Parental Rights vs Abortion on driving voter turnout..

They just did the head to head thing on those issues in Virginia. How did that turn out?

 

Millions of Americans triggered by the possibility that killing babies might be rendered less convenient.

This is our America.

 

The only places where LGBTQ issues may move the needle for conservatives is deep red states. Iowa is not in play anyway.

 

So called parental rights is as much of a losing issue for "conservatives" as is the abortion issue. Since you decided to use Iowa as an example.
Moms for Liberty Falls Flat on Its Face in School Board Races

And it wasn't just Iowa
Moms for Liberty Candidates Take a Beating in Some School Races

Voters Reject Moms for Liberty

Tuesday’s elections were a different story. In Bucks County, and many other districts across the country, voters rejected a majority of candidates aligned with the group’s agenda in what elections experts said could be a backlash to their priorities.

In Pennsylvania, Iowa, Virginia, Minnesota, New Jersey and other states, voters favored candidates who expressed interest in improving traditional public education systems over those who adopted the agenda of Moms for Liberty, which has been at the forefront of efforts to reject coronavirus pandemic health measures in schools, restrict certain books and curriculum and curb the rights of LGBTQ students, and other like-minded groups.​

 

Opinion | Don’t Believe the Hype About Abortion

The key example offered for this line of reasoning was Virginia’s state legislative elections, in which Democrats held the Senate, losing only one seat, and flipped the House by picking up three. Vox’s Rachel Cohen described the results in Virginia and elsewhere as “a resounding victory for Democrats and abortion rights supporters.” But is holding a 21-19 majority in the Senate and a 51-49 majority in the House really a resounding victory?

I think not. Virginia is a blue state that Mr. Biden carried 54% to 44% in 2020. Last week Republicans won in seven House districts Mr. Biden carried in 2020 by up to 10 points and four Senate districts he won by up to 9 points. Democrats didn’t flip a single district Donald Trump took. These margins don’t fit with the notion that abortion draws large numbers of independents and Republicans to vote for Democratic candidates.

Two factors probably had a bigger effect than abortion. The commonwealth was redistricted before the election. That benefited Democrats last week, according to Sean Trende, a senior election analyst at RealClearPolitics. Since Virginia is blue, the redistricting resulted in more solidly Democratic districts than solidly Republican ones. Mr. Trende was one of the special masters appointed by the Virginia Supreme Court to draw the lines.

Offsetting the Democratic redistricting advantage was the popularity of Virginia’s Republican governor, Glenn Youngkin. An Oct. 16 Washington Post/Schar School poll found that 54% of Virginians approved of the governor’s job performance and 39% disapproved. Only 43% of the same respondents thought Mr. Biden was doing a good job, while 55% didn’t. This favorability advantage for Republicans helped GOP candidates grab districts that normally would have gone Democratic.

 

That was my initial reaction as well. I'd forgotten that Obama won Iowa twice, but Trump won Iowa by over 8 points in 2020. Hard to imagine a dramatic shift, particularly if it's the same candidates this time.

 

The SCOTUS is expected to rule on abortion related cases in multiple states. They are also about to decide if they take up the abortion pill case. Parental rights? We're talking one, maybe two states? There are multiple abortion related cases. Sorry, but abortion is what will once again draw people to the polls

 

I'm a resident of Virginia and although my county (Fairfax) is solidly Democratic, the neighboring counties, Prince William and Loudoun have a number of swing districts. Strictly anecdotal based on television commercials, the ad campaigns of Republican candidates focused almost entirely on the issue of crime while the Democrats focused almost entirely on abortion with the end result being Democratic victories in almost every contest. Abortion may not have been the only factor but it was a significant factor and Governor Youngkin's attempt to blunt the issue by proposing a "reasonable" 15-week ban with exceptions wasn't very effective probably because voters thought that if the Republicans did end up with majorities in both Houses of the State Legislature they would have introduced much more restrictive legislation which Youngkin would have ended up signing into law (anyone remember DeSantis signing a 6-week ban into law in Florida?). Although I'm not familiar with the poll that you cited all that it demonstrated was that Youngkin's approval didn't extend to his ability to influence voters considering that he did campaign on behalf of Republican candidates.

 

Obama won Ohio and Florida 2x as well.

 

There is probably some truth in there but much of it strikes me as typical Karl Rove tortured partisan rationalizations. I don’t think it’s a stretch to conclude that abortion cost republicans a few points of support in 22 and 23.

 

Millions of Americans preferring to label their opponents as baby killers to honestly considering their views for even a minute.

This is our America.

 

Counterpoint: Look at the abortion ballot referendums (including victories in states like Ohio, Montana, and Kansas). Look at the Democrats outperforming expectations despite controlling the Presidency and Biden not being very popular, even with an electorate that shouldn't favor them. It indicates that swing voters are disproportionately not swinging the GOP's way since Dobbs.


EDIT: I'll also say that the author's attempt to compare Virginia in a presidential election to an off-year election is very disingenuous.