(TheLibertyRevolution.com)- Republicans candidates for office are starting to soften rhetoric regarding abortion, as it’s becoming a major issue among voters in the lead-up to November’s midterm elections.
Following the Supreme Court overturning the landmark Roe v. Wade decision earlier this summer, many Republicans turned up the heat to celebrate the victory. They were very outspoken about how good this would be for the country, and many pushed for states around the country to enact restrictive legislation that would place big limits on abortion — if not ban it altogether.
Democrats did just the opposite, of course, dumping in excess of $30 million into advertising that called members of the GOP “too extreme.” The ads also warned that if Republicans were to have control in Congress and even in local state governments, they would fully strip away a woman’s right to abortion.
Those moves have seemingly paid off, at least in the short term. First, Pat Ryan campaigned around abortion rights and won a special election for the 19th Congressional District in New York. Then, voters in the heavily-conservative state of Kansas shot down a ballot initiative that would have imposed restrictions on abortion in the state.
These two liberal victories focused on abortion rights have made many Republican political candidates to reconsider their approach to abortion messaging. Some are either clarifying what their views are on abortion or downplaying them.
Others are still insisting that Democrats are the ones who don’t have a good pulse on what voters in the country really want.
One example of this is Blake Masters, who is the GOP nominee for a U.S. Senate seat in Arizona. He’s trying to take down Democratic Senator Mark Kelly to win a seat for the GOP.
NBC News recently reported that Masters removed a line from his campaign website that read “I am 100% pro-life.” At the same time, he’s launched a new campaign that attacks Kelly. In a new ad that his campaign has started to run, Masters says:
“Most people support commonsense regulation around abortion. But, Mark Kelly votes for the most extreme abortion laws in the world. We’re talking no limits, up until birth. Think about how crazy that is.”
The tone is basically shifting from criticizing abortion altogether to criticizing extreme approaches about it by liberals.
Tiffany Smiley, another Republican who’s running for a Senate seat out of the state of Washington, has run a new ad that criticizes her liberal opponent of attempting to scare voters about where she stands on abortion. In the ad, Smiley says:
“Patty Murray has spent millions to paint me as an extremist. I’m pro-life, but I oppose a federal abortion ban.”
Even Florida Senator Marco Rubio, who would be considered one of the more consistently conservative members of Congress, has backed off his stance on abortion a bit. He recently told CBS Miami:
“I believe that abortion is the killing of an unborn human being and that all human beings are entitled to the dignity and protection of life. That said, I’ve also said that I will support bills that have exceptions. I have in the past, and I will in the future. I will support any bill that saves lives.”
