Majorities disapprove of Roe v. Wade reversal and Democrats are ...

(CNN) Multiple polls conducted since the Supreme Court's ruling overturning Roe v. Wade find that broad majorities of the public disapprove and suggest that in the immediate aftermath of the ruling, the decision could be more motivational for Democrats than Republicans.

In a new Monmouth University survey released on Tuesday, 60% of US adults disapprove of the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, with just 37% approving. There's also a significant intensity gap: 53% of Americans strongly disapprove of the ruling, including 84% of Democrats, compared with 29% who strongly approve, including 58% of Republicans.

That's similar to the finding of two other polls conducted after the ruling: an NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist survey (56% of US adults oppose the court's decision, 40% support it) and a CBS News/YouGov survey (59% of US adults disapprove, 41% approve).

In the CBS/YouGov survey, 52% overall call the decision a step backward for America, compared with 31% who see it as a step forward. In that poll, 51% also say it will make the lives of most American women worse, compared with 18% who say it will make their lives better.

Democrats are more apt to call it a step backward (77%) than Republicans are to say it's a step forward (64%), and while three-quarters of Democrats say it will make life for American women worse (76%), only 33% of Republicans see the ruling as making life better for American women.

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Supreme Court: New poll shows 54% of Americans disapprove of ...

Washington (CNN) A majority of Americans -- 54% -- now say they disapprove of the job the Supreme Court is doing following the leak of the draft opinion showing the justices are poised to overturn Roe v. Wade, according to a new poll released Wednesday

The Marquette Law School poll findings represent a dramatic change from how Americans viewed the court in March, the last time the survey was conducted. Then, 54% of respondents said they approved of the nine justices and 45% said they disapproved. Now, only 44% approve.

Taken a week after the nation learned of a draft opinion authored by conservative Justice Samuel Alito that showed the high court was poised to overturn Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 decision that legalized abortion nationwide, the survey underscores the deep opposition to the possible move. Days after the leak, a CNN poll conducted by SSRS showed that Americans remain broadly opposed to overturning the Roe decision, with 66% saying it should not be completely struck down.

The new Marquette Law School poll showed that among Democrats, approval of the Supreme Court following the leak also took a notable hit since March, with just 26% of Democrats approving of the court this month as compared to 49% two months ago. Republicans, meanwhile, gave the court a 68% approval rating this month, up from the 64% they gave it in March.

The Supreme Court's approval rating has been on the decline recently. Last summer, a Gallup poll showed Americans giving the court a 49% approval rating -- and 44% disapproval rating -- that stood in stark contrast to where public opinion on the court was in 2020, when 58% of Americans told Gallup they approved of the court. That new figure represented the first sub-50% rating the court has received since 2017.

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CNN poll: The Supreme Court's draft opinion on Roe v. Wade hasn't ...

(CNN) Americans remain broadly opposed to overturning the Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion nationwide, according to a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS , following the leak of a draft Supreme Court opinion that would strike down the landmark ruling.

Sixty-six percent say Roe v. Wade should not be completely struck down, and 59% would support Congress passing legislation to establish a nationwide right to abortion, including 81% of Democrats, 65% of independents and 30% of Republicans, the survey finds.

But comparing the results of the new poll to one conducted immediately before the revelation of the draft opinion, the impact on the political landscape heading into the 2022 midterms appears fairly muted.

The share of registered voters who say they are extremely or very enthusiastic about voting this fall rose 6 points between the first survey and the second, but that increase is about even across party lines. Among Democrats, 43% now say they are extremely or very enthusiastic, up 7 points. Among Republicans, it's 56%, up 9 points. And voters who say overturning Roe would make them "happy" are nearly twice as enthusiastic about voting this fall as those who say such a ruling would leave them "angry" (38% extremely enthusiastic among those happy, 20% among those angry).

The share of Americans who would be angry in the wake of such a ruling (36%) sharply outweighs that who would be happy (17%), and some of the poll's findings suggest the issue could become a motivating factor for Roe supporters should the draft opinion become the final one. Younger adults are particularly apt to say they would feel angry if Roe were overturned (47% among those younger than 45, compared with 26% among older adults). But younger voters remain far less enthusiastic about casting a ballot this fall -- just 9% of them are extremely enthusiastic about voting this fall vs. 31% of older voters.

More broadly, 37% of Americans strongly support Congress establishing a nationwide right to abortion , more than the 28% who strongly oppose such an action. Half (51%) say that if Roe falls, they want their state to become a safe haven for women seeking abortion, compared with 20% who say the procedure should be banned completely in their state. And the share of Americans who say their views on abortion align more with Democrats than Republicans rose 7 points between the two polls (44% with Democrats, 32% with Republicans in the later poll vs. 37% Democrats, 31% Republicans in the earlier one).

Abortion not the only factor for most voters

Republicans hold a narrow edge over Democrats on the generic ballot test, 49% to 42% among registered voters, a slight improvement for Republicans compared with the poll conducted immediately before the ruling. On the economy -- the issue most likely to be a driving factor for voters this fall -- nearly half of adults (46%) in the latest poll say the Republican Party's positions are more aligned with their own, compared with 31% for the Democratic Party. About three-quarters say that which party controls Congress makes a real difference -- a figure that did not shift between the two polls -- with more Republicans saying so than Democrats (88% vs. 78%).

Those findings suggest the overall picture for the midterm elections is little changed after this week's news , at least in the short term. Only about half of the country say they have heard a great deal or a good amount about the draft Supreme Court opinion thus far (49%), with 51% saying they've heard just some or nothing at all about it.

The poll conducted after the draft ruling became public also finds a small increase since January in the share of Americans who say they would only vote for a candidate who shares their views on abortion; that view increased more among Republicans (from 15% in January to 26% now) than among Democrats (24% in January to 29% now). On this measure, though, the ideological divide tells a different story, with liberals' commitment to a candidate who shares their views on abortion rising 12 points; among conservatives, it's up 6 points.

Should Roe fall, most now say they would like their own state to set abortion laws that are more permissive toward abortion (58%) than restrictive (42%). Those percentages are similar to the results of a CNN poll conducted in January, though about half (52%) think abortions would become at least somewhat harder to get where they live if Roe were overturned. There is a larger share in the new poll compared with January, though, who say that if Roe is struck down, they do not think that abortion would become harder to get where they live (25% now vs. 14% in January). That shift is driven mostly by men: 35% say so now vs. 19% in January. Among women, 16% say so now vs. 10% in January.

Further threats to privacy

In considering the impact that a ruling like the draft opinion might have on other laws resting on privacy rights, Americans are more likely to see a couple's right to marry regardless of their gender as under threat (38% see it as threatened, 35% as secure) than they are to say the same of a woman's right to use contraception (23% threatened, 63% secure) or a couple's right to marry regardless of race or ethnicity (19% threatened, 66% secure). Democrats see more of a threat across the board, including 57% who say same-sex marriage is threatened vs. 21% among Republicans. Overall, nearly two-thirds (63%) say the Supreme Court ought to consider public opinion in making its decisions.

There are particularly sharp divisions by age over abortion, and the strong backing for abortion rights among younger adults suggests an opening Democrats could use to boost their standing with this group, whose support of President Joe Biden has waned. Among those younger than 45, 75% oppose overturning Roe and 68% support Congress establishing a nationwide abortion right, compared with 58% opposed to overturning Roe and 51% in favor of congressional action to codify abortion rights among those older than 45. And 30% of younger people say they would only vote for a candidate who shares their views on the issue vs. 23% among older people.

In the earlier poll, perceptions of each party's alignment with the mainstream are about equal. Roughly half of the public, 52%, say they see the views and policies of the Democratic Party as generally mainstream rather than too extreme, with 54% saying the same of the Republican Party. Partisans are generally comfortable with their own party: 90% of Republicans see the GOP as mainstream, and an identical 90% of Democrats consider their party to be mainstream. Just 13% of Americans view both parties as too extreme.

While Republicans are better aligned with Americans' views on the economy and Democrats on abortion, the two polls show that several other issues are more closely divided. Americans are split on which party shares more of their views on voting rights and election integrity (41% say Democrats, 38% Republicans), helping the middle class (35% Democrats, 32% Republicans), education (35% Democrats, 34% Republicans) and the United States' role in world affairs (35% say Republicans, 30% Democrats). The GOP has a significant lead on immigration (42% to 34%) and crime and policing (43% to 28%), while Democrats do on women's rights (45% to 29%). Other than abortion, Americans' party preferences changed little on the issues that were tested in both surveys.

The two CNN polls were conducted by SSRS online and by phone, with both samples drawn from a probability-based panel. One survey was conducted from April 28-May 1 among a random national sample of 1,007 adults. Results for the full sample of that poll have a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.9 percentage points. The second was conducted from May 3-5 among a random national sample of 800 adults. It has an error margin of plus or minus 4.5 points.

The headline of this story has been updated.

CNN Poll: As Supreme Court ruling on Roe looms, most Americans ...

(CNN) Most Americans oppose overturning the Supreme Court's Roe vs. Wade precedent, according to a new CNN Poll conducted by SSRS, with a majority saying that if the decision was vacated, they'd want to see their own state move toward more permissive abortion laws.

Just 30% of Americans say they'd like to see the Supreme Court completely overturn its Roe vs. Wade decision, with 69% opposed -- a finding that's largely consistent both with other recent polling and with historical trends. In a set of three surveys taken last autumn by different pollsters, support for overturning Roe vs. Wade stood between 20% and 31%, depending on the precise framing of the question. And in CNN's polling dating back to 1989, the share of the public in favor of completely overturning Roe has never risen above 36%.

Fifty-nine percent of Americans say that if Roe vs. Wade were overturned, they'd like their state to set laws that are more permissive than restrictive toward abortion, a preference that stands in opposition to the prediction most make that abortions would likely be restricted or banned in the areas where they live. Another 40% say they'd like their state to set more restrictive laws.

Saturday marks the 49th anniversary of the Supreme Court's Roe vs. Wade decision, which established the constitutional right to an abortion, at least in the first three months of pregnancy. Six in 10 Americans, including 68% of women, say they personally know someone who's had an abortion.

The precedent set by the decision might be overturned by the Court's upcoming decision in a case revolving around a Mississippi abortion law. If so, access to abortion could be banned or restricted in many Republican-led states across the country.

But the poll finds few in favor of that outcome should the precedent fall. Just 20% of Americans would like to see their state ban abortion completely if Roe is overturned and 20% would like to see their state restrict, but not ban, abortions. On the other side, 52% of the public said in the CNN poll that they would like to see their state become a "safe haven" for women who want abortions but can't get them where they live, with another 7% favoring more permissive laws but not wanting their state to become a "safe haven."

Expectations break the other way, though. Nearly one-quarter of Americans, 23%, say they think it's likely that abortions would be completely banned in their area if Roe were overturned, with 32% predicting that abortions would become harder to get, and 14% that there wouldn't be a change in the availability of abortions. Another 30% aren't sure how their area might be affected.

The current opposition to overturning the Court's decision on Roe includes majorities across gender, racial, generational and educational lines. The bigger divides are partisan and ideological: 86% of Democrats and 89% of liberals say they don't want to see Roe overturned, compared with 44% of Republicans and 33% of conservatives. Partisanship seems more closely connected to views on Roe than gender: Similar shares of Democratic women (87%) and Democratic men (85%) oppose overturning Roe. By comparison, 47% of Republican women and 43% of Republican men are opposed.

The possibility of the Roe vs. Wade precedent ending evokes more strongly negative than positive feelings, signaling a possible intensity gap on the issue. Around one-third of Americans, 35%, say they'd be angry if Roe were completely overturned, with another 25% saying they'd be dissatisfied. By comparison, just 12% would be satisfied, and 14% happy. Another 14% say they wouldn't care either way.

Roughly half of Democrats, including 58% of Democrats younger than the age of 45, say they'd be angry. By contrast, 29% of Republicans say they'd be happy with the outcome.

Relatively few Americans say they're planning to base electoral decisions solely around abortion. Twenty percent of Americans say they would only vote for candidates who share their views on abortion, down from 30% in 2019. Another 59% currently say they'd consider it as one of many important factors, and 21% say that they don't see it as a major issue. The number of Americans who say they're using the issue as a litmus test is relatively low among both those who support overturning Roe (25%) and those who don't want to see it overturned (18%).

Americans' opinions on the legality of abortion aren't identical to their feelings about how common abortions should be. Most Americans say, 56% to 44%, that they think it would be a good thing to reduce the number of abortions performed in the US. A 90% majority who favor overturning Roe say this would be a good thing, as do 41% of those who don't want Roe overturned. But both Republicans and Democrats older than 45 are more likely than younger people in their respective parties to say it'd be a good thing to reduce the number of abortions performed.

The CNN Poll was conducted by SSRS January 13-18 among a random national sample of 1,000 adults surveyed online after being recruited using probability-based methods. Results for the full sample have a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 4.0 percentage points.

A majority of Americans back abortion rights, but the support is ...

(CNN) Where do Americans stand on abortion rights? It's a simple and important question, especially in light of the recent leak of a draft US Supreme Court opinion that would overturn Roe v. Wade , but one that is far from easy to answer.

Issue polling in general is tricky, and the issue of abortion rights is particularly hard to poll. While it does seem that more Americans want the procedure to be legal than not, people on all sides of the issue can find something they like in the polling on abortion.

A few months ago, Lydia Saad at Gallup did a great roundup of how Americans responded to the different ways questions about the legality of abortion have been asked. She counted nearly 20 ways and found anywhere from massive support for abortion rights (north of 80% for abortions to save the life of the mother) to massive opposition (only about 10% were in favor of legal third-trimester abortions).

But when it came to the questions that most mirror our current abortion debate, support usually nominally outruns opposition.

On whether Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion nationwide, should be completely overturned, CNN's most recent poll conducted by SSRS showed that 66% did not want it to be overturned. This closely matches a recent CBS News/YouGov poll , which indicated that 64% of Americans want to keep Roe v. Wade as is.

Roe v. Wade, among other things, gave women the unimpeded constitutional right to an abortion in the first trimester. Perhaps not surprisingly, somewhere around 60% of Americans are in favor of keeping first-trimester abortions legal.

It depends on the question

From there, support for abortion rights declines.

When asked whether they want abortion to be always legal, mostly legal, mostly illegal or always illegal, a split public emerges. An AP-NORC poll from last year that 23% thought abortion should always be legal, 33% said it should mostly be legal, 30% said mostly illegal and 13% believed it should always be illegal. (The results line up with the long-term average percentages on this question.)

What these findings tell is that few Americans want abortion to always be legal and even fewer want it to be always illegal. Instead, the abortion debate comes down to coalitions.

In this case, the coalition who want abortion to be at least mostly legal (56%) outruns the coalition that wants it illegal at least most of the time (43%).

An even different question, but one that should be familiar to followers of the abortion debate, is whether people label themselves "pro-choice" (normally framed as pro-abortion rights) or "pro-life" (normally framed as anti-abortion).

Here, Gallup has consistently found a near even split. Last year, it was 49% pro-choice to 47% pro-life, a result well within the margin of error.

In terms of specific time frames, support for abortion rights drops after the first trimester. A recent Wall Street Journal poll found that slightly more Americans (48%) were in favor an abortion ban after 15 weeks than not (43%), if there were exceptions for the life of the mother. This is in line with previous AP-NORC polling showing that only 34% think abortion in the second trimester should be always or usually legal.

When you see these different results, you get to understand why surveys on Americans' opinions of abortion often raise more questions than they answer.

Where the voters are

That said, the ballot box does offer some clues about the questions we should focus on to understand where American voters are.

Colorado, Louisiana, Since 2018, there have been five ballot measures ( Alabama Oregon and West Virginia ) that sought to limit abortion rights. Not all of them had the same wording, though the results were basically what you'd expect, given the politics of each state.

Alabama, Louisiana and West Virginia voted in favor of limiting rights, while Colorado and Oregon went in the other direction.

More interestingly, the results of those ballot measures matched up very well with the percentage of people in those states who think abortion should be always or mostly legal.

Using data compiled by the New York Times' Nate Cohn on this question, I calculated that the absolute average difference was just 4 points between the margin on the ballot measure result and the margin in polling between "always or usually legal" and "always or usually illegal." The median difference was a mere 2 points.

The only real outlier was West Virginia, where a surprisingly low 52% of voters cast a ballot against a constitutional right to an abortion. Polling in this very red state has generally indicated more opposition to abortion rights.

Remember, more Americans believe abortion should usually or always be legal than not, so on this key question, it's fair to say the pro-abortion rights coalition is bigger than the anti-abortion one.

Of course, this isn't the case in every state. Although the polling is close, there are about 15 states where more residents than not think abortion should be always or mostly illegal.

And if Roe v. Wade does get overturned, it'll ultimately be this state-level polling that matters most.

Supreme Court approval tanks after abortion opinion leak, poll shows

About 44% of Americans approve of the job the Supreme Court is doing, according to the new poll.

That number is down 10 percentage points from March, when the poll was last conducted.

Support for the court among Republicans is up slightly.

WASHINGTON – Public approval of the Supreme Court tumbled sharply after a leaked draft opinion in a blockbuster abortion case indicated that the conservative wing of the court is considering overturning Roe v. Wade, according to a poll Wednesday.

About 44% of Americans approve of the way the nation's highest court is handling its job, down 10 points from March, the Marquette Law School poll showed.

Associate Justice Samuel Alito's draft opinion, leaked to Politico earlier this month and later confirmed by the court, was the driving factor in the shift. The unprecedented leak set off protests across the nation, was applauded by anti-abortion advocates and reshuffled the political landscape heading into this November's midterm election.

The survey was conducted from May 9 to May 19.

"It is hard to escape the conclusion that the leaked draft opinion overturning Roe is at the center of this decline," said Charles Franklin, the poll's director.

Approval of the court rose about 4 percentage points among Republicans, who are more likely to embrace anti-abortion positions. But that wasn't enough to offset a huge, 23-point drop among Democrats. Among independents, approval dropped 6 points.

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With lifetime appointments for its members, the nine-justice Supreme Court was designed by the framers to be the one branch of government that doesn't respond to political pressure. At the same time, both liberal and conservative justices have discussed the importance of the court retaining its credibility as an impartial institution as Washington becomes increasingly partisan.

That has been easier said than done as Republican-nominated justices have split with those nominated by Democratic presidents in cases dealing with COVID-19 vaccination requirements, election laws that some view as discriminatory and the death penalty. Six of the nine current justices were nominated by GOP presidents.

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In its most divisive case in years, the court must decide whether to uphold Mississippi's ban on most abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. The law contravenes Roe in 1973 and a subsequent ruling in 1992, Planned Parenthood v. Casey. Those decisions allowed people to obtain an abortion until about 24 weeks of pregnancy.

"Roe was egregiously wrong from the start," Alito wrote in the leaked opinion. "We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled."

The court confirmed the authenticity of the draft but stressed the decision was not final. A majority of the court appeared to leaning Mississippi's way at argument in December.

Marquette interviewed 1,004 adults nationwide. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.9 percentage points.

Approval of the court fell to 49% in September, down from 60% two months earlier, in the wake of a decision allowing Texas to ban abortion after six weeks of pregnancy.

Why the Republican offensive on abortion is escalating - CNNPolitics

(CNN) When three red states finalized severe restrictions on abortion over consecutive days last week, they highlighted the GOP's rising militancy on the issue -- and the political and legal calculations underpinning it.

Separate actions last week in Oklahoma, Florida and Kentucky made clear the red state drive to retrench, or eliminate, access to abortion is escalating as the Republican-appointed Supreme Court majority nears a decision, expected in late June, in which it is widely anticipated to overturn Roe v. Wade , the landmark 1973 decision that established a nationwide right to abortion.

The abortion restrictions these states approved last week all denied exceptions for victims of rape or incest -- a provision that was once a common feature of conservative anti-abortion proposals but has been jettisoned almost completely in the wave of new restrictions approved since 2021. The Oklahoma legislation banned nearly all abortions from the moment of conception and imposed severe penalties on doctors who perform them, including up to 10 years in jail. The Kentucky bill , continuing an offensive already underway in several other red states, prohibited state residents from obtaining medication abortion through the mail, as the federal Food and Drug Administration authorized late last year.

We are seeing this pattern because the Supreme Court's conservative majority has signaled that it is ready to reverse Roe. Now, we are getting a sense of what red states really want to do when Roe is gone. That is why we are seeing bans from fertilization -- as in Oklahoma -- and laws that focus on abortion pills, which will be crucial in determining whether bans will be effective.

Taken together, the sweeping bills finalized last week show how the sympathetic signals from the Republican-appointed Supreme Court majority are changing the strategy of red states. In earlier legislative sessions, Republican-controlled states generally had either passed abortion restrictions designed to provide a test case the Supreme Court could use to overturn Roe or had approved bills crafted narrowly enough that they hoped they could survive legal challenges while Roe remained the law, says Mary Ziegler, a Florida State University law professor who studies the history of abortion law.

But after former President Donald Trump's appointments of Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett established a clear conservative majority on the court -- and particularly since that majority signaled during last year's hearing on a challenge to Mississippi's 15-week abortion ban that it is inclined to retrench or entirely scrap Roe -- the red states are removing the veils to more clearly indicate where they will take the law if the court allows them.

"We are seeing this pattern because the Supreme Court's conservative majority has signaled that it is ready to reverse Roe," Ziegler told me in an email. "Now, we are getting a sense of what red states really want to do when Roe is gone. That is why we are seeing bans from fertilization -- as in Oklahoma -- and laws that focus on abortion pills, which will be crucial in determining whether bans will be effective."

All of this is coming even as a January CNN survey conducted by SSRS found that more than two-thirds of Americans oppose the court overturning Roe v. Wade. Abortion restrictions routinely draw broader support in red states, but even in them, a 2018 state-level analysis by the nonpartisan Public Religion Research Institute shared with CNN found that in most cases, a majority of residents do not want to completely ban abortion -- despite the fact that several states have passed "trigger" bans to do so if the Supreme Court allows it.

Against that backdrop, the severe abortion restrictions rapidly proliferating in red states represent a bet from the Republicans controlling them that they can satisfy the demands of their most ardent base supporters without facing any consequences among more centrist voters in their coalition who are uneasy, or outright opposed, to the new limits. Across the red states, Republicans are placing a similar wager on the broad wave of other bills they have approved in rapid-fire succession since 2020 to limit transgender rights , censor classroom discussion of race , gender and sexual orientation and ban certain books

If that bet pays off, and red state Republicans suffer no midterm defections over this surge of socially conservative legislation -- an outcome that may be the most likely possibility amid the extensive public discontent over President Joe Biden's performance -- pressure inside the party to lurch policy further to the right will only intensify, not only on abortion, but also on the broad range of cultural issues energizing conservative activists.

A rising tide of legislation

These hardline bills continue the clear pattern of the past two years. Elizabeth Nash, who tracks state policy for the Guttmacher Institute, a think tank supporting reproductive rights, says that since 2021, 12 Republican-controlled states have passed laws restricting or banning abortion. Of those, she says, only the new limits approved in Idaho, South Carolina and Wyoming preserve some exemptions for victims of rape and incest.

It is critical that Democrats take this radicalization we are witnessing and make it into a kitchen table issue. That has to be part of the discourse with the American people this year in order to make this into a competitive election, because it is the single most important thing happening in our politics. Simon Rosenberg, president of NDN

More states may follow before this legislative season ends. Republican-controlled legislatures in Ohio and Louisiana may advance new abortion bans, with further action under discussion but less likely in Alabama, Missouri, South Carolina and Tennessee, Nash says. Separately, Missouri , Tennessee and Ohio may bar residents from obtaining medication abortion solely through the mail. Oklahoma could also supplement the ban Stitt signed last week with several additional measures, including a bill authorizing Texas-style private lawsuits (which are also under discussion, if less imminently, in Ohio and Louisiana).

Red states are also discussing ways to extend the reach of their restrictions beyond their borders. A Republican state legislator in Missouri has proposed to authorize lawsuits against people in other states who help a state resident obtain an abortion. After Citibank indicated it would pay expenses for Texas employees who traveled out of state to obtain abortions , a Republican Texas state legislator last month threatened to introduce legislation barring companies that did so from local government contracts.

This increasingly confrontational posture toward abortion in red states tracks with the GOP's trajectory on other social issues. Republican-controlled states have also moved toward more militant positions on LGBTQ issues, not only banning transgender women and girls from school sports, but also initiating child abuse investigations against parents (Texas) and criminal penalties against medical professionals (Alabama) who provide gender-affirming treatment for transgender minors. A broad red-state push to limit how race and gender are discussed in public school classrooms has spilled over to new measures to restrict how teachers talk about sexual identity and orientation (such as the Florida legislation critics call the "don't say gay" bill, which DeSantis recently signed into law), and proposals to make it easier to ban books they don't approve of not only in school libraries, but also in public ones.

Democrats struggling to respond

On every front, ideas that once might have been considered on the fringe inside the GOP have moved rapidly into law -- and, in most instances, inspired copy-cat proposals in other states. Democrats have struggled to respond to this offensive, both at the state and national level. In Washington, the House of Representatives has passed legislation that would codify a national right to abortion and undo many states' moves against transgender youth, but Republican-led filibusters have blocked those proposals in the Senate (along with the House-passed bill that would override the voting restrictions many of these same red states have approved). And though state Democrats have voted almost en masse against these policies, as well as the voting restrictions, the party has been divided over how much to stress its opposition to them in the midterm elections -- frustrating some party strategists in the process.

"It is critical that Democrats take this radicalization we are witnessing and make it into a kitchen table issue," says Simon Rosenberg, president of NDN, a Democratic research and advocacy group. "That has to be part of the discourse with the American people this year in order to make this into a competitive election, because it is the single most important thing happening in our politics."

Of all the socially conservative causes Republicans are advancing in the red states, abortion is probably the issue Democrats feel most comfortable contesting. As CNN recently reported, with the Supreme Court decision approaching, a wide array of Democratic candidates are stressing their commitment to preserving abortion rights.

"I do think they are overplaying their hand electorally, because November could be the first election we've had in decades when Roe is not the law of the land, and I think the backlash will be very swift and severe," says Christina Polizzi, press secretary for the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee.

JUST WATCHED 'White supremacist law': How restrictive abortion legislation targets Black and brown women Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH 'White supremacist law': How restrictive abortion legislation targets Black and brown women 04:31

Polls have consistently found that a solid majority of Americans oppose overturning Roe -- with that resistance extending well into the Republican coalition. In the January CNN survey , not only did 69% of all adults oppose ending the constitutional right to abortion, so did 43% of Republican men and a striking 47% of Republican women, according to detailed results provided by the CNN polling team. In a follow-up question, nearly three-fifths of all adults said that if the Supreme Court did overturn Roe, they wanted their states to make their abortion laws more permissive, while only 40% wanted them more restrictive. About one-third of both Republican men and women joined the majority who preferred that state laws become more permissive.

Support for abortion restrictions, not surprisingly, is greater in red-leaning states, whose populations typically include more of the White evangelical Christians who compose the core of the social conservative movement. When the Public Religion Research Institute tabulated state-by-state abortion attitudes in a massive 2018 poll, it found that majorities in Mississippi, Idaho and Arkansas -- states that have imposed some of the latest restrictions -- said it should be illegal in all or most cases, according to results provided by the institute's research director, Natalie Jackson. But clear majorities said it should be legal in all or most cases in Florida and Arizona, where Republicans have passed new restrictions, and slight pluralities echoed that position in Georgia, Texas and Oklahoma -- three other states where Republican officials have voted to limit access.

More recent surveys have also found unease with the restrictions. Nearly 3 in 5 Florida voters opposed the state's 15-week abortion ban in a University of North Florida poll earlier this year. (Half of those polled were told that the bill offered no exceptions for rape and incest -- and only 51% of even Republican voters who were given that information backed the ban.)

In Texas, a University of Texas/Texas Tribune survey has found state residents split almost exactly in half over the fetal heartbeat abortion ban but a clear majority opposed to the separate "trigger" bill the legislature approved to ban all abortions if the Supreme Court allows it . Other UT polls have found that fewer than about 1 in 8 Texas residents want to ban abortion without those exceptions for rape, incest and the woman's health, and a solid majority oppose the legislation authorizing private lawsuits against those involved in providing abortions. That opposition encompassed a significant portion of Republicans: two-fifths of Republican women and about one-third of Republican men said they opposed the absolute "trigger" ban and about one-third of Republicans opposed the private lawsuit bill.

Voters' reactions may be crucial

The future of the anti-abortion drive in red states -- and the broader movement to roll back civil rights and liberties there -- will likely pivot on how the Republican voters uneasy with these proposals respond to them. These polls show that in theory the sharp right turn on abortion and other social issues from red-state Republicans could fracture the electoral coalition that now allows them to dominate these states.

But in practice, many observers believe, Democrats face significant obstacles to peeling away many Republican-leaning voters unhappy over these issues, in the near term at least.

"That 40% of Republican women may oppose banning abortion," says James Henson, director of the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas at Austin, "but in a campaign situation" Republicans can overcome that hesitance by shifting those voters' focus toward other issues where they disagree with Democrats.

Even if the Supreme Court overturns Roe, he says, the GOP's odds of holding those voters are magnified by a midterm environment in which ordinarily Republican-leaning voters have so many objections to the performance of Biden and other Democrats, from inflation to immigration. "The environment shapes what you can get leverage on and what people will respond to, and it's a very noisy environment right now," Henson says.

Red state Republicans broadly share that confidence. As Matt Mackowiak, an Austin-based GOP strategist, told me earlier this year, "I do not expect to see a suburban revolt due to the legislature's priorities." Rather than losing suburban support over the right's turn on abortion and other social issues, he predicted the Republican vote share will rise "due to parental anger at school and Covid overreach." Republican Govs. Greg Abbott in Texas and DeSantis in Florida, who have pushed some of the most aggressive social conservative agendas, are considered strong favorites for reelection in November, and Tennessee GOP Gov. Bill Lee, who has matched them step for step, does not even have a serious Democratic opponent.

Tresa Undem, a Democratic pollster who focuses on issues relating to gender equality and politics, agrees that few Republican women who support abortion rights are likely to defect from the party coalition if the court overturns Roe. Her extensive surveys have found that the vast majority of them still share the broader unease with cultural change in American society that has energized the GOP coalition in the Trump era. "Republican women don't vote on" abortion, she says.

But Undem thinks the situation could be very different among women who identify as independents. That's especially likely, she thinks, if the Supreme Court's ruling so unambiguously rescinds Roe that it generates sustained media coverage.

"I think if it's outright overturned, and this breaks through, people learn about, it will definitely affect independent women," she says. "I keep going back in my mind to Texas. I was stunned; we did a focus group of independent women and they said things I have never heard. At least half the women said something like this: 'I have never even really cared who the governor was of Texas, but my skin crawls thinking about the issue of (the private lawsuits Texas authorized against abortion providers).' It's the signal of all that other power and control that they think politicians have over their lives."

The January CNN survey underscores that possibility: Fully three-fourths of women who identified as independents said they opposed overturning Roe. Yet with so many other challenges at this tumultuous moment in American life shaping voters' attitudes, it's far from clear that those concerns will translate into votes against the Republicans advancing those laws. Even many voters opposed to the abortion restrictions, Undem acknowledges, may calculate, "I don't think I am going to need an abortion, but I am filling up my (gas) tank right now."

Dani Thayer, left, and Marina Lanae, both of Tulsa, Oklahoma, protest at the state Capitol, Wednesday, April 13, 2022, in Oklahoma City.

The safest prediction may be that if Republican governors and state legislatures run well this November in the states moving so sharply to the right on abortion and other cultural issues, they will be emboldened to continue pushing the frontier of such legislation.

There are no signs the current round of targets represents the outer boundary of ambition for the social conservative movement or the red-state Republican officials responding to it. During the recent confirmation hearings for incoming Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson , three Republican senators suggested the court had erred in previous decisions that prevented states from barring the sale of contraceptives or blocking interracial and same-sex marriages. The total abortion bans, prohibition on mail distribution of medication abortion, discussion of extending private lawsuits across state lines and punishment of companies that help employees obtain abortions outside states that are prohibiting them signal where red states may move next on that front.

Analysis Ronald Brownstein
Mary Ziegler
Florida State University Law Professor
Simon Rosenberg
President Of Ndn

A historically unpopular Supreme Court made a historically ...

I covered the political impact in part in a prior column . But the court's actions in this case may do something more than just affect the elections this year.

The Supreme Court's own reputation is at stake , and the decision to get rid of Roe v. Wade and to upset the status quo comes at a very sensitive time for the justices in a different court: the one of public opinion.

And that's where we'll start our look at the news of the week through numbers.

The Supreme Court is historically unpopular

The Supreme Court is not elected by the voters. A lot of people agree, though, that it's important that the court maintains its legitimacy in the eyes of the public. After all, the court relies on others to enforce its own rulings.

The high court's legitimacy in the public's mind was already at very low levels, and that was before the overturning of Roe -- something most Americans didn't want

Forty-one percent of voters approved of the job the Supreme Court was doing, according to a May Quinnipiac University poll . The majority (52%) disapproved. That was the highest disapproval rating recorded by Quinnipiac since it started asking about the court's approval back in 2004.

The court's standing is a reversal from where things were two years ago when 52% of voters approved and 37% disapproved in Quinnipiac polling.

Quinnipiac isn't the only pollster to show a major degradation in the court's standing. The percentage of Americans (25%) who have great or quite a lot of confidence in the court is at the lowest level ever recorded by Gallup since 1973.

The slide can primarily be attributed to Democrats. Today, 78% of Democrats disapprove of the job the court is doing, according to Quinnipiac . In 2020 , just 43% did. Republican disapproval of the court has declined from 38% two years ago to 28% now.

The reason the public and Democrats have turned against the Supreme Court is pretty clear: It's been seen as increasingly political and issuing decisions that aren't popular.

The aforementioned Quinnipiac poll showed that a mere 34% of voters believed the court is mainly motivated by the law. Most (62%) felt that the Supreme Court is mainly motivated by politics. Four years ago, the split was far more even, with 50% believing the court was mainly motivated by politics and 42% saying it was mainly motivated by the law.

Again, this trend is driven by Democrats. Eighty-six percent of them told Quinnipiac the court is mainly motivated by politics. That's up from 60% in 2018 . Republicans who said the same had barely changed, from 46% in 2018 to 42% now.

It would be one thing if the court was seen as activist and making popular rulings. It's not. Both the Gallup and Quinnipiac polls were taken after word leaked in May that the court was on the precipice of overturning Roe.

Americans agreed with the 1973 Roe ruling. A May NBC News poll found that 63% of them didn't want Roe overturned. Indeed, every poll I know of has shown a clear majority of Americans in favor of Roe.

This has pretty much always been the case, going back to 1973, when 52% favored the decision in a poll by Louis Harris & Associates

Indeed, I'm not sure I can recall another controversial and consequential Supreme Court decision that was this unpopular.

Polls found a split public when the court mostly upheld the Affordable Care Act in 2012.

A majority of Americans (54%) were in favor of the court stopping the hand recount in Florida that effectively ended the 2000 presidential election between George W. Bush and Al Gore, according to a CBS News poll at the time.

A majority (55%) also approved of the court's decision to desegregate public schools in 1954's Brown v. Board of Education.

One could argue that what the Supreme Court has done in overturning Roe is unprecedented from a public opinion point of view.

What effect it will ultimately have, however, is yet to be determined.

Record midterm turnout looks possible

One potential impact of the Supreme Court's latest ruling is that it could make people more likely to turn out to vote -- in a cycle that is already seeing really high turnout.

In other words, we could be looking at a second consecutive midterm with record turnout.

Through Tuesday, turnout in primaries is up 13% in the states that have voted so far compared with this point in 2018. (This does not include states where statewide turnout by party was unavailable for either 2018 or 2022.)

The 2018 turnout, itself, was up from both 2014 and 2010. In fact, 2018 had the highest midterm turnout -- as a percentage of the voting-eligible population -- in more than a century.

The high primary turnout shouldn't be surprising given what we saw in Virginia last year or in the polling so far this cycle. The competitive 2021 Virginia gubernatorial election had the highest turnout for an off-year election in the commonwealth since at least the mid-1990s.

Further, more voters are extremely enthusiastic about voting this year than in either 2010 or 2014, according to CNN/SSRS polling . And that extreme enthusiasm matches how voters felt at this point in 2018.

Under a slightly different metric, ABC News/Washington Post polling has found more voters saying at this point in the midterm cycle that they're certain to vote in November than at similar points in the 2010, 2014 or 2018 cycles.

I should point out that under all these turnout metrics, Republicans have been doing better than Democrats. Turnout is up 28% in Republican primaries from 2018, while it is down 2% in Democratic primaries. Republicans are more enthusiastic and certain to turn out than Democrats, according to the polls.

The fall of Roe could alter that dynamic, at least a little bit. A majority of Democrats (55%) said in a May Kaiser Family Foundation poll that they would be more motivated to turn out in the midterms if Roe were overturned. Only 23% of Republicans said the same.

Put another way, the overturning of Roe means we might not only be looking at record Republican turnout come November. Democrats may end up not being too far behind.

For your brief encounters: School ends in the nation's largest city

Many students, from kindergarten to 12th grade, have been on summer break for a while now. That is not the case in New York City, where the final day of school is Monday

For most elementary school students, 2015 Gallup polling suggests there will be a bit of sadness. The majority of them feel engaged by school. The opposite is true of high school students, who feel mostly bored.

An editorial note: This writer always felt ecstatic at the end of school, no matter the grade. He hated school and never, ever, wishes to go back.

Leftover polls

America's influence: A new : A new Pew Research Center poll finds that 47% of Americans think the country's influence in the world is waning, while 19% think it is getting stronger. A majority (66%) think China's influence is getting stronger.

Poll: Most Americans give Trump low marks on Supreme Court picks

Craig Gilbert and Richard Wolf

A majority of Americans disapprove of President Donald Trump’s handling of appointments to the U.S. Supreme Court and doubt he would pick the “right kind of person” to fill the next opening on the high court, according to a new and wide-ranging national survey about the court by the Marquette University Law School.

But if a vacancy occurs during the 2020 election year and Trump nominates someone to fill it, the public overwhelmingly believes the Senate should hold confirmation hearings.

In fact, a lopsided majority (73%) said it was “the wrong thing to do” when Senate Republicans refused during the 2016 election to fill a court vacancy in the final year of Democrat Barack Obama’s presidency.

The national survey released Monday offers a sweeping snapshot of public perceptions of the court, its individual justices, its role, major rulings it has handed down and issues it could soon decide.

By a large margin, Americans trust the Supreme Court more than either of the other two branches of government (Congress and the presidency), according to the nationwide poll of 1,423 adults taken Sept. 3 to 13.

And most oppose the idea of adding seats on the court, an idea embraced by some on the left who feel Republicans have bent the rules to maintain a conservative majority on the court.

But one idea for reforming the court that does have broad approval (72%) is having justices serve fixed terms instead of lifetime appointments, an idea that is strongly favored by Republicans, Democrats and independents alike in the survey.

Compared to the other branches, the high court is well regarded: 80% of those surveyed have at least some confidence in the institution and almost 40% have a lot of confidence. The court rates much higher than Congress and the presidency in this regard. In fact, 57% said they trust the Supreme Court the most of the three branches, compared to 21% who chose the presidency and 22% who chose Congress.

The court is not perceived as highly partisan or extreme. Notably, its chief justice, John Roberts, is the least polarizing member of the court when it comes to the difference between how Democrats and Republicans view individual justices; Brett Kavanaugh, appointed by Republican Trump, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, appointed by Democrat Bill Clinton, are the most polarizing along partisan lines.

About half of those surveyed perceive the court as moderate. Almost 40% perceive it as conservative and a bit over 10% perceive it as liberal. But only one in 10 perceives it as “extremely” conservative or “extremely” liberal. Most think the court follows “mainly the law” rather than “mainly politics” in reaching its decisions.

The poll also found that, while Democrats and Republicans are sharply divided over key rulings the court has handed down, these partisan differences don’t extend to the public’s view of all cases.

For example, of seven major rulings the survey asked about, the most popular was one that is widely embraced by conservatives: the finding in “DC v. Heller” that the Second Amendment confers an individual right to bear arms. It was viewed favorably by two-thirds of those polled.

But the next most popular ruling (viewed favorably by 56%) was one embraced more widely on the left than the right: the ruling establishing a constitutional right for same-sex couples to marry.

In the same vein, the court’s most unpopular decisions include some decried by liberals (the “Citizens United” ruling allowing corporations and unions to spend unlimited amounts to support or oppose political candidates) and some decried by conservatives (allowing race to be considered in college admissions).

Looking ahead to issues that are now before the court, the poll found:

About six in 10 adults were opposed to overturning Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that made abortion legal in all 50 states. The court agreed this month to hear a key Louisiana abortion case and others appear headed its way.

Almost the same number support a decision that would extend protections against employment discrimination on the basis of sex to sexual orientation, as well. The court has three cases before it that will test whether gay and transgender people are covered by existing employment protections.

A little over half support making it constitutional to use public funds for religious school students.

A little over half think a ban on semi-automatic weapons would not violate the Constitution (even though support for the right to bear arms is broad).

A little over half (52%) would oppose the court striking down Obamacare, with 37% favoring such as ruling.

More than half (53%) would oppose a decision that allows the administration to end the DACA program that permits young people brought to the United States illegally to avoid deportation

In addition to being the least polarizing branch of the government, the court is also the least well-known.

While almost six in 10 Americans could offer an opinion of Kavanaugh and Ginsburg, only 16% could offer one about the court’s most anonymous justice, Stephen Breyer.

About half of those polled knew enough to rate at least three members of the court. Only about a third knew enough to rate a majority of the court’s nine members.

Roberts ranked right in the middle, at fifth, in name recognition, after Ginsburg, Kavanaugh, Clarence Thomas and Sonia Sotomayor. Ginsburg, Sotomayor and Roberts had the most positive ratings, while Kavanaugh — who was at the center of a hugely divisive confirmation fight last year — was the only justice who was viewed negatively by more people than viewed him positively.

Asked about Trump’s handling of court appointments, 43% approved and 57% disapproved. That was lower than his approval rating on the economy among all adults (48%) and slightly higher than his rating on handling immigration (42%).

Asked how much confidence they have that Trump will select the right kind of person if there is another opening on the court, 45% said at least “some” confidence while 55% said very little or none at all.

There were big gaps between Democrats and Republicans over Trump’s handling of the court, not surprisingly, as there were over broader questions about the court’s decision-making. Most Republicans think the court should base its rulings on the original meaning of the Constitution rather than viewing it as a document whose meaning has evolved over time. Democrats follow the opposite pattern, and the partisan gap is huge on this question. Most Democrats think it’s more important that a decision lead to a fair outcome rather than that it “follows the law even if seemingly unfair.” Republicans are the opposite.

There are huge partisan differences among U.S. adults over revisiting Roe v. Wade, over how the court should handle Obamacare and over whether the court should decide that a business owner’s free speech rights or religious beliefs can justify refusing service to gay customers.

But Democrats and Republicans are closer to agreement over key aspects of the confirmation process that has spurred so many bitter partisan fights in Washington.

Majorities of Republicans, independents and Democrats all say it was “the wrong thing to do” when Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Republican, refused to take up Democrat Barack Obama’s nomination of Merrick Garland during the 2016 election year — including 59% of Republicans, 70% of independents and 87% of Democrats.

Likewise, Americans of all political stripes think that the Senate should hold confirmation hearings if there is an opening in the 2020 election year and Trump nominates someone to fill it — including 75% of Republicans, 76% of independents and 62% of Democrats. Questions about the health of the 86-year-old Ginsburg, one of the court’s four more liberal justices, have fueled speculation about that scenario.

Four out of five adults said that if a nominee to the court is “qualified and has no ethical problems,” then senators are not justified in opposing confirmation just because those senators are from a different political party.

And majorities of Democrats, Republicans and independents all say it’s not justified for senators to oppose a qualified nominee with no ethical problems simply because of how they think that member of the court would decide cases.

Over half of Americans in new poll say Supreme Court should ...

WASHINGTON – Nearly two-thirds of Americans say the Supreme Court should uphold its decision in the historic Roe v. Wade case that ruled abortion access was a constitutional right, according to a Washington Post-ABC News poll.

The poll, conducted Nov. 7-10, found 60% of Americans believe Roe should be upheld, versus 27% who believe the high court should overturn that landmark decision.

Three-fourths of Americans, 75%, further said that a person's decision to get an abortion should be between them and their doctors; only 20% said the state should regulate the procedure.

The poll also found only a slight majority of Republicans support overturning Roe outright; 45% of Republicans said they want the ruling overturned versus 42% who said the court should keep the ruling in place. A majority of Democrats in the poll, at 82%, and independents, at 58%, said the court should keep Roe in place.

Women, at 64%, were more likely to support upholding Roe than men, at 56%, though a person's political affiliation was more likely to predict their support for upholding the decision than their gender.

Future of Roe:As Supreme Court hears Texas abortion cases, questions linger about vitality of Roe v. Wade

The poll's findings come as the Supreme Court hears contentious cases from Texas and Mississippi that attempt to either circumnavigate or outright call on the court to overturn its past ruling. The court heard arguments in the Texas case on Nov. 1 and will take up the Mississippi case on Dec. 1.

The Post-ABC poll found that 65% of the public said the court should strike down the Texas law, while 29% of respondents said the law should be upheld.

The Texas law adopts a novel legal mechanism that makes abortion after six weeks of pregnancy illegal, but bars the state from enforcing the law. Rather, it deputizes individual people to sue anyone suspected of having or abetting an abortion, with the possibility of earning $10,000 in state court.

In 1973, the Supreme Court ruled that a woman has a constitutional right to an abortion, and reaffirmed that decision in 1992's Planned Parenthood v. Casey. In Casey, however, the court allowed states to place some constraints on abortion if they find the fetus is viable, a metric that varies in law.

Texas abortion law:Abortion at the Supreme Court: A road map to the cases pending over Texas' six-week ban

Since those rulings, the court has taken a rightward turn as more conservative justices have been appointed to the bench. Republican lawmakers now hope the court's 6-3 conservative majority will reconsider the core constitutional question in Roe when ruling on one of the cases before it.

Mississippi's law is viewed by legal analysts as a direct challenge to Roe. That law bans abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy, a period before the viability standard established by the court, which is generally found to be around 22 to 24 weeks.

The poll surveyed 1,001 adults nationally through cellphone and landline calls. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points

Follow Matthew Brown online @mrbrownsir.