Anti-choice activist Lila Rose today endorsed radio host Larry Elder as California's next governor. Elder is the leading candidate in the recall election attempting to oust the current governor, Gavin Newsom. Rose
says that she spoke with Elder and if elected, he promises:
"1. To use line-item veto power to cut all abortion funding
2. To veto all abortion expansion and abortion misinformation legislation
3. To drop all charges against David Daleiden and Sandra Merritt
4. To appoint judges and regulators who respect the constitutional right to life".
Make California Texas!
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Elder probably doesn't want that "help." Republicans today are the dog that caught the car. As noted above, the most prominent Texas Republicans, and many others across the nation, are largely staying silent about the news. A number of those Republicans who have mentioned last night's move by the Court are trying to downplay it, claiming that nothing has changed and that
Roe v. Wade is still the law of the land even in Texas.
As one
Washington Post reporter
notes, this is not too suprising for those who have been paying attention to Republicans' rhetoric about abortion over the past few years. They like using it as motivation to rally their base, but actually overturning
Roe -- as yesterday's move really does, albeit probably only temporarily -- takes away something for their base to fight for and makes their opponents really, really mad (and the public at large, by a clear margin, favors keeping
Roe in place).
When Joe Biden said in a debate last year that
Roe v. Wade was "on the ballot" in 2020, President Trump replied, "You don't know what's on the ballot. Why is it on the ballot? Why is it on the ballot? It's not on the ballot." Trump knew that if people really thought
Roe was in danger, they'd come out against him. While I think what the Court did just stinks, and some people are going to suffer for a time, in the long run, I suspect it backfires.