Republicans Think If They Say ‘Abortion Isn’t a Real Issue’ Enough Times, Then It Won’t Be a Real Issue

"This election is not going to be about abortion," Sen. Lindsey Graham said over the weekend of this year's election about abortion. OK, saying it doesn't make it true.

By Kylie Cheung | August 19, 2024 | 4:49pm

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Republicans Think If They Say ‘Abortion Isn’t a Real Issue’ Enough Times, Then It Won’t Be a Real Issue

The moment the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade—leading Republicans in state legislatures to ban abortion and pregnant people to suffer the dire consequences—abortion became the issue of the 2024 election. Regardless, top Republicans seem to think they can engage in some deeply pathetic manifestation ritual and simply proclaim that abortion “isn’t an issue.”

In a Sunday interview on NBC, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) fielded a question about whether he’d continue to support a national abortion ban, despite Donald Trump’s deceitful insistence that he supports leaving abortion up to the states… which is the current, awful state of affairs. “This is a debate worth of work of a great country to have, but this election is not going to be about abortion,” Graham said. “It’s going to be about the economy and a world on fire.”

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Crazily enough, Lindsey, abortion is perhaps one of the ultimate economic issues before us: Seeking and being denied abortion care can push someone deeper into poverty. The costs of traveling across state lines to access abortion care can bankrupt someone, as they pay for transportation, lodging, child care, and miss work. But Republicans like Graham don’t care about addressing or even acknowledging these basic facts—they care about putting as much distance between themselves and reality as possible.

Graham’s comments follow some very similar comments from JD Vance. Last week, Vance told Fox News, “I think most suburban women care about the normal things that most Americans care about, right? They care about inflation, they care about the price of groceries, they care about public safety in the streets where their kids play.” Again: These aren’t separate issues!

And in an unhinged press conference on August 9, while word-vomiting an answer to a question on medication abortion, Trump insisted that “abortion has become much less of an issue” and is “actually going to be a very small issue” this election cycle, which pretty much every poll readily disproves.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), too, is declining requests for comment from news outlets about his position on a national abortion ban, and Republican candidates up and down the ballot are also ducking questions on the issue. While Democrats are striving to rally their rightfully outraged base around abortion, Republicans’ strategy is clear: abdicate all responsibility for their bans, obfuscate, and avoid talking about this issue altogether. The RNC platform barely touches on abortion, though, chillingly, it still manages to call for fetal personhood. We’ll see how all of this works out for them in November!