On The Trail, Senate Democrats Put “Abortion Front and Center”

National Journal: “Dems have been pumping money into ads and events”

In the days since the Republican Supreme Court ruling overturning Roe v. Wade Democratic Senate campaigns have put “abortion front and center,” as Senators “crisscrossed their states attending events” and “lasered in” on Mitch McConnell’s threat to pass a national abortion ban if Republicans win the Senate.

See for yourself:

National Journal: From New Hampshire to Nevada, women Democratic senators running for reelection highlight abortion rights.

July 1, 2022

Savannah Behrmann

• Soon after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, several female Democratic senators in tough reelection races laser-focused their campaigns on abortion rights.

• They’ve dropped major money on TV air time. They’ve crisscrossed their states attending events on the issue. And they’re looking to keep the momentum going until November.

• In particular, Democrats have been pumping money into ads and events in the states of Nevada, New Hampshire, and Washington, where three of the upper chamber’s Democratic women are up for reelection.

• All three Democratic senators have lasered in on comments from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell earlier in May—shortly after Politico released a draft of the SCOTUS decision—saying a federal abortion ban would be “possible” if Republicans retook the upper chamber.

• “American women cannot afford to have a McConnell-led Senate majority or have any of my opponents in the United States Senate. A woman’s most fundamental freedoms will be on the ballot this November,” Sen. Maggie Hassan, the Democrat up for reelection in New Hampshire, told reporters Monday.

• Cortez Masto has labeled Laxalt, Nevada’s former attorney general, “an automatic vote for Mitch McConnell’s federal abortion ban” and has been running television ads against him on the issue […]Audio was leaked Thursday from The Nevada Independent of Laxalt calling the 1973 Roe v Wade decision a joke, and that it made him “sad” Nevada wasn’t a “pro-life” state.

Las Vegas Review Journal: Cortez Masto says abortion rights about freedom for women

July 1, 2022

Nick Robertson

• Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto was in Las Vegas on Friday with health care providers to support abortion rights after the Supreme Court effectively overturned the landmark Roe v. Wade decision last week.

• Cortez Masto framed the fight over abortion rights not as a political one, but as the freedom for women to do what they want with their bodies.

• “Not just a majority of Nevadans, but a majority of Americans support the right of a woman to choose to access health care and recognizes her equal rights,” Cortez Masto said. “This decision was to be very personal, with her family and her doctors, and not government officials weighing in.”

• Laxalt, the former state attorney general, celebrated the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade and previously said he would support additional abortion restrictions in Nevada.

• “There is no question in my mind that my opponent, Adam Laxalt, would support a federal abortion ban that eliminates access to reproductive care nationwide,” Cortez Masto said. “He is out of line with a majority of Nevadans in this state.”

Concord Monitor: On the trail: Abortion front and center on NH campaign trail

July 1, 2022

Paul Steinhauser

• Sen. Maggie Hassan vows that she’ll “fight and never back down” to protect legalized abortion.

• “This decision catapults us backwards, and there are politicians like Mitch McConnell, who’ve made it clear that their objective is to ban abortion nationwide,” Hassan charges in her ad. “We will not be intimidated. I will fight and never back down.”

• In New Hampshire, Democrats have had a head start in the now national full-court press on abortion. The state party and politicians have repeatedly spotlighted the issue for a year –  since the passage last summer of a state budget that Republicans showcased as the most conservative in decades – that included a ban on abortions after 24 weeks of gestation and mandatory ultrasounds for all women before a pregnancy is terminated.