The Supreme Court’s June 2022 Dobbs v. Jackson decision overturning Roe v. Wade may have created a political headache for the Republican Party for years to come, but by fueling a surge of female turnout that prevented a red wave in the midterm elections, the Dobbs decision set in motion a series of events that led to President-elect Donald Trump’s historic reelection.

Before the Supreme Court upended fifty years of abortion precedent, it looked as though the Democratic Party was heading toward possibly historic losses in the House and Senate thanks to President Joe Biden’s anemic job approval numbers. But after Dobbs, Democrats received a surge of support, predominantly from unmarried women, that turned an expected Senate loss into a Senate gain and minimized losses in the House.