Analysis: Republicans were so thirsty for the anti-abortion pot that they scared the average voter

For a long time, the Republican Party used the banner of opposition to abortion to mobilize the most conservative electorate. In the USA, where voting is not mandatory, it is not enough to win the voter’s preference; it is also necessary to motivate him to leave the house and visit the urn. It worked.

Anti-abortion, or “pro-life” positions, as they like to say, have become “mainstream” among Republicans. President Donald Trump insisted on appointing three judges to the Supreme Court who opposed the practice. And they wasted no time. Having a majority of the court, they repelled Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that nationally guaranteed women the right to terminate a pregnancy.

In several states in the South and Midwest, very restrictive rules automatically took effect.

The success story ends here. Pro-life banners fell well among the most conservative, but not among the population as a whole. More than 40 years of legalized abortion have made a woman’s right to decide about her own body incorporated into the average American citizen’s preference.

According to a Gallup poll, only 19% of Americans think abortion should be banned; 80% think it should be allowed, split between those who endorse it in all cases (32%) and those who think it should be allowed on certain occasions (48%). So the end of Roe vs. Wade was not well received.

Kansas, a far more rural and conservative state than the national average, had already given a signal in August that this could happen, when a popular poll determined that abortion should remain a right. Now, in the midterm elections, the effect has returned with force in the country and may have been partially responsible for avoiding what would be an overwhelming Republican victory in the Legislature.

Exit poll by CNN showed that 27% of voters said that abortion was the factor that most influenced their vote, which puts it very close to the economy, the eternal champion. Furthermore, four states, Michigan, Kentucky, California and Vermont, held popular consultations on abortion, and voters in all of them decided to maintain or expand the right.

The imbroglio even helps to understand why the Republicans were better in the races for the House than in the Senate. Through a series of mechanisms, the Republican Party has been selecting candidates and leaders who are more radical than its average electorate, whether on behavioral issues such as abortion, or in defense of the Trumpist thesis that the last presidential election was stolen.

Several of them were successful in the race for a seat in the House, as it takes place through districts that, due to years and years of “gerrymandering” (redrawing the boundaries of polling stations with the aim of favoring the ruling party), are becoming more and more radical.

The problem is that the election to the Senate is not done by districts, but at the state level. There, moving away from the average preference ceases to be an advantage to become a burden. In short, the pro-life flag, while used sparingly, helped the Republicans. But they lost their minds and then went so thirsty for the pot that it ended up scaring off the average voter and even the mildly conservative.

Is there a chance of something similar happening in Brazil? I’m afraid not. In the US, the average preference for less restrictive legislation is clear. In Brazil, the opposite occurs. According to Datafolha, 71% either want to keep the law as it is, only admitting abortion in case of rape or risk to the mother’s life, or restrict it even more. Those who defend its expansion or the end of any limitation are only 26%.

Considering that here Congress has gone even further to the right and that the Lula government will not be willing to go against the Bible bench, the chances of decriminalization all rest with the Federal Supreme Court, which could in principle recognize the decision to follow or not with pregnancy as a woman’s fundamental right. Would it be Roe vs. Brazilian Wade.