Source: Politics<\/p>\n
A higher-than-expected inflation report was threatening to black out President Joe Biden\u2019s big celebration Tuesday of party-line legislation designed to bring down prices. The subsequent plunge of markets seemed to ensure a painful head-meets-wall day inside the White House.<\/p>\n
And then, Sen. Lindsey Graham offered an unexpected soft landing. The South Carolina Republican\u2019s 15-week national abortion ban immediately diverted and divided Republicans and left Biden\u2019s aides shocked at the political lifeline they\u2019d just been handed.<\/p>\n
Administration officials and presidential allies \u2014 including some anxious about appearing jubilant on a day when markets were crashing \u2014 leaned hard into the split screen: denouncing Graham\u2019s bill in increasingly harsh terms while Graham\u2019s Republican colleagues pronounced themselves downright vexed over his decision to offer up a plan more conservative than his previous proposals.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m gonna quote Lindsey Graham from Aug. 7, 2022,\u201d White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said. \u201cAnd he said, \u2018I\u2019ve been consistent: I think states should decide the issue of marriage and states should decide the issue of abortion.\u2019 That\u2019s from his own mouth.\u201d<\/p>\n
So obvious was the apparent ill-timing of the bill\u2019s introduction that one White House aide said a Republican lobbyist friend joked that Graham appeared to be working for the Biden administration. Other aides suggested that the comments continued a Democratic winning streak that started mid-summer and began to imagine holding onto both houses of Congress.<\/p>\n
\u201cDems might need to send gift baskets and champagne to Graham and other Republicans for their selfless act of service today,\u201d another Democratic official told POLITICO.<\/p>\n
The immediate response to Graham\u2019s legislation, which would not just establish a ban on abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy but also allow states to keep and pass more restrictive laws, was a microcosm of the way abortion politics has wholly upended the midterm sprint.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s not as if the images out of the White House were pristine. Live TV coverage of Biden\u2019s speech was bracketed by large red arrows signifying the stock market\u2019s downward trajectory. The more Biden talked about how the legislation would help the economy, the more the markets tumbled. By the closing bell, Wall Street had suffered its worst day since June 2020, with the Dow dropping more than 1,250 points.<\/p>\n
But Democrats, who have been on the defensive for months over stubbornly high inflation, felt once again revitalized in trying to fend off GOP-led initiatives to restrict abortion rights. Virtually every Senate candidate quickly issued statements excoriating Graham\u2019s bill and asking their Republican opponents whether they would sign off on it.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat are the \u2018MAGA Republicans\u2019 doing over in the Capitol today?\u201d Senate Majority leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) asked at the White House event for Democrats\u2019 healthcare and climate legislation, formally dubbed the Inflation Reduction Act. \u201cIntroducing national bans on abortion,\u201d Schumer scoffed. \u201cJust unbelievable.\u201d<\/p>\n
Top operatives in the party said that they were just as surprised to see Graham\u2019s move, which they likened to a slow, telegraphed pitch down the middle of the plate. Several confessed to first learning about the legislation Monday evening through Sean Hannity\u2019s Fox News program, where the latest iteration was initially teased.<\/p>\n
There was widespread anticipation that the Graham bill would quickly find its way into Democratic fundraising solicitations. Whether it would become a feature of ad campaigns was a somewhat less relevant point, those operatives added, since so much of the current messaging was geared around abortion already \u2014 an issue some GOP contenders were already clearing from their websites.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn almost every race, there is some advertising right now hitting Republicans on abortion,\u201d said one top Senate Democratic official.<\/p>\n
In Colorado, Republican Senate candidate Joe O\u2019Dea derided the \u201cpep rally\u201d at the White House as \u201carrogant,\u201d but he conceded that the Graham bill was \u201cas reckless and tone deaf as is Joe Biden and Chuck Schumer\u2019s hostility to considering any compromise\u201d on abortion. His opponent, Sen. Michael Bennet, called a national abortion ban \u201coutrageous.\u201d<\/p>\n
And Democratic governors, including those up for reelection like Steve Sisolak in Nevada, pledged to ignore a ban should it pass and pursue every legal option to shield abortion rights.<\/p>\n
“Lindsey Graham and House Republicans are reminding Americans what they\u2019ve already told us \u2014 Republican control means they will vote for a national abortion ban,\u201d DNC spokesperson Ammar Moussa said. \u201cThat\u2019s their agenda.”<\/p>\n
Schumer, one of the warmup acts for the Inflation Reduction Act celebration, relayed Graham\u2019s plan to the thousands gathered on the White House\u2019s South Lawn, who responded with jeers. Strutting back and forth on set with his trademark aviator sunglasses and wielding a handheld microphone, Biden didn\u2019t mention Graham \u2014 but took square aim at some of his Republican Senate colleagues, blasting Rick Scott and Ron Johnson by name for their efforts to raise taxes on the working and middle class.<\/p>\n
It wasn\u2019t just Graham who Democrats believed bore gifts. It was also reported that former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who still harbors presidential ambitions, was working with abortion opponents to help Republican governors craft legislation in the wake of Roe v. Wade being overturned. A Democrat working on governors\u2019 races called it \u201cthe cherry on top\u201d of the day.<\/p>\n