Anti-abortion advocates found themselves on the defensive after the Dobbs ruling, struggling with a new reality for which they may have been unprepared — the public is largely supportive of abortion rights and opposes significant efforts to ban or restrict the procedure.
At the same time, abortion rights supporters and lawmakers have been hammering home the impact of the decision, making it a driving election issue. Democrats want to keep up the pressure on Republicans and build on their success from 2022, when candidates running on abortion won a surprising number of races.
On Monday, a new coalition of advocacy organizations announced plans to spend $100 million over the next decade to restore access to abortion rights across the country.
The funding will help build a long-term federal strategy to codify the right to abortion the next time Democrats control all three branches of government, using lobbying efforts, grassroots organizing, public education and comprehensive communication strategies to mobilize support among lawmakers and the public.
Also on Monday, President Biden, Vice President Harris and Democrats zeroed in on former President Trump’s role in restricting abortion access.
“Today, our daughters know fewer rights than their grandmothers. This is a health care crisis, and we all know who to blame: Donald Trump,” Harris said at a campaign event in Maryland on Monday.
She squarely put the blame on Trump, saying he “intended” for the three Supreme Court justices he appointed to overturn Roe, calling it “premeditated.”
Abortion rights activists said they feel more organized now, with much larger groups of supporters than those seen prior to Dobbs.
Many said they had tried to sound the alarm about coordinated conservative efforts to bring down Roe v. Wade, but some admitted they got complacent.
“One of the things that we’ve thought about post-Dobbs decision, post-Roe, is how we didn’t have maybe the best strategy to absorb people who were interested in the issue, and to activate them when we didn’t have a crisis,” said Lupe M. Rodriguez, executive director of the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Justice.
