Where is Kamala’s plan for women? Neither party takes reproductive rights seriously

Ever since the Supreme Court’s intention to overturn the Roe v. Wade decision was leaked in 2022, the issue has powerfully motivated voters, even in strongly Republican areas. In Montana, for example, abortion is legal until the 24th week of pregnancy, but the Republican governor and legislature have repeatedly tried and failed to pass laws to ban terminations. In response, a recent push to ensure that abortion rights were safeguarded from such interference was so popular that the petition to get the issue on to November’s ballot received more than twice the number of signatures necessary.

And Montana is only one of nine states currently organising constitutional amendments and initiatives for the autumn election. Kansas — also traditionally Republican — has already passed similar protections, and also did so with surprisingly large margins. It’s not clear if these attempts are enough to drive typically Republican voters to support a Democratic presidential candidate, but the state-level ballot initiatives have caused higher than usual voter turnout. And as polls are spelling out, Democrats, women and younger voters are particularly likely to see abortion as a motivating factor in their vote.

With this in mind, Trump’s sudden change of tune does prompt one question: could these pro-choice voters be a more important voting bloc for him than those on the religious Right who were instrumental in electing him in 2016? Certainly, the reproductive rights platform does seem to be shifting things this election cycle. In Texas, for example, Greg Abbott has seen his disapproval ratings rise since passing restrictions on abortion, and conversely, Marilyn Lands, who campaigned on a strongly pro-choice platform in conservative Alabama, has made headway by running on a strongly pro-choice message.

Why is this? One explanation is that while elements of the Right have successfully campaigned on the more edgy “family values” matters, against things such as transgender healthcare for children and the teaching of critical race theory in schools, when it addressed more popular issues, such as the availability of IVF and gay marriage, it’s possible they started alarming some of the more moderate voters in their midst. There hasn’t been a major election since the Alabama Supreme Court made its controversial ruling about IVF treatments, so how big an effect this will have on voter turnout and support for political parties is so far speculative.

But equally, if the Democrats were to pick up centrists and undecideds by promising to reverse the damage done to reproductive rights, can they actually be trusted to deliver on their promises, given their past record? The general understanding of American political parties is that the Democrats are good for reproductive freedoms and the Republicans want to bring about some sort of Handmaid’s Tale dystopia. However, if we look past the language politicians use when they’re trying to get elected, and instead at what happens once they achieve office and have the power to pass legislation, we see a slightly different divide.

Since the Eighties, the Christian Right’s stance has evolved from being mostly apolitical to pushing rigid positions on the subject, leaving it hard for a pro-choice Republican politician to now gain any real support in the party. Susan Cullman has spoken recently about how marginalised someone who supports abortion rights can be in the party. More recently, only a handful of Republican governors promised to preserve abortion rights in their states — Maryland, Massachusetts, Vermont, and New Hampshire — and all of them were or are leading states that tend to vote Democrat in Presidential elections. If Trump’s Republicans are looking to bring a more moderate position to women’s rights issues, there is a lot of ground yet to cover.

At the same time, however, there is precious little evidence to support the idea that Democrats are devoted to protecting reproductive rights, beyond appointing pro-choice justices to the Supreme Court. Not only have Democratic presidents failed since the Seventies to reinforce abortion rights — they have also failed to push back on legislation that has shut clinics down, dragged their feet in approving the drug regimen once known as RU-486 for administering abortions, and they have not pursued changing the law that forbids federal funds — such as Medicaid coverage — from paying for abortion services.

Over the years, such moves have restricted access to reproductive rights, making them available only to those who can afford them. The party thus seems to be cynically paying lip-service to those women who are voting for them. After the Dobbs decision in 2023, Joe Biden tweeted that “it’s time to restore Roe v. Wade once and for all”. It’s now a year and a half later, and there was no follow-up as to what that might mean, how Democrats might go about it, and of course no actual restoration.

It’s also important to remember that reproductive rights extend to more than simply access to abortion. And nor have these wider issues been addressed by the Democrats. These are things such as the maternal mortality rate — which is rising at an alarming speed and disproportionately affecting black and poor — and the difficulty rural communities face in accessing prenatal health care services. These are all issues that affect the working class, the vulnerable and the marginalised — the Democrats’ former constituency. Yet no one in the party seems interested in discussing them, let alone other hot-button issues such as surrogacy or subsidised childcare.

Instead, on both sides of the political aisle, all the focus is on abortion — but only in rhetoric and not in specific policy. It’s all very well for a presidential candidate to come up with a jaunty slogan like Harris’s “We are not going back”, but the time for pretty speeches and fiery rhetoric is over. What women need is a plan.

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Jessa Crispin is the author of three books, most recently Why I Am Not A Feminist: A Feminist Manifesto. 

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