JD Vance Messes Up Again

10.15.24

Click to skip ahead: Anti-Abortion Strategy looks at the latest in ‘ban’ vs. ‘minimum national standard.’ In Attacks on Democracy, all eyes on Florida. In the States, news from Florida and North Carolina. Of Course They Want Us Dead reviews the latest in anti-abortion messaging. Ballot Measure Updates look at what’s happening in Nebraska and Maryland. In the Nation, Republicans are calling themselves ‘pro-choice’. Finally, in 2024 news, a shocking new ad put out by Democratic groups.

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Anti-Abortion Strategy

I know, I know. You’re sick of hearing about the terms ‘ban’ and ‘minimum national standard.’ I’m sick of writing about them! But Republicans are ramping up their lies in these last few weeks before the election, so I spoke to Snopes about what it all means. (Even if this is old news to you, stick around—because it appears that JD Vance gave up the game, again, in an interview to Fox News.)

I’ve written about this too many times to count, but here’s the short version for new readers: Republicans are trying to fool Americans on abortion by claiming they oppose a national ‘ban,’ but support a ‘minimum national standard.’ The truth? Those are the same exact thing.

Essentially, conservatives are quietly defining ‘ban’ as a total prohibition on abortion with zero exceptions, even for a pregnant person’s life. (Under that definition, there are no abortion bans in America at all.) That means when a Republican says they oppose a national abortion ban, all they’re really saying is that they oppose a federal law that would ban all abortions without a single exception.

But no one is proposing federal legislation like that! In fact, the most common policy Republicans have proposed is a 15-week ban with some exceptions. While most Americans would call that a ban—the GOP calls it a ‘minimum national standard’.

It’s confusing by design, and there’s perhaps no worse offender of this kind of rhetorical trickery than Vance. At the vice presidential debate, for example, Vance claimed “I never supported a national ban” but instead “talk[ed] about setting some minimum national standard.”

When Snopes reached out the Trump/Vance campaigns to ask how they define a ‘minimum national standard,’ Vance’s team ignored the request for comment and Trump’s campaign refused to give a straight answer. They simply repeated that Trump has “been very clear that he will NOT sign a federal ban.”

Trump repeats this supposed opposition to a national ban whenever he can; it’s a tactic to get headlines he hopes will win back pissed off female voters. In fact, just this weekend Trump said that a national abortion ban is “off the table,” which prompted a whole new round of news coverage that I’m sure he loved.

Meanwhile, though, Vance was mucking things up in a Fox News Sunday interview. I never thought it would be a Fox News reporter who held Vance’s feet to the fire on this, but I’ll take what I can get.

What’s most important to notice about the clip below is that Vance admits that he supports a 15-week ban, which he characterizes as a restriction on ‘late’ abortion. (At that point, even the host asks him if he’s just playing with semantics.) Vance was able to pivot, though, by saying that Trump wouldn’t pass a national ‘ban.’ This is why it’s so vital that someone gets Vance and Trump to answer, directly, what the difference is between a ‘minimum national standard’ and ‘ban.’ Otherwise, they’re just going to keep playing this game.

Something to remember: When Republicans say they support a “minimum national standard,” it doesn’t mean they’d stop at 15 weeks! That’s just one standard that’s been proposed. Twelve and 6 week bans are also “minimum national standards.”

Attacks on Democracy

All eyes should be on Florida right now: What happens with Amendment 4 won’t just determine abortion access across the country, but how Republicans will use state power to quash the will of voters.

Remember, before its 6-week ban went into effect, Florida was a vital abortion access point—people traveled there for abortions from around the entire region. And since the ban was enacted, the impact has been felt around the country.

The other reason Florida is so important to pay attention to right now is that the GOP’s attacks on democracy there have been relentless—and will likely be a model for Republicans in other states. I’ll be publishing an explainer soon on everything that’s gone down in the state, but the most recent attacks include Gov. Ron DeSantis launching a ‘fraud’ investigation into 36,000 already-verified signatures in support of Amendment 4, with police showing up to voters’ homes to question them; DeSantis weaponizing state agencies to lobby against the pro-choice ballot measure (using taxpayer dollars, to boot); and Republicans threatening television stations with criminal charges for running ads for Amendment 4.

On Friday, Republicans pushed forward with their so-called fraud investigation—perhaps one of the most dangerous attacks on the pro-choice measure.

A report from Secretary of State Cord Byrd alleges that over 16% of the signatures gathered for Amendment 4 are invalid. Republicans issued a $328,000 fine against Floridians Protecting Freedom, claiming that petitioners forged signatures in support of the ballot measure.

This is something I actually warned about back in 2022, when I started to hear rumblings of DeSantis going after signature-gatherers. I pointed out that one of Republicans’ biggest problems with abortion rights is how popular it is. Claiming that voters didn’t really support Amendment 4 allows the GOP to both quash the measure and pretend that the majority of voters don’t actually support abortion rights.

While Amendment 4 and its signatures have already been certified by the Secretary of State’s office, this attack could open the door for a legal battle should the measure win. (The latest polling showed that 61% of Floridians support Amendment 4.)

Campaign director Lauren Brenzel says, "Simply put, it’s because our campaign is winning and the government is trying to do everything it can to stop Floridians from having the rights they deserve.”

Some better Florida ballot measure news: The Department of Health attorney who sent the threatening letter to stations over Amendment 4 ads has left his job. We don’t know if it’s because of the letter, but the timing would certainly suggest as much. A Florida attorney has filed an election fraud complaint against the Republican health official responsible for using taxpayer dollars to campaign against Amendment 4. (Previous legal attempts to hold the GOP responsible for weaponizing state agencies against the citizen-led initiative have failed.) Finally, Central Florida Public Media reports that there’s a lot of excitement over Amendment 4 among young voters, who just might be the key to the ballot measure vote.

In the States

Speaking of Florida, this piece from The 19th about the state’s so-called exception for fatal fetal anomalies is a must-read. All exceptions are designed to be impossible to use, but the way women with doomed pregnancies are kept from accessing care may be one of the cruelest examples. (I write about this at length in my new book.)

The main hurdle has to do with what qualifies as ‘fatal’. Is a condition fatal, for example, if a fetus would live for a few weeks? What about days? Or hours? And are doctors willing to stake the careers and freedom on that diagnosis?

The 19th, for example, tells the story of Emily Friend, who was denied an abortion in Florida even though her fetus was diagnosed with Trisomy 18:

“Trisomy 18…is fatal before the first year of life in more than 90 percent of cases. Those who survive are still severely disabled. It was, the doctors told her, a diagnosis ‘incompatible with life.’ Statistically, her baby—if she had a live birth—would only live a few weeks, at most. But with Trisomy 18, most pregnancies end in miscarriage or stillbirth.”

Still, Friend had to travel to Virginia for an abortion because of the uncertainty on what constitutes a fatal condition:

“I wish I could have been home. I wish I could have just been home with my animals and in my house. I wish that I didn’t have to have him shipped back in the mail…”

When I talk about the suffering and cruelty of bans, this is what I mean. And as I’ve pointed out so many times before, it was all planned for.

For more on the campaign to force women to carry nonviable pregnancies to term, read Abortion, Every Day’s “Calculated Cruelty” series: Part I, Part II, Part III.

“Amber was not a statistic. She was loved by a family. My heart is overwhelmed with pain. Some days I can’t even explain it…all I know is a part of me is gone as a mother.”

- Shanette Williams, mother of Amber Nicole Thurman

In North Carolina, Republican gubernatorial candidate Mark Robinson is trying to soften his image on abortion rights. Again. Robinson, who chastised women who have abortions for not being “responsible enough to keep your skirt down,” now says he regrets the language he used:

“I need to be a person that is not standing on a stage screaming down and yelling to a young lady who has found herself in a terrible position of trying to make a difficult choice, what I need to be is a person who’s willing to come down off that stage and communicate with that young lady and tell her all the great reasons why she shouldn’t and should choose life.”

Robinson has also tried putting out an ad revealing his wife’s abortion, and claiming that he doesn’t want to change North Carolina’s abortion law—even though he was caught on tape admitting that he would push for a total ban. If this guy wins, I’m going to lose it.

Of Course They Want Us Dead

Right now, the American Hospital Association is asking a federal appeals court to ensure that Idaho doesn’t use their abortion ban as an excuse to let women die—which seems like a pretty low fucking standard! As you may remember, Idaho has been in a battle with the federal government over their ban and the fact that it violates EMTALA, which requires hospitals give women stabilizing and life-saving care.

In June, the Supreme Court declined to take up the substance of the case, kicking it back down to a lower court. The 9th Circuit is expected to hear arguments in December. In other words, we don’t have final legal word on whether states will be able to claim that their bans aren’t beholden to EMTALA, or that EMTALA doesn’t require abortions. In simpler terms: Republicans are still fighting a legal battle over whether or not they can kill us.

If you missed my column earlier today about how the anti-abortion movement planned for women’s deaths, you can check it out below:

Abortion Bans Are Designed to Kill

In related news, you may have seen this column from David French at The New York Times about Florida’s ballot measure vote and the state’s ban. I had to flag this one section, in particular, where French repeats the same exact messaging I warned about in my column earlier today:

“Properly interpreted (problems interpreting pro-life laws have tragically led to too many terrible incidents), this is not a law that leaves women vulnerable to dangerous pregnancy complications. It has elements that are necessary to assure doctors that they won’t be prosecuted if they provide life- or health-saving care.”

You catch that? Any danger posed to women isn’t the fault of laws that treat them as less than fully human, but the silly lawyers and doctors who are simply misinterpreting the bans!

Now that you know what this messaging tactic is, you will start to see it everywhere.

Ballot Measure Updates

There are ten states where abortion is on the ballot this November, but Nebraska is the only one where there are two competing measures. In addition to the pro-choice measure that would protect abortion rights up until ‘viability,’ there’s a proposed amendment to enshrine the state’s 12-week ban into the state constitution.

But as you know, anti-abortion groups—who can see how popular abortion rights are—have deliberately framed their measure as pro-choice. They’re hoping to trick Nebraskans into voting to codify an abortion ban.

As I reported on Friday, polling indicates that both measures will pass; that means whichever one has more votes will win. Vox has an explainer on the two measures today, and the way the confusion is very much the point—but there’s something else important in that piece that I wanted to flag.

Reporter Rachel Cohen points out that the anti-abortion measure, Initiative 434, wouldn’t just enshrine Nebraska’s 12-week ban into the state constitution—but let legislators to pass further restrictions on abortion. Cohen also highlights a video posted by the Nebraska Catholic Conference, which assures viewers that Initiative 434 would “allow for additional protections to be passed in the future.”

In other words, as Republicans try to feign compromise, they’re already thinking five steps ahead about how to ban abortion entirely.

Speaking of dirty ballot measure tricks, let’s talk about Maryland. Abortion rights amendment Question 1 is incredibly popular; the latest polling shows that it has nearly 70% of voters’ support. But anti-abortion groups are using the language of the proposed amendment to claim that the measure isn’t really about abortion—but eradicating parental rights.

Question 1 doesn’t use the word abortion; instead it confirms an “individual’s fundamental right to reproductive freedom, including but not limited to the ability to make and effectuate decisions to prevent, continue or end the individual’s pregnancy.”

Jeffrey Trimbath, president of the Maryland Family Institute, says that the absence of the word abortion means that “fundamentally, it’s not about abortion…It’s about undermining parental rights.”

Conservatives have tried to use lies about parental rights in nearly every state where abortion is on the ballot, but claiming that an amendment is entirely about parental rights is definitely a new strategy. It’s ridiculous, but it goes to show how badly they know they’re losing. They’re not even bothering with an anti-abortion message anymore; abortion rights are so popular they just pretend these measures are about something else entirely.

In the Nation

I wrote a bit on Friday about the Republicans pretending to be pro-choice as we get closer to November. On Sunday, CNN got into the same—examining how House Republicans are feigning moderation on abortion rights in the hopes of winning over voters (women, especially).

What’s especially wild, though, is watching GOP candidates call themselves ‘pro-choice’. CNN points out that several Republican candidates have been using the term to describe themselves, even as their policies remain unchanged.

Obviously, it’s hard to take these men seriously. Rep. John Duarte of California for example, not only calls himself ‘pro-choice,’ but argues that Donald Trump is “functionally pro-choice.” Huh?

How long will it be before these terms mean nothing at all?

While we’re talking about abortion-related phrases and GOP lies, I wanted to flag this piece from maternal fetal medicine physician Cara C. Heuser in Scientific American. In a moment when Republicans are raging about ‘abortion up until birth,’ I really appreciated Heuser sharing why third-trimester abortions “are moral and necessary health care.” Here’s a snippet, but I recommend reading the whole column:

“Along with the profound sadness that hangs in the room, I often see love and comfort—unbearable grieving but also relief. I hope having some agency and choice in how their devastating situation ends provides at least a tiny salve of solace to this person and their family. What I know is that denying them agency during this time would be barbaric.”

Quick hits:

• The Nation asserts that Democrats must win the Senate to restore abortion rights;

• The New York Times looks at how abortion rights could decide control of state Supreme Courts;

• And more on the poll showing that abortion is the top election issue for young American women.

2024

Two democratic groups have launched a multimillion dollar ad buy attacking Republicans on abortion rights. The Hill reports that ads from Progress Action Fund and Defend the Vote will air in seven battleground states on television and online. Progress Action Fund founderJoe Jacobson says, “Voters have made it crystal clear that they do not want deranged Republican politicians invading their personal lives, which is why Trump and his allies will lose yet again this November.”

You can watch one of the ads below, but be warned, it’s extraordinarily disturbing. (It features a woman in pain, dying, and being denied care.) The other ad highlights how Republicans want to ban emergency contraception.