Sweet Home Alabama
Abortion becomes a winning issue for a Democrat in a small Alabama House district held by the GOP for 22 years.
Republicans down in Alabama created a situation where a Democrat could win a special election for Alabama House District 10, making her the first net-gain Democratic pick-up in the Alabama Legislature since 2002.
First, Alabama passed the Human Life Protection Act that bans abortions at any stage of a pregnancy. The law provides for exceptions in cases 1) where a fetus has a lethal anomaly (a medical condition that would cause the fetus to be stillborn or to die shortly following birth), 2) where a pregnancy would "present serious health risk" to the woman, and 3) it does not ban procedures to end ectopic pregnancies.
In what I think is a mistake, it does not include an exception in cases of rape or incest. I understand the position that such a pregnancy does create a child, but the female in these cases is not a consenting partner in the coital act. I do not believe she should be forced to carry a pregnancy to term and suffer the pain and psychological damage such a situation brings.
But things got complicated when the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos, prepared and stored in the process of In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) are, in fact, children.
The problem arises due to having enough embryos to freeze in the first place. The extra embryos exist because it sometimes takes multiple implantation attempts before the embryo attaches and begins to gestate. My daughter and several friends of ours who have gone the IVF route have undergone multiple implantations.
So what do you do with the remaining embryos if you are satisfied you are not going to need or want them?
Most times they are simply destroyed but according to the Alabama SC ruling, that destruction would technically be a crime under the Human Life Protection Act.
And the abortion fanatics across the nation screamed that the Alabama legislature had just banned IVF procedures.
They didn’t, of course.
Quickly realizing the complication, Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall weighed in, saying he had “no intention of using the recent Alabama Supreme Court decision as a basis for prosecuting IVF families or providers” and on March 7th, the Bama Legislature passed a bill granting civil and criminal immunity for IVF providers and receivers. Governor Kay Ivey (a Republican) signed that bill into law within an hour of its passage by the Alabama Senate.
Too late.
Democrat vultures sitting on ever telephone pole in America pounced and seized (something the media reserves for describing what Republicans do) and hysterically began the “See, we told you about those redneck Christo-Fascist White Christian Nationalist Trumpers! We told you they wanted to keep women barefoot, pregnant and in the kitchen, forced to be tradwives (traditional wives) forever! Haven’t you seen the Handmaid’s Tale!”
And just like that, abortion became a linchpin issue once again.
The Democrats successfully nationalized an election in a small district outside Huntsville, Alabama and funds flowed from all over the nation in support of, and into the coffers of, Marilyn Lands (D-Madison).
Lands won District 10 by a margin of 62 to 38.
The DNC jumped in immediately, crowing that this is what all Republicans can expect from now on because Abortion is a right, you know and those damn Catholic theocrats Trump appointed to SCOTUS took that right away from women.
Baby killing is back on the ballot, baby! And the Democrats are there for it.
We are told that we must change our tolerance for abortion to win votes.
I’m not sure that is true, but I am pretty damn sure we can’t afford many more self-inflicted wounds like we just did in Alabama.
Alabama pundits on both sides think District 10 is likely to go back red in 2026, but you can bet this roll up more mileage than an Amazon delivery truck in the run up to the 2024 presidential election.
Republicans need to figure out their messaging on the issue of abortion, they should have been working on it way before Dobbs was decided in 2022. It should be easy in a world where abortion proponents want to terminate a human fetus but will put you in jail for breaking an endangered bird’s egg or for praying outside an abortion clinic - thanks to Alabama, it has again become such an inflammatory issue reason no longer matters.
Teddy Powell is a church friend of mine and was put up for the special election - we're very disappointed of course, but there was only 14.5% turnout - and you know WHO was motivated to show up and "send a message". I wouldn't impute too much meaning to this. It was a VERY isolated case in a district that's gone 52-45 Republican in previous (normal) elections.
Maybe. But before I believe everybody in Alabama got suckered in, I'd really like to know who counted the votes.