Despite having a six-week heads-up via a leaked draft of the Supreme Court’s decision, the Democratic Party appeared caught completely off foot by the Dobbs ruling, which effectively overturned Roe v. Wade.
With abortion laws now the purview of the states, there is also growing consternation in progressive media circles. They fear that President Joe Biden’s tepid response to the ruling, which centered on his offering a brief statement and then boarding an airplane and flying out of the country, has been inadequate at best. Biden mustered some anger at the NATO summit in Spain, but policy-wise, he has conceded there’s not much the White House will do.
While Biden was overseas and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was reading poems, Democratic firebrands Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Elizabeth Warren were offering incandescent but unrealistic ideas to a sympathetic national media. These included the idea of impeaching Supreme Court justices and opening abortion tents on federal lands. The closest the House and Senate Democratic majorities can come to resembling even a shell of codifying Roe would require abolishing the filibuster, a popular idea among the media intelligentsia. Unfortunately, naughty Sens. Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema have already stated that this is a non-starter. Beyond that, the Democrats have no plan for a post-Roe world, an inconvenient truth that they dare not admit to a disheartened base. The base, after all, now increasingly sees a feckless aged majority and a president who seems out to lunch at all times.
However, the main problem for Democrats lies in their extreme position on abortion up to the moment of birth. Roe acted as a warm duvet over the operational procedures of abortion. It allowed Democrats to stand by a “pro-choice” talking point without having to defend it to a moderate electorate still not comfortable with a party willing to celebrate abortion. With Roe lifted, Democrats now have to go about the act of actually selling abortion by campaigning on it at state levels. For the first time in 50 years, national office seekers will have to specify their positions. Democrats will be forced either to stand firm on an unpopular extreme or moderate their positions and anger their base further. As of now, they cannot decide, and they are unprepared.
As far as Biden is concerned, his administration has gone from insider whispers of an aged out-of-touch president, who some party outsiders are already placing seeds to replace in 2024 (hello, California Gov. Gavin Newsom), to loud shouts and flat-out revolt. Take Erin Ryan, a liberal commentator, who tweeted that “Democrats need a mean president.” Writing in the Washington Post, Perry Bacon Jr. claims that the fall of Roe is the culmination of Democratic Party establishment failures. Former Harry Reid aide Adam Jentleson tweeted that Biden’s inaction smells of “loser stink.” Most recently, the Atlantic pondered if Biden is a man out of his moment and in over his head. Putting things more succinctly, Democratic strategist Nina Smith told the New York Times, “It didn’t seem like there was a game plan.”
Making matters worse, the Roe loss was compiled with other administration losses, such as the Environmental Protection Agency’s autocratic executive power and the striking down of New York’s onerous gun control laws. These blows show Democrats the dangers of skirting their congressional duty and ruling by judicial fiat. But it appears that having done so for so long, they no longer have any idea how to move forward as a party.
Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) has written for National Review, the New York Post, and Fox News and hosts the Versus Media podcast.
