Republican candidates fared poorly in last week’s midterm elections, largely because of voter anger over the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade — the landmark 1973 abortion rights decision supported by a strong majority of Americans . The GOP was supposed to easily regain control of the House and Senate this year, and it just barely managed to flip the House. Now, Republicans are forced to come to terms with the fact that their mission for at least the past decade — to rid the country of abortion rights — has been deeply unpopular. Some of them struggle to make excuses. read more “You can’t really blame the Republicans in Congress or [House Minority Leader] Kevin McCarthy,” Fox News pundit Greg Gutfeld insisted on The Five Tuesday night, “because they didn’t overturn Roe v. Wade. This was the Supreme Court. So it would have been much better if that hadn’t happened.” Of course, the Supreme Court was only able to overturn Roe because Republicans installed justices on the supreme court who were handpicked by the Federalist Society to do so. The show’s only voice, Jessica Tarlov, fired back at Gutfeld: “Well, I’m glad everybody’s admitting it now,” to which Gutfeld replied, speaking over her, “I say it’s worth it.” Tarloff continued, “When the decision was made, there were very few Republicans who thought it would have the negative impact it did because they believed that everyone would be comfortable with what ‘states’ rights’ meant and that people would just go to next door if they needed to have an abortion.” The televised conversation reflects the realization that many elected Republicans are finally catching on. “Abortion has played a much bigger role than we expected,” Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) said Monday. The story continues Fox News personality Jeanine Pirro also admitted last week that the GOP had no idea how important abortion rights would be in this election. “We thought it was all about the economy, inflation and crime,” he told The Five. So far, Republicans aren’t doing the kind of introspection that would be needed to change course on the issue. Jezebel reported last week that anti-abortion groups are accusing Republican candidates of not being louder and clearer about their plans to ban abortions. On the loss of Dr. Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania, for example, Susan B. Anthony president of Pro-Life America, Marjorie Dannenfelser, had this to say, according to Politico: “We broke our backs to help him win, but he did a very poor job of saying what he would do for the people of Pennsylvania on the pro-life front,” she complained, citing Oz’s refusal to answer whether he would vote for a federal abortion ban after from 15 weeks of pregnancy. He and other Republicans lost, he added, because they “hoped the issue would go away,” which turned out to be “political negligence.” Republican politicians counted on sending abortion “back to the states” as a successful strategy, because that really meant “back to the heavily aggressive state legislatures that will outlaw it.” The six states that actually put abortion rights to a popular vote — including Kansas, Montana and Kentucky — all saw support. The bottom line is that the United States is a decidedly pro-choice country. And as long as Republicans try to impose their rule against the will of the people, they will be punished at the polls. More from Jezebel Subscribe to Jezebel’s newsletter. For the latest news, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Click here to read the full article.
