In a large majority of states, most people think the vast majority of abortions should be legal:
The immediate constriction of access to abortion that followed helped Democrats overperform in the 2022 midterms and probably continues to power Democratic electoral strength. In part, this is because Democrats have a new, potent organizing argument: protecting access to abortion. In part, though, it’s because most Americans — including a majority of people in most states won by former president Donald Trump in 2020 — think abortion should be legal.
PRRI conducted a huge, national poll on views of abortion, covering respondents in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. It found that not only that do most Americans believe that abortion should be legal in all or most cases, but most people in most states hold that position. Even Republicans are more than twice as likely to say that abortion should be legal in all or most cases than to say it should be banned completely.
The results of the state-by-state poll are shown below. In each state, the segment of the population that supports access to abortion (blue) is larger than the segment that opposes it (orange). On average, there are 8.7 people in a state who think abortion should be legal in all or most cases for every one who thinks it should be illegal. In states that voted for Trump in 2020, the average ratio is 5.6 to 1.
It is the case that support for legal abortion correlates to presidential vote, even more than it does to the state’s White evangelical Protestant population. But even in the most Trump-friendly states, most people support access to legal abortion. Only in seven of the 25 states Trump won in 2020 does less than half of the population support abortion access; in two others, exactly half do.
The various built-in advantages Republicans have in our decrepit constitutional order will mitigate the political damage to Republicans somewhat, but Dobbs is going to have effects on American politics that last well beyond a single electoral cycle. And the policy effect of Dobbs will be to make abortion policy less democratic and further from majority public opinion.
…HIT ‘EM HARD:
This is a pro-choice nation. Everywhere:
