In this image released by the White House, President Barack Obama and his daughters, Malia, left, and Sasha, watch first lady Michelle Obama speak at the Democratic National Convention on television from the Treaty Room of the White House Tuesday, Sept. 4, 2012. (AP Photo/The White House, Pete Souza)
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The Arizona Supreme Court ruling that restores an 1864 law banning abortion at any stage has Republicans scrambling to distance themselves from the archaic law. The result is some textbook examples of hypocrisy and Republicans screaming in frustration over the results of getting exactly what they insisted that they wanted.
The best example of what happens when a dog succeeds in catching the car may be found in a statement from Republican Senate candidate Kari Lake. Lake now says she “opposes” the ruling and is asking Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs—who defeated Lake in the 2022 gubernatorial election—to pass “an immediate common sense solution” to block the court’s ruling.
But just two years ago, when an appeals court ruled against the law in the exact same case, Lake declared that the ban passed when Arizona was still a territory was “a great law.” During a debate with Hobbs, Lake insisted that she would enforce the 1864 law if elected.
Now Lake is begging Hobbs to bail Republicans out of the disaster they supported and caused.
Lake is far from alone in her frantic backpedaling. Other Arizona Republicans are attacking the ruling and the effect goes far beyond one state.
As The Wall Street Journal reports, the Arizona decision blows up the pretense behind Donald Trump’s claim that he can both destroy Roe v. Wade and somehow remain neutral. It even has Republicans in Florida quaking as they look at how the Arizona law threatens their political security.
As much as Republicans would like to pretend that the Arizona Supreme Court just happened to glance at the Big Book of Ye Olde Laws and randomly weigh in a century and a half ago, that is not how this happened. Republicans did this.
This case was brought in 2022 by Arizona’s Republican attorney general at the time, Mark Brnovich, after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. Attorneys general in 17 other states, led by Arkansas’ Tim Griffin, filed an amicus brief in support of reinstating the ban. It was also supported by Republican Speaker of the Arizona House Ben Toma by Republican President of the Arizona Senate Warren Peterson.
At every level, this ruling is exactly what Republicans said they wanted. What they told their supporters they wanted. It is literally what Lake and other Arizona Republicans campaigned on. There are reportedly enough votes in the House and Senate to overturn the law, but Toma is blocking a vote.
Also signing on in support of the case were half a dozen big right-wing groups, including the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the American College of Pediatricians, and the Charlotte Lozier Institute, all of which also filed amicus briefs with the U.S. Supreme Court in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the case that overturned Roe.
Republicans can lie about it all they want, but the Arizona Supreme Court acted because Trump ended Roe, and Republicans persuaded the Arizona court to enforce a law made when Arizona was only about half a territory.
This is the promise Republicans made to radical anti-abortion forces to secure their funds, fervor, and support in every campaign since Roe. Like Pontius Trump trying to wash his hands of the results he bragged about, Republicans are finding that getting what they asked for isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.
Meanwhile, organizers said earlier this month they have collected enough signatures to put the Abortion Access Act on the ballot this November, which would enshrine the right to an abortion in the state constitution. Voters in seven states, including some that are regarded as dark red, have sided with reproductive rights, and as many as 13 more could see the issue on the ballot in 2024. In Arizona, such a ballot measure—especially in light of the recent ruling—could bring voters to the polls in a way that would be very unfavorable to Republicans this November.
That’s also why DeSantis and other Republicans are shaking in Florida. That state will also have a similar ballot measure this November. Actions like the IVF ruling in Alabama and this latest ruling in Arizona are a wake-up call for Florida voters to remind them that they need to get out and fix this in a way Republicans can’t easily reverse.
Every time this issue is in the news, it increases the chance that voters in those states will want to ensure their abortion rights. And it increases the chance that Republicans lose more elections. That includes increasing the chance that Trump goes down hard.
Reprinted with permission from Daily Kos
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Fox News’ evening “opinion” hosts completely ignored Tuesday’s ruling from the all-Republican Arizona Supreme Court reviving a 160-year-old state law that bans abortions under almost all circumstances, as the network continues its pattern of shielding viewers from stories that could damage Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.
Arizona’s restored statute “forbids the procedure except to save a mother’s life and punishes providers with prison time,” The Washington Post reported. “Under the 1864 territorial law, which went into effect 48 years before Arizona became a state, anyone who administers an abortion could face a mandatory prison sentence of two to five years.” Arizona Republicans had expanded the court in 2016, and every current member was appointed by a Republican governor.
Trump bears a share of the responsibility for this ruling: His Supreme Court appointees were crucial votes to overturn Roe v. Wade, eliminating the constitutional protections for abortion rights which had stood for nearly 50 years and opening the door for statewide abortion bans and other extreme policies. The ruling is also consistent with the GOP’s most recent platform, which calls for a nationwide ban on all abortions because “the unborn child has a fundamental right to life which cannot be infringed.”
In short, the ruling is a victory for the anti-abortion movement’s decadeslong quest to ban the procedure — and could theoretically be treated as such by an ideologically conservative news outlet. But you can tell that Fox’s stars and executives, who prioritize their effort to return Trump to the White House, think the story undermines that goal because the network is giving it minimal airtime.
Fox provided a mere 12 minutes of coverage to the Arizona ruling on Tuesday; America Reports, Your World, and Special Report were the network’s only programs to address it at all. By contrast, CNN gave the ruling 2 hours of airtime across 8 shows, while MSNBC provided 2 hours and 20 minutes of coverage over 9 shows.
Some Fox coverage acknowledged the ruling — and abortion more broadly — could pose a serious threat to Trump’s presidential campaign. Chief political anchor Bret Baier noted that the story is “politically harmful to Republicans kind of across the board” during a discussion on Special Report. In response, Fox contributor Byron York said that it “seems scripted” that the ruling came one day after Trump’s vague statement that the states “will determine” abortion. He continued, noting the political peril the ruling poses for Trump:
BYRON YORK: He's really trying to create a tent that enough Republicans can stand under to elect him in November. So he does that yesterday. Today, Arizona comes out after the Biden campaign jumps all over Trump and said, "States are going to do radical things and Trump is going to be at fault," and then they do this with this 1864 law. It absolutely seems scripted. And Trump is going to get stuck with this time after time after time throughout this campaign.
Meanwhile, hosts Laura Ingraham, Jesse Watters, and Sean Hannity — among the former president’s biggest supporters at Fox — did not address the ruling on their evening broadcasts, even as they all found time to discuss an NPR editor’s claim that the outlet is too liberal.
The trio and their guests had touted Trump’s Monday statement on abortion, arguing that the former president was “entirely right” and had enshrined “democracy” and “states’ rights,” while dodging the political consequences of extreme and unpopular GOP-backed abortion bans.
But Tuesday’s ruling showed the horrifying and politically disastrous consequences of such a state-by-state regime — so they pretended it didn’t happen.
The network did the same thing in February, providing little coverage after the Alabama Supreme Court halted in vitro fertilization treatments in the state by ruling that frozen embryos are legally equivalent to children. Fox also hid bad news for Trump from its audience in March, when former Vice President Mike Pence said he would not endorse Trump over their differences on issues including abortion.
Methodology
Media Matters searched transcripts in the SnapStream video database for all original programming on CNN, Fox News Channel, and MSNBC for either of the terms “Arizona” or “court” within close proximity of any of the terms “abortion,” “Howell Code,” “1864,” “160,” “1901,” “123,” “Planned Parenthood,” “ban,” or “bar” or either of the names “Hazelrigg” or “Mayes” (including misspellings of either) on April 9, 2024, when the Arizona Supreme Court upheld a penal code provision that bans all abortions except in cases to save the life of the mother.
We timed segments, which we defined as instances when the Arizona Supreme Court ruling was the stated topic of discussion or when we found significant discussion of the ruling. We defined significant discussion as instances when two or more speakers in a multitopic segment discussed the ruling with one another.
We also timed mentions, which we defined as instances when a single speaker in a segment on another topic mentioned the ruling without another speaker in the segment engaging with the comment, and teasers, which we defined as instances when the anchor or host promoted a segment about the ruling scheduled to air later in the broadcast.
We rounded all times to the nearest minute.
Reprinted with permission from Media Matters
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