MAGA's Abuser Problem

8.4.26

THE QUICK & DIRTY:

Ballot Box: Previewing today’s primaries in Arizona, Kansas, and Missouri

MAGA’s Abuser Problem: Allegations against Rep. Max Miller, plus a disturbing new poll

In the Nation: The ‘defund’ movement continues, while anti-abortion extremism surges, plus potential roadblocks to Todd Blanche’s AG nomination

Anti-Abortion Strategy: Making ‘abortion pill reversal’ feminist

Stats & Studies: New research on abortion and mental health

Massachusetts Leads the Way: An exciting bill to expand access heads to Gov. Healey’s desk

Ballot Box

Today is a major primary election day, and reproductive freedom is front and center at the ballot box in Arizona, Kansas, Michigan, Missouri, Virginia, and Washington. Here’s what to expect going into tonight.

In Arizona, Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs and Democratic AG Kris Mayes have been campaigning for reelection on their pivotal roles in keeping abortion legal in the state, and reversing an 1864 abortion ban. (Since then, voters also did away with a 15-week ban by codifying abortion protections in a 2024 ballot measure.)

GOP gubernatorial candidate Rep. Andy Biggs, the Republican frontrunner, is an insurrectionist who’s proposed a national abortion ban in Congress four separate times. Biggs is expected to cruise to victory—putting an anti-abortion radical against Arizona’s pro-choice governor this November.

Last week, we told you about new polling from Reproductive Freedom for All that showed eight in 10 voters in the three battleground states—including Arizona—believe the right to abortion must be protected. But Arizona Mirror notes that here lies a crucial challenge for Democratic candidates: not enough voters recognize the immediate threat to abortion rights as clearly as they do the threat to, say, Medicaid.

That’s exactly why you can expect to see GOP candidates go all in on denying or downplaying their anti-abortion records in the coming months.

Four years after Kansas voters defeated a sneaky anti-abortion ballot measure in the first major post-Dobbs ballot box victory, another sneaky anti-abortion ballot measure is on the docket. We’ve covered this one extensively over the last several months. The “Kansas Elections for Supreme Court Justices Amendment” would change the state’s Supreme Court system so justices are elected, rather than appointed. (Right now, a nine-person panel sends three candidates for justices to the governor, who then appoints their pick.)

The Brennan Center notes that the measure is designed to give the GOP-controlled legislature key decision-making power in the state Supreme Court’s makeup. In other words, Kansas Republicans see it as their best chance to reverse a 2019 state Supreme Court ruling that enshrined a constitutional right to abortion. Planned Parenthood Great Plains Votes warns that the measure “is about banning abortion and restricting rights that Kansans have demanded they keep.”

The Kansas City Star’s editorial board called on voters to reject the ballot measure, stating that they “firmly believe the proposal was put before voters to continue Republican lawmakers’ assault on women’s reproductive rights in the state.”

“The push to elect state Supreme Court justices is a direct result of the overwhelming and bipartisan defeat of the misleadingly named Value Them Both amendment in 2022. … Notably, the anti-abortion lobby is not hiding its true intent for a measure we can only describe as the latest big government move to take away Kansans’ personal reproductive freedom.”

Meanwhile, Missouri voters will also weigh in on a ballot measure today: Amendment 4, which would substantially raise the threshold for future ballot measures to be successful. The measure would require citizen-led initiatives to win a majority in every congressional district. In other words, the measure would strip Missouri’s bigger, more liberal cities of the crucial electoral power that allowed voters to overturn the state’s abortion ban back in 2024, and, before that, expand Medicaid in 2020 and legalize marijuana in 2022.

Tellingly, Amendment 4 won’t create new barriers for proposed amendments that state lawmakers put on the ballot.

Obstructing direct democracy is a long-time Republican strategy—one with stark consequences. Remember, a decisive majority—57%!—of Florida voters supported an abortion rights ballot measure in 2024. But the amendment failed to pass because it didn’t reach the 60% threshold requirement. (Since then, Florida Republicans have pushed even more restrictions on ballot measures.) As abortion rights ballot measures continue to sweep the nation, expect GOP state-level officials to try to create more and more barriers to keep voters from having a say.

As a reminder: in November, Missouri will vote on Amendment 3—a measure to reinstate a total abortion ban after voters codified protections for abortion in 2024. Speaking of Republicans trying to water down their anti-abortion extremism, which they recognize as electorally toxic: the Missouri GOP has spent the last several months spinning their Amendment 3 as, somehow, supportive of reproductive freedom. They’re framing the measure as protecting the right to abortion for rape and incest victims, and not as a ban on abortion but a ban on gender-affirming care for minors.

In some separate news from today’s primaries, Iowa Democrat Rob Sand is galvanizing voters in his gubernatorial race—in no small part due to his proactive position against the state’s ban. Sand’s GOP opponent, Zach Lahn, is currently trying to frame Sand as an extremist who supports “partial-birth abortion,” which is a made-up GOP boogeyman.

Why? At a recent town hall, in response to a question from an anti-abortion audience member who argued life begins at conception, Sand referenced a Bible verse that suggests life begins at the first breath taken. Lahn’s camp has taken this quote out of context to insist Sand supports ‘abortion up until birth,’ which isn’t a thing.

This is all exhausting, and it’s a reminder that GOP framing of even the most moderate Democrats as baby-killing extremists isn’t rooted in any facts. There’s no point in tip-toeing around their lies. The real extreme position is supporting government intervention in our pregnancies.

Quick hits:

• Maine Senator Susan Collins and her aides are reportedly peeved that as she runs for a sixth term, no one’s letting her forget her deciding vote to confirm Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court—where he famously overturned Roe v. Wade. Boo-hoo;

• And things are getting messy in Montana, where Democrat Alani Bankhead and liberal, Independent Seth Bodnar’s respective campaigns are pressuring the other to drop out ahead of a crucial ballot deadline, rather than split the vote. Bodnar’s campaign has support from a former Montana Democratic Party chair and past president of Reproductive Freedom for All.

MAGA’s Abuser Problem

Despite dozens of allegations of sexual misconduct, Donald Trump has twice been elected president. Two-thirds of MAGA voters self-report that they’d happily vote for a candidate accused of abuse. And, right now, as Jessica wrote about yesterday, the GOP is shrugging its way through another horrific scandal: Congressman Max Miller of Ohio is accused of abusing his wife and child.

Miller’s ex-wife Emily Moreno accuses Miller of holding a gun to her head, throwing boiling water at her, and fracturing their toddler daughter’s collarbone. Miller was previously accused of abuse by former Trump White House Press Secretary Stephanie Grisham, who dated him prior to his marriage to Moreno.

If the name Moreno sounds familiar, that’s because Emily is the daughter of Ohio Sen. Bernie Moreno. And yet, even as the disturbing details of Miller’s treatment of Emily came to light in a July 18th exposé from Mother Jones, it wasn’t until Sunday, August 2, that Sen. Moreno denounced Miller or asked him to step down. (The senator says his daughter previously asked him not to comment.)

Miller has yet to face a consequence, let alone any steps toward his removal. And don’t expect him to step down out of shame: this weekend, Miller released an utterly vile video calling his ex-wife a liar. His proof? Days after an alleged assault, Emily cooked him dinner. “If I had assaulted her, would she have offered to cook me dinner six days later?” he smugly posits. It should go without saying, but: yes. A domestic violence victim would absolutely do everything they could to appease their abuser, for their safety and their children’s safety.

On a bleak but important note, Emily serves as state policy director of the far-right America First Policy Institute. The organization opposes no-fault divorce—their position is that women should have to prove misconduct like abuse or desertion to secure a divorce. This should go without saying, but the requirement that you sufficiently ‘prove’ abuse in court in order to separate from an abuser can be life-threatening for victims—certainly victims who have had a gun held to their head or boiling water thrown at them. Emily also serves on the board of Ohio Right to Life, whose positions could force victims to have their abusers’ babies and further entrap them.

Emily deserves the same help and support that all victims deserve—and her experiences demonstrate just how dangerous her politics are.

As for Miller, who is still shamelessly holding onto his office, it’s clear that across the political spectrum, misogyny and gender-based violence are far too acceptable, because patriarchy pervades across society. But a clear, distinct GOP problem: two-thirds of their base gleefully, readily says they’ll support accused abusers—because, in no small part thanks to Trump and MAGA brainwashing, they automatically see victims as liars with an agenda.

And, yes: I’ll make this about abortion. Abortion bans are gender-based violence, meaning gender-based violence is baked into the very fabric of the GOP’s platform. Of course they’ll embrace candidates accused of gender-based violence: to do so is a core piece of their political identity.

In the Nation

As we await the confirmation vote for attorney general nominee Todd Blanche, POLITICO reports that in a private meeting with faith leaders last week, Blanche promised that the Justice Department was working with the HHS, FDA, and White House “so that the Dobbs decision becomes permanent in every single state.” Blanche also said the DOJ was “putting practices and policies in place” to stop providers from shipping abortion pills into banned states.

Jessica is digging into this now, and will have much more for you tomorrow—including audio clips of that call—but in the meantime, make sure read the whole POLITICO piece.

For now, let’s get into some other important reporting on Blanche. Last week, Paul Vaughn, a criminal anti-abortion protester prosecuted by the Biden administration, received a seven-figure payout for so-called ‘anti-Christian discrimination.’ The New York Times reports that one crucial source of contention in Blanche’s nomination has been his support for a slush fund to grant payouts to Trump supporters prosecuted under the Biden administration. The fund could offer payouts to literal insurrectionists, and as a result, even some Senate Republicans like lame-duck Sen. John Cornyn have expressed misgivings about voting to confirm Blanche.

But as the Times notes, the payout for Vaughn shows how the DOJ doesn’t even need to explicitly carve out a slush fund for Trump’s cronies and supporters—they can simply make up BS ‘anti-Christian discrimination’ claims and continue rendering similar settlements.

And, nearly a month after the expiration of the ‘defund’ provision on Planned Parenthood, anti-abortion groups are still lashing out. The conservative Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission insists (🚩) there are still “legislative pathways in Congress to renew the now-expired defund provision.” At the end of last month, Speaker Mike Johnson told the Washington Examiner, “I come from the pro-life movement. Everybody knows where my resolve is. We’re going to get the job done as soon as we can.” So, as groups like Planned Parenthood explicitly warned, the fight is far from over.

Plus: keep your eyes peeled for August 18, as American Catholic bishops have designated (🚩) it a day of nationwide “action” to protest the “rising abortion rate.” As part of a campaign that will stretch until October, the Church in the U.S. is calling for “a focused effort of prayer and action to stop the spread of abortion pills.” Part of this will entail urging American Catholics to send automated messages to pharmacies and pharmaceutical companies pushing them to stop providing abortion pills.

The campaign doesn’t explicitly call for anti-abortion violence or harassment, but it doesn’t have to. Not only have attacks and threats against providers surged in recent years, but in the last few months, the Trump administration has openly egged anti-abortion activists on, releasing so-called ‘reports’ that frame any amount of accountability that protesters have faced as ‘anti-Christian discrimination.’

Quick hits:

• The Economist and Reveal offer crucial context on how abortion pills and shield laws protecting abortion pill providers have allowed the national abortion rate to increase since Dobbs;

• Now-former March for Life President Jennie Bradley Lichter just announced (🚩) her resignation because, contrary to the ‘pro-life’ movement’s insistence that a woman’s place is the home, Bradley Lichter admitted her active career helming a national organization was keeping her from her family.

Anti-Abortion Strategy

For weeks now, a California court has been presiding over whether anti-abortion crisis pregnancy centers have the right to lie to women that medication abortions can be reversed via so-called “abortion pill reversal (APR).” In 2023, California Attorney General Rob Bonta sued Heartbeat International for their false claims about APR, but Heartbeat—represented by Thomas More Society—pushed back, arguing that this violated their freedom of speech.

As the case goes to trial, the anti-abortion movement has increasingly been passing legislation and pushing lawsuits to allow CPCs to act with total impunity. Their goal is for CPCs to be able to violate any number of basic consumer protection requirements, and operate without any state regulation—despite receiving more and more taxpayer dollars.

With the California trial underway, we’re seeing a trend: anti-abortion publications like Pregnancy Help News, organizations like National Right to Life, and right-wing tabloids like the California Post are suggesting that it’s anti-feminist to stop CPCs from lying to women about abortion pill reversal. Conservatives claim this is, somehow, about “choice.” They’ve co-opted the word to frame it as “anti-choice” to stop women from being targeted with dangerous medical misinformation:

A sampling of headlines they’ve put out:

• 🚩 When “choice“ only goes one way (Pregnancy Help News)

• 🚩 Women deserve informed consent – including APR; nurse CEO of California clinics sued by AG (Pregnancy Help News)

• 🚩 CEO of pregnancy clinic sued by Calif. AG advocates in court for patients’ right to fully informed choice (National Right to Life)

• 🚩 Rob Bonta is pro-choice –as long as the choice is abortion (New York Post)

The California Post editorial board cheekily begins:

“A man has gone to court to tell California women what to do with their bodies. That man is Rob Bonta, the state’s attorney general. But wait, you say. Aren’t Democrats like Bonta pro-choice? Well, yes — if that choice is abortion. If the choice is to save the baby, not so much.”

I warned about this very strategy last month: the Thomas More Society argues that if California truly supports a “woman’s right to choose,” they should support women ‘choosing’ APR.

In reality, as-fucking-always, it’s the anti-abortion movement that’s anti-choice: they’re trying to deny our ability to make informed choices that don’t actively endanger us. They’re trying to deny our ability to know we’re receiving health advice from anti-abortion activists rather than actual doctors.

Another important flag: this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to anti-abortion gaslighting. This court case itself is premised around supposed violations of CPCs’ free speech rights, framing anti-abortion activists as victims. In reality, it’s pro-choice speech that’s increasingly under attack.

🔎 New Study on Abortion & Mental Health 🔎

The very concept of “abortion pill reversal” is rooted in a stigmatizing anti-abortion myth: that abortion is so inherently detrimental to one’s mental health, and that ‘abortion regret’ is so prevalent, that we need an option to reverse it. In reality, 99% of abortion patients don’t regret their choice.

While people can certainly have adverse mental health experiences after an abortion, that’s true of any health service—and when it comes to abortion, shame or depression can come from abortion stigma rather than the actual health service.

A new University of Maryland-led study confirms what we already know, finding no correlation between increased mental health medication use and having an abortion.

Why is this study important? Anti-abortion activists are increasingly desperate to weaponize anything to frame abortion—especially medication abortion—as uniquely dangerous. Look at the junk science studies they’ve been pushing since last year, and how they pressured the FDA to ‘review’ mifepristone safety. Part of this propaganda campaign has been to frame abortion as dangerous, for not just physical but mental health.

The truth? Just last week, we learned about a new study that found abortion bans are associated with increased suicidal thoughts in teenage girls. It’s devastating—but it’s not surprising.

Massachusetts Leads the Way

It’s not enough to simply not ban abortion—is your state working to expand access to the procedure?

The Massachusetts Senate just passed a vitally important bill to allow abortion throughout pregnancy, negating the state’s current 24-week ban. The Prioritizing Patient Access to Care Act, widely supported by reproductive rights groups across the state and nation, now heads to Gov. Maura Healey’s desk.

Right now, women in need of abortion past 24 weeks are being forced to leave the state, sometimes driving 500 miles to Maryland—like one woman whose fetus had a catastrophic stroke and only had a 50% chance of survival.

“I continue to hear about patients who still need to travel out of state and pay out of pocket to get necessary care,” state Rep. Christine Barber said upon the bill’s introduction last year. “This bill will ensure that abortion care, including later in pregnancy, is a decision made between a patient and doctor, not lawyers or politicians.”

Anti-abortion activists, legislators, and conservative media have been raging about the bill for weeks—accusing Democrats of trying to sneak through legislation that allows abortion “up until birth.”

Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America even took the opportunity to blast Massachusetts’ existing law, which the group says allows abortions “for babies with disabilities and life-limiting diagnoses.” (That’s the language antis use to shame women who end nonviable pregnancies and those with severe fetal abnormalities.)

No matter what you hear from anti-abortion activists in the coming days, this legislation is what voters want: Over 80% of voters don’t want the government to intervene in our pregnancies—period.

Currently, just nine states and D.C. allow abortion throughout pregnancy: Alaska, Colorado, Maine, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, and Vermont. We’re hopeful Massachusetts will soon join the list.