact checkers gave the ad a rating of “two Pinocchios,” meaning it contains “significant omissions and/or exaggerations … [and is] misleading.” They called the ad a “misfire.”)
Brook Hougesen, a spokeswoman for the National Republican Senatorial Committee, slammed Emily’s List and its chosen candidates for being two-faced. “These Democrats are using these issues to fill their campaign coffers … then remain fairly quiet on the very issues Emily's List stands for back home,” Hougesen told the WSJ.
But Democratic pollster Mark Mellman told the WSJ that avoiding the abortion issue is a matter of pragmatism. “Abortion is not the most important issue to voters these days in these Southern states,” said Mellman, who is assisting Emily’s List candidate Alison Lundergan Grimes in her bid to unseat Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell.
Mellman may be understating the importance of the abortion issue in the region, however: A recent NBC/Marist Poll found that 67 percent of Kentuckians would support banning abortion in all or most cases.
Meanwhile, Emily’s List spokeswoman Marcy Stech downplayed her group’s seeming abandonment of its core mission to promote explicitly pro-abortion female Democrats. “Our candidates are champions for women and families, and that's part of a whole host of issues,” Stech told the WSJ.