Speaking before a swanky crowd of Democratic lawmakers, political operatives, and deep-pocketed donors earlier this month at the annual We Are Emily Gala, Vice President Kamala Harris cast Donald Trump as an enemy of in vitro fertilization.
"In an interview last week, he seemed perfectly fine with a national ban that would make IVF illegal across the country," the White House's lead abortion-rights messenger told the crowd of Democrats gathered to support Emily's List, the group that works to elect pro-choice Democratic women nationwide.
In February, when the Alabama supreme court ruled that frozen embryos created through IVF are considered children under state law, Democratic operatives and candidates quickly added IVF as another bow in their "reproductive-rights" quiver ahead of the 2024 elections. In early March, Harris even began referring to Trump in social media posts as the "architect of the IVF crisis."
Yet it's far from clear whether Democrats' IVF-related attacks are resonating at all with voters, given that Trump — who now believes abortion should be left to the states — has said he would "strongly support the availability of IVF" and most down-ballot Republican candidates are following his lead in embracing access to fertility treatments.
Democrats' response to Trump's federalist approach to abortion this cycle is to tie every state-level restriction to the presumptive GOP nominee. That's a clear indication that President Joe Biden's party still views abortion as a winning issue this election cycle as the 81-year-old incumbent continues to lag behind his GOP opponent in most swing-state polls.
On the stump, Democrats up and down the ballot . . .
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