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      Is the Democratic Midterm Surge Overrated? Why Republicans Can Still Win the House and Senate.

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      Ross Douthat, a Times Opinion columnist, hosted an online conversation with Kristen Soltis Anderson, a Republican pollster, and the conservative writer and radio host Erick Erickson, to discuss whether Republicans are blowing the fall campaign — or whether a red wave is still possible.Ross Douthat: Kristen, Erick, thanks so much for joining me. Let’s start with the big picture. From early 2022 through the middle of the summer, Republicans consistently led the generic ballot for Congress, by around two and a half points. Today, the same generic ballot is either tied or gives Democrats a slight edge. Kristen, what changed?Kristen Soltis Anderson: The biggest thing that I’ve seen shift is enthusiasm on the Democratic side. During the winter and spring, Republicans had an advantage when voters were asked how motivated they were to vote. Key parts of the Democratic coalition were just not as tuned in or interested in participating.That’s a relatively normal dynamic in a midterm year, but the last two or three months have seen Democrats close that enthusiasm gap.Erick Erickson: I underappreciated how much the Dobbs decision would play a role in that.But the RealClearPolitics polling averages go back about two decades. For midterm elections where Republicans have done well, at this time of year, the polling has narrowed. Tom Bevan of RealClearPolitics had a good piece on it last week. I actually told my radio listeners that we should expect a tying of the generic ballot in August, and here it is. I would wait to really assess the direction of the race until late September.Douthat: If we assume Dobbs has boosted Democratic enthusiasm, Kristen, how heavily should we weight that effect relative to, say, falling gas prices?Anderson: The Dobbs decision was the big turning point. It has been less about changing voters’ minds from Republican to Democratic and more about activating voters who might have been tuned out and less engaged. It has also given Democrats a message to run on that changes the topic from inflation and gas prices. I still see the economy as a huge driver of this midterm, which is why I still think at this point Republicans are in an OK position. But there’s a reason Democratic candidates have been running ads about abortion.Douthat: Erick, you just said you might have underestimated the Dobbs effect. Do you think G.O.P. politicians were actually prepared to have abortion back in democratic debate?Erickson: I have been more than a bit perplexed at the G.O.P.’s surprise over the Dobbs decision, considering it leaked weeks before it was official. They had time to prepare for it and find some common ground and never seemed to get on the same page. By not being prepared, they allowed more aggressive voices on the issue to spook voters. When you have loud voices in the G.O.P. start talking about making abortion a criminal offense after Dobbs, that tends to spook people.Still, I do continue to think the economy is going to be disproportionately at play in the election. As Kristen said, more Democrats will turn out than otherwise would have pre-Dobbs, but the G.O.P. should be OK if the party focuses on the economy and inflation.Douthat: Well, unless inflation continues to diminish, right? It seems like Republicans have pushed a lot of chips onto that issue. Do you both think the G.O.P. needs a highly inflationary economy or a potential recession to win Congress this fall?Anderson: I’m certainly not rooting for a bad economy. But there is typically a link between people’s perceptions of the economy and their willingness to stick with the party in power. It is worth noting that inflation and rising gas prices were an issue where even Democrats were expressing concerns before Dobbs. Republicans rightly saw it as an issue on which their party had two key things going for them: Independents thought it was a top issue, and voters trusted Republicans more on it.Erickson: We are not going to see deflation, so reduced inflation is still inflation.Anderson: It’s also worth noting that even though the chatter in Washington seems to be that inflation is fading fast as an issue for voters, I’m not necessarily buying that that’s the case.Erickson: Yeah, as a dad who does a lot of the grocery shopping and cooking, milk and meat are still expensive, even if not as expensive as they were a few months ago, and wage increases for Americans have not offset the costs of many consumer goods.Douthat: Have Republicans focused too much on the economy at the expense of other issues that might have worked for them — crime, immigration, even education?Anderson: Crime and immigration are areas where Republicans have an advantage with voters, but those issues just haven’t been as salient with them.Erickson: Republicans have a comprehensive story to tell about the deterioration of the quality of life in America.Douthat: Let’s talk about the candidates who are trying to tell that story. Erick, you’re in Georgia, where Herschel Walker is the G.O.P. nominee for Senate and not exactly impressing on the campaign trail. Popular Republican governors in swing states passed up Senate races, presumably because they didn’t want to deal with the demands of Trumpism, and now you’ve got G.O.P. candidates trailing in the polls everywhere from Arizona to Pennsylvania to Wisconsin.How bad is the candidate problem, and can a Walker or a Dr. Oz still win?Erickson: I’ll take the last part first. The G.O.P. has managed to nominate some clunkers of candidates. But yes, Republicans can still win. This is actually why I am a bit hesitant now to embrace the national narrative of this election.Walker is a flawed candidate, but the national narrative has the race worse than it actually is. Walker has actually been ahead in some recent polls. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee chair recently mentioned races he expected to do well in, and Georgia was not on the list. On the ground in Georgia, Walker has retooled his campaign, brought in new people, and the crowds are growing as his air war likely intensifies.Oz and Blake Masters are not great. But the political environment can get some of these flawed candidates elected. Remember, in 1980, a bunch of Republicans got elected as “accidental” senators; they were swept into office by Ronald Reagan’s landslide victory and because the national mood was so dour. Also, it is worth noting that in 2020, the G.O.P. exceeded expectations, and pollsters still do not have good answers for why they missed that. We could be experiencing part of that again.Douthat: Let me pitch that point to you, Kristen: Not only Republicans but a lot of liberals are very hesitant to trust polls showing big Democratic advantages in Senate races, especially in Midwestern states, given the record Erick mentions. How doubtful should we be about polling in this cycle?Anderson: I’m far from a poll truther or unskewer or what have you. But I am keenly aware of the ways in which public polling can miss the mark. And it is notable that in some of the last few election cycles, we’ve had public polls that told a very rosy story about Democratic Senate candidates that did not pan out and lost to incumbent Republicans. Lindsey Graham and Susan Collins, anyone? I’m also thinking of 2018, where states like Indiana and Missouri were considered tossup or close races in a blue-wave year and yet Republicans won.At the same time, those 2018 examples show that it is possible for candidates to outperform expectations even in the face of a wave that is supposed to be crashing the other direction.Douthat: Do you think the polling industry has substantially adjusted since 2020? Are the polls we’re seeing of, say, Pennsylvania or Wisconsin more trustworthy than past polling, in your view?Anderson: I’ll use a recent example to highlight my concerns. In Florida we just had a big primary election, and one of the major polls that got released before the primary showed in the governor’s race, the more progressive candidate, Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried, ahead of the more centrist Democrat and former Republican, Charlie Crist. The poll was very transparent in its methodology, but the underlying data had a large number of college-educated voters. Even if you do the appropriate things with data weighting, that underlying data is skewing quite progressive. Crist actually defeated Fried by a wide margin.I don’t say this to criticize those pollsters, as they were transparent about their data, but if Democrats are extra fired up to vote right now, there’s a chance they’re also extra fired up to take polls.Douthat: But we do have a few actual results, from the abortion referendum in Kansas to the recent special election in New York, where liberal causes and Democratic candidates have done well in real voting, not just in polls.How much do you read into those kinds of election results?Anderson: The Kansas result was a wake-up call for Republicans. It showed Democrats making real strides in speaking to voters in the center about abortion using language those voters might use and tapping into values those centrist voters might hold. But I’m reluctant to say that special election results are transferable to other races in other states on other issues.Erickson: I’m doubtful we can really extrapolate Kansas to the rest of the nation.Douthat: Erick, let’s talk about Donald Trump, because the other big change from the summer is that the former president is back in the headlines. Assuming, as seems likely, that the classified-documents scandal is somewhat frozen from here till Election Day, how long a shadow does Trump cast over the midterms?Erickson: Democrats have said for some time they wanted Trump to be an aspect of their 2022 argument. He, of course, wants to be part of it as well. Republicans have been terrible about taking the bait and talking about Trump. To the extent the G.O.P. is willing to ignore their reflexive “stand by your man” impulse and instead focus on the economy, education, crime, etc., they can move past his shadow quickly.I’m just not optimistic Republicans can do that, given their prior behavior on the matter.Douthat: And Kristen, as Erick says, from the Democratic side and especially the Biden White House, there seems to be a clear desire to make the midterms about Trumpism. That didn’t work particularly well for Terry McAuliffe in the Virginia governor’s race last year. Is it a better strategy now?Anderson: In a midterm, the party out of power always wants it to be a referendum, while the party in power wants it to be a choice.The problem with Trump becoming more in the news is that it helps Democrats try to make it a choice. It gives them a prominent foil. But simply saying, “Don’t vote for candidate X because of Trump” isn’t foolproof.Douthat: If a bunch of Trump-picked candidates lose their Senate or governor races, does it weaken him for 2024 at all?Erickson: I have resigned myself to Trump’s core supporters insisting the G.O.P. establishment undermined those candidates in order to stop Trump and the only way to chart a better course is to double down on Trump. They will blame Mitch McConnell and others before Trump gets blame.Anderson: It is notable that when my firm asked Republican voters if they thought Trump was helping or hurting Republican candidates in the midterms, 61 percent said he was helping, and only 27 percent said hurting. This was from a survey we did in August.Even among Republicans who don’t think of themselves as “Trump first,” putting him before their party, a majority view him as helping. Granted, some of this may be Republican respondents circling the wagons in response to the question. But I doubt a poor showing in the midterms will lead to blaming Trump.Erickson: If Democrats really do want Trump to go away, they should just ignore him. Before the F.B.I. going to Mar-a-Lago, Republicans were doing their slow walk away from Trump. I somewhat suspect Democrats really want to keep Trump’s position in the G.O.P. elevated because independent voters just do not seem to care for the guy, and that gives Democrats an edge while making a 2024 Republican primary messy.The bigger issue for Trump is major donor support. Those people will see a need to move on. Trump will be less able to rely on larger dollar donors to build out 2024 than he did in 2020, though he won’t need them as much, since he can raise a lot from small-dollar donors. If they, however, consolidated behind someone else, it could cause problems for Trump.Douthat: OK, time to ask for predictions. Out of the competitive Senate races where G.O.P. candidates are seen as struggling or the race is just close — let’s say Arizona, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Nevada, because I think J.D. Vance will win Ohio — which ones do you think are the most likely G.O.P. wins, and which the most likely Democratic victories?Erickson: The G.O.P. takes Georgia. The Democrats take Pennsylvania and hold Arizona. The G.O.P. takes Nevada. I continue to think Ron Johnson wins his re-election in Wisconsin, too. I agree on Vance and think the national narrative there is out of sync with Ohio voters, who’ve moved more Republican.Anderson: I have the same choices as Erick: Republicans taking Georgia and Democrats taking Pennsylvania. That’s not to say I think those are rock solid, and the Pennsylvania race is just strange in general.Douthat: And if the economy worsens and the possibility of a red wave returns, what could be the most unexpected G.O.P. pickup?Anderson: I keep hearing buzz around this Washington Senate race. Republicans are very happy with their candidate there, Tiffany Smiley, who is a former triage nurse. A female candidate with a health care background could be powerful in this cycle.Erickson: I would keep my eye on the Colorado Senate race and the Oregon gubernatorial race. Also, New Hampshire remains in play, though the G.O.P. needs to settle on a candidate.Douthat: Final predictions — give me House and Senate numbers for Republicans.Erickson: I’m going with 51 in the Senate and 235 in the House.Anderson: I’ll say 230 seats in the House and 51 in the Senate. But I would also like to note that we are two months away.Douthat: Your sensible humility is duly noted, Kristen. Thanks to you both for a terrific discussion.Ross Douthat is a Times columnist. Kristen Soltis Anderson, the author of “The Selfie Vote,” is a Republican pollster and a co-founder of the polling firm Echelon Insights. Erick Erickson, the host of the “Erick Erickson Show,” writes the newsletter Confessions of a Political Junkie.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      Abortion and Trump Are Giving Democrats a Shot

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      Forget Hot Girl Summer. We just came off Hot Primary Summer, which featured fewer tequila shots than the Megan Thee Stallion-inspired original — unless, maybe, you were partying with Dr. Oz — but still packed way more drama than you’d expect in a midterm election cycle.Republican voters in Georgia stiff-arming Donald Trump? Democratic House members in New York savaging one another over redrawn districts? John Fetterman winning the Democratic Senate primary in Pennsylvania just four days after suffering a stroke? Sean Parnell exiting the Pennsylvania Republican Senate primary after accusations of domestic abuse? Herschel Walker and Eric Greitens sticking with their Senate runs despite accusations of domestic abuse? Democrats capturing a House seat in Alaska, defeating Sarah Palin in the process? Abortion rights supporters winning big in [checks notes] Kansas?It has been quite the ride.With Mr. Trump out of office but still desperate to wield influence over his party like an incumbent president, these 2022 elections were fated to be more edge-of-your-seat than usual. The unofficial Labor Day kickoff of the fall campaign season will only push anxiety levels higher as the parties scramble to game out and shape where the electoral circus is headed.Mary Peltola leaving a voting booth in Anchorage.Mark Thiessen/Associated PressJohn Fetterman with supporters in Erie, Pa.Gene J. Puskar/Associated PressHerschel Walker at a fish fry hosted by the Georgia Republican Party.Haiyun Jiang/The New York TimesA rally for a Trump-backed candidate in Arizona.Brandon Bell/Getty ImagesIn terms of the Big Picture, the primaries confirmed some things we already knew, and revealed others that now loom large for the fall.The summer certified that Donald Trump still has his tiny hands wrapped around the throat of the G.O.P. He meddled mightily in the midterms, doling out endorsements and anti-endorsements with promiscuity, and wound up with an impressive win-loss record. Even looking only at the cases where Mr. Trump backed a non-incumbent in a contested primary, his success rate was 82 percent, according to FiveThirtyEight.It was unsurprising, if still depressing, to witness how thoroughly the G.O.P.’s moral compass has been shattered. Today’s Republicans will snuggle up with even the creepiest of characters, so long as those characters are Trump-approved. (See: Gaetz, Matt.)In the category of not so much depressing as horrifying: Republican voters elevated legions of election-denying conspiracymongers. In Michigan and Nevada, the party’s nominees for secretary of state are so far down the Stop the Steal Rabbit hole they may never see daylight again, while Pennsylvania Republicans’ choice for governor is so disturbing that some former party officials there are lining up to endorse his Democratic opponent. But for overall wingnuttery, it is tough to beat Arizona, where G.O.P. voters went all in on reality-challenged MAGA ravers up and down the ticket.There were isolated pockets of sanity. Georgia Republicans showed sense and spine in rejecting Mr. Trump’s revenge campaign to oust Governor Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, both Republicans, for having refused to help Mr. Trump steal the 2020 election. And Nebraska Republicans shunned Mr. Trump’s preferred pick for governor there, yet another prince of a guy accused of — you guessed it! — sexual misconduct.On the Democratic side, the big reveal turned out to be that the party isn’t as dead as everyone thought. Democrats overperformed in multiple special elections. The party’s voters are feeling more energized. President Biden’s job approval ratings have ticked up. The political handicappers have tweaked their predictions in Democrats’ direction. November could still go badly for Team Blue, but the once-forecast red wave seems to have lost momentum.There are many reasons for this: gas prices easing, Congress finally passing at least part of the president’s domestic agenda, mediocre-to-awful Republican nominees struggling to find their groove. But perhaps the biggest unforeseen factor: It turns out that American women don’t like being told that they don’t have a right to bodily autonomy.Go figure.Despite Americans’ overwhelming support for at least some abortion access, the Republican Party has long found it useful to exploit social conservatives’ intense passion on the issue. For decades, the G.O.P. has whipped voters to the polls with promises of killing Roe v. Wade, even when the party’s true priorities were slashing taxes and regulations and pursuing other non-culture-war matters. But with the Supreme Court’s decision on Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization in June, Republicans are the proverbial pooch that finally caught the car — a car now threatening to turn them into a greasy patch of political roadkill. Which would absolutely serve them right.Post-Dobbs, the political outlook has brightened for Democrats. Motivation among their voters has shot up, shrinking the crucial “enthusiasm gap” between the parties. A recent Pew poll found a 13-point jump since March in the number of people who said abortion rights would be “very important” in their midterm vote — a rise driven overwhelmingly by Democrats. The party’s candidates did better than expected in the five federal special elections held since the ruling. In deep red Kansas last month, voters smacked down a measure aimed at stripping abortion protections from the state’s constitution — by a 59-to-41 margin that stunned the nation. Democrats have also gained ground on the generic congressional ballot, where pollsters ask voters which party they prefer.The Democratic Party is still sharply divided between its center, left and far-left factions, with the capacity for rowdy progressives to hurt moderate Democrats in battleground states. But for now, the combination of Dobbs and Trumpism on the march is acting as a pretty potent glue.Republicans are scurrying around, trying to avoid getting hit by the backlash over the end of Roe. Multiple candidates are claiming more nuanced positions and softening their rhetoric as they tiptoe away from the more aggressive stances of their past. At least a couple have scrubbed their websites of anti-abortion statements. (Blake Masters, the MAGA choice for Senate in Arizona, has been particularly slippery.)Democrats, meanwhile, are learning to love their inner culture warrior, going hard at their Republican opponents on the issue. Even Republicans who express support for limited abortion rights are getting hit as Democrats seek to paint the entire G.O.P. as a threat to women’s bodily autonomy — which it mostly is.Multiple states have abortion-related measures on the ballot in November. Typically the anti-abortion side is the one that drives such efforts, as in Kansas. But this year, for the first time in two decades, a smattering of measures are aimed at securing reproductive rights. Other states are eyeing similar efforts for the future, including Arizona, which narrowly missed the deadline for getting something on the ballot this year. Democrats hope these measures will help turn out their voters and boost their candidates — much like the anti-gay-marriage ballot measures in 2004 aided President George W. Bush’s re-election.All of this is a striking departure from the conventional political wisdom, in which Republicans have long been seen as having the upper hand at culture warring. When Team Red spun up conservatives over hot-button topics like abortion and gay marriage, Team Blue struggled to keep the focus on things like health care and the economy. That dynamic has been flipped on its head.The reproductive rights side has long had the numbers, just not the intensity. If Democrats can keep the pressure on, abortion politics could prove increasingly painful and destructive for Republicans, stretching well beyond this crazy election season.Couldn’t happen to a more deserving party.What’s at stake for you on Election Day?In the final weeks before the midterm elections, Times Opinion is asking for your help to better understand what motivates each generation to vote. We’ve created a list of some of the biggest problems facing voters right now. Choose the one that matters most to you and tell us why. We plan to publish a selection of responses shortly before Election Day.

      The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      Partial Recount in Kansas Affirms Vote on Abortion Rights

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      A hand recount in nine Kansas counties affirmed the overwhelming rejection of an anti-abortion constitutional amendment by the state’s voters on Aug. 2.The recounted results differed from the initially reported results by fewer than 65 votes out of more than 556,000 cast in those counties, an error rate of about 0.01 percent.“As we expected, the recount again confirmed the Aug. 2 landslide victory for freedom,” said Ashley All, a spokeswoman for Kansans for Constitutional Freedom, the main group that opposed the amendment. “Kansans across the political spectrum voted to protect the constitutional rights of women to make private medical decisions about abortion.”The recount was requested by Melissa Leavitt, a Kansas resident, and its more than $100,000 cost was funded in large part by Mark S. Gietzen, an anti-abortion activist who is the chairman of the Kansas Coalition for Life.An email sent to an address associated with Ms. Leavitt was not returned. Reached for comment on Monday, Mr. Gietzen continued to suggest that the vote counts were wrong, but said he did not have time to share details or evidence on a phone call because he was busy writing a lawsuit that he planned to file later in the day.The original results reported in the nine counties showed 365,568 votes against the amendment and 190,847 votes for it. The recounts showed 365,511 votes against the amendment (57 fewer than originally reported) and 190,853 for it (six more than originally reported). Such small discrepancies can be caused by a number of factors, including unclear marking of ballots.The recount “proves once and for all that there is no systemic election fraud in our state’s election process,” the Kansas secretary of state, Scott Schwab, a Republican, said in a statement. “Kansans should be confident that these results put to rest the unfounded claims of election fraud in our state and know that our elections are secure and that their vote counted.”Statewide, the amendment lost by more than 160,000 votes. Typically, recounts in statewide races result in shifts of a few hundred votes at most.The nine Kansas counties that were required to perform recounts account for more than half of the ballots cast statewide in the amendment vote. They are Johnson County, which includes Kansas City suburbs and is the state’s largest; Sedgwick County, which includes Wichita; Shawnee County, which includes the capital, Topeka; Douglas County, which includes Lawrence, home to the University of Kansas’ flagship campus; and Crawford, Harvey, Jefferson, Lyon and Thomas Counties. More

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      Republicans Should Pay a Political Price for Abortion Bans

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      The right to an abortion is protected in the Kansas State Constitution and on Tuesday, a decisive majority of voters kept it there. Fifty-nine percent of Kansans who went to the polls voted to reject a constitutional amendment that would have opened the door to full abortion bans of the kind that exist in neighboring states like Missouri and Oklahoma.What makes this all the more striking is the fact that Kansas is one of the most reliably Republican states in the country. Donald Trump won in the 2020 presidential election with more than 56 percent of the vote. Three of its four representatives in the House are Republicans and its two Republican senators, Jerry Moran and Roger Marshall, are among the most conservative in the Senate.Anti-abortion activists were confident they would succeed. They’ve taken, instead, a devastating blow to their project.It is hard to overstate the significance of this defeat. The vote in Kansas is the first time abortion has been on the ballot since the Supreme Court’s ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health, which overturned Roe v. Wade. It’s the first time any voters have had the chance to weigh in on new abortion restrictions, and the result is a stunning victory for Kansans, and Americans, who believe that the right to an abortion is an inextricable part of our liberty under the Constitution.If it isn’t already obvious that Dobbs has unsettled American politics, the vote in Kansas makes it clear. Republicans may still win the House, and even the Senate, in November. But the sheer unpopularity of abortion bans — as well as the monstrous consequences for women in states that have banned abortion — is a heavy weight around the neck of the entire Republican Party.The task, for the national Democratic Party, is to make that weight even heavier. And for this, they have the model of Kansas, where pro-choice activists went on the offensive against restrictionists. They drew a sharp contrast between their aims and those of their opponents and made abortion rights a live issue for voters.Republicans do not want to fight on this turf — see the immediate campaign to downplay the impact of Dobbs in the wake of the ruling — which is all the more reason for Democrats to make them do it.What I WroteI didn’t have a column this week! I did do other things, however. I joined the Left Anchor podcast at The American Prospect (my journalistic alma mater) to discuss the Supreme Court, the Constitution and how to take both back from the political right.I also recorded a short video for the Criterion Channel in which I explored the career of the late, great actor Yaphet Kotto.Now ReadingAnnie Lowrey on pregnancy and motherhood for The Atlantic.Jennifer L. Morgan on slavery and reproductive rights for the African American Intellectual History Society.A 1978 interview with screenwriter-director Paul Schrader on his debut film, “Blue Collar.”Gaby Del Valle on “environmental nativism” for The Nation magazine.Monica Potts on Republicans and same-sex marriage for FiveThirtyEight.The transcript of Vin Scully’s radio call of the ninth inning of Sandy Koufax’s 1965 perfect game against the Chicago Cubs.Feedback If you’re enjoying what you’re reading, please consider recommending it to your friends. They can sign up here. If you want to share your thoughts on an item in this week’s newsletter or on the newsletter in general, please email me at jamelle-newsletter@nytimes.com. You can follow me on Twitter (@jbouie), Instagram and TikTok.Photo of the WeekI am a huge fan of the Beastie Boys, and so when I saw this mural the last time I was in New York, I had to take a picture.Now Eating: Strawberry Ice CreamMy son has become something of an ice cream connoisseur, and frequently requests different flavors of ice cream to make at home. This week, we made strawberry ice cream using a recipe from David Lebovitz’s book, “The Perfect Scoop.” Here’s the recipe and, fair warning, you’ll need an ice cream maker for this.Ingredients1 pound fresh strawberries, rinsed and hulled¾ cup granulated sugar1 tablespoon vodka or other liquor1 cup full-fat sour cream1 cup heavy creama squeeze of fresh lemon juiceDirectionsSlice the strawberries and toss them in a bowl with the sugar and vodka, stirring until the sugar begins to dissolve. Cover and let stand at room temperature for one hour, stirring every so often.Pulse the strawberries and their liquid with the sour cream, heavy cream and lemon juice in a blender or food processor until almost smooth, but still slightly chunky.Refrigerate for an hour, then freeze in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s instructions. More

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      How Democrats See Abortion Politics After Kansas Vote

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      A decisive vote to defend abortion rights in deeply conservative Kansas reverberated across the midterm campaign landscape on Wednesday, galvanizing Democrats and underscoring for Republicans the risks of overreaching on one of the most emotionally charged matters in American politics.In a state where Republicans far outnumber Democrats, Kansans delivered a clear message in the first major vote testing the potency of abortion politics since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade: Abortion opponents are going too far.The overwhelming defeat of a measure that would have removed abortion protections from the state constitution quickly emboldened Democrats to run more assertively on abortion rights and even to reclaim some of the language long deployed by conservatives against government overreach, using it to cast abortion bans as infringing on personal freedoms. (As of Wednesday, the margin was 58.8 percent to 41.2 percent.)“The court practically dared women in this country to go to the ballot box to restore the right to choose,” President Biden said by video Wednesday, as he signed an executive order aimed at helping Americans cross state lines for abortions. “They don’t have a clue about the power of American women.”In interviews, Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Massachusetts, urged Democrats to be “full-throated” in their support of abortion access, and Representative Sean Patrick Maloney, the chairman of the House Democratic campaign arm, said the Kansas vote offered a “preview of coming attractions” for Republicans. Representative Elissa Slotkin, a Michigan Democrat in a highly competitive district, issued a statement saying that abortion access “hits at the core of preserving personal freedom, and of ensuring that women, and not the government, can decide their own fate.”Republicans said the midterm campaigns would be defined by Mr. Biden’s disastrous approval ratings and economic concerns.Supporters of the measure that was on the ballot, which would have removed abortion protections from the Kansas constitution, embraced after the outcome was called on Tuesday.Christopher (KS) Smith for The New York TimesBoth Republicans and Democrats caution against conflating the results of an up-or-down ballot question with how Americans will vote in November, when they will be weighing a long list of issues, personalities and their views of Democratic control of Washington.“Add in candidates and a much more robust conversation about lots of other issues, this single issue isn’t going to drive the full national narrative that the Democrats are hoping for,” said David Kochel, a veteran of Republican politics in nearby Iowa. Still, Mr. Kochel acknowledged the risks of Republicans’ overstepping, as social conservatives push for abortion bans with few exceptions that polls generally show to be unpopular.“The base of the G.O.P. is definitely ahead of where the voters are in wanting to restrict abortion,” he said. “That’s the main lesson of Kansas.”Read More on Abortion Issues in AmericaKansas Abortion Vote: In the first election test since Roe v. Wade was overturned, Kansas voters resoundingly decided against removing the right to abortion from the State Constitution, a major victory for the abortion rights movement in a reliably conservative state.Justice Dept. Lawsuit: The Biden administration sued Idaho over a strict state abortion law set to take effect. The suit is the first new litigation filed by the federal government to protect abortion access since the end of Roe.One Woman’s Abortion Odyssey: She was thrilled to learn that she was pregnant. But when a rare fetal defect threatened her life, she was thrust into post-Roe chaos.A National Pattern: A Times analysis shows that states with abortion bans have among the nation’s weakest social services for women and children.Polls have long shown most Americans support at least some abortion rights. But abortion opponents have been far more likely to let the issue determine their vote, leading to a passion gap between the two sides of the issue. Democrats hoped the Supreme Court decision this summer erasing the constitutional right to an abortion would change that, as Republican-led states rushed to enact new restrictions, and outright bans on the procedure took hold.The Kansas vote was the most concrete evidence yet that a broad swath of voters — including some Republicans who still support their party in November — were ready to push back. Kansans voted down the amendment in Johnson County — home to the populous, moderate suburbs outside Kansas City — rejecting the measure with about 70 percent of the vote, a sign of the power of this issue in suburban battlegrounds nationwide. But the amendment was also defeated in more conservative counties, as abortion rights support outpaced Mr. Biden’s showing in 2020 nearly everywhere.After months of struggling with their own disengaged if not demoralized base, Democratic strategists and officials hoped the results signaled a sort of awakening. They argued that abortion rights are a powerful part of the effort to cast Republicans as extremists and turn the 2022 elections into a choice between two parties, rather than a referendum just on Democrats.“The Republicans who are running for office are quite open about their support for banning abortion,” said Senator Warren. “It’s critical that Democrats make equally clear that this is a key difference, and Democrats will stand up for letting the pregnant person make the decision, not the government.”A Kansas-style referendum will be a rarity this election year, with only four other states expected to put abortion rights directly to voters in November with measures to amend their constitutions: California, Michigan, Vermont and Kentucky. However, the issue has already emerged as a defining debate in some key races, including in Michigan and Pennsylvania, where Democratic candidates for governor have cast themselves as bulwarks against far-reaching abortion restrictions or bans. On Tuesday, Michigan Republicans nominated Tudor Dixon, a former conservative commentator, for governor, who has opposed abortion in cases of rape and incest.Voting in the primary election in Topeka, Kan., on Tuesday.Katie Currid for The New York TimesAnd in Pennsylvania, Doug Mastriano, the far-right Republican nominee for governor, said, “I don’t give a way for exceptions” when asked whether he believes in exceptions for rape, incest or the life of the mother. Governor’s contests in states including Wisconsin and Georgia could also directly affect abortion rights.Other tests of the impact of abortion on races are coming sooner. North of New York City, a Democrat running in a special House election this month, Pat Ryan, has made abortion rights a centerpiece of his campaign, casting the race as another measure of the issue’s power this year.“We have to step up and make sure our core freedoms are protected and defended,” said Mr. Ryan, the Ulster County executive in New York, who had closely watched the Kansas results.Opponents of the Kansas referendum leaned into that “freedom” message, with advertising that cast the effort as nothing short of a government mandate — anathema to voters long mistrustful of too much intervention from Topeka and Washington — and sometimes without using the word “abortion” at all.Some of the messaging was aimed at moderate, often suburban voters who have toggled between the parties in recent elections. Strategists in both parties agreed that abortion rights could be salient with those voters, particularly women, in the fall. Democrats also pointed to evidence that the issue may also drive up turnout among their base voters.After the Supreme Court’s decision, Democrats registered to vote at a faster rate than Republicans in Kansas, according a memo from Tom Bonier, the chief executive of TargetSmart, a Democratic data firm. Mr. Bonier said his analysis found roughly 70 percent of Kansans who registered after the court’s decision were women.“It is malpractice to not continue to center this issue for the remainder of this election season — and beyond,” said Tracy Sefl, a Democratic strategist. “What Democrats should say is that for Americans your bedroom is on the ballot this November.”Inside the Democratic Party, there has been a fierce debate since Roe was overturned over how much to talk about abortion rights at a time of rising prices and a rocky economy — and that is likely to intensify. There is always the risk, some longtime strategists warn, of getting distracted from the issues that polls show are still driving most Americans.Senator Brian Schatz, Democrat of Hawaii, said he understood the hesitancy from party stalwarts.“The energy is on the side of abortion rights,” he said. “For decades that hasn’t been true so it’s difficult for some people who have been through lots of tough battles and lots of tough states to recognize that the ground has shifted under them. But it has.”He urged Democrats to ignore polling that showed abortion was not a top-tier issue, adding that “voters take their cues from leaders” and Democrats need to discuss abortion access more. “When your pollster or your strategist says, ‘Take an abortion question and pivot away from it’ you should probably resist,” he said.A Kaiser Family Foundation poll released this week showed that the issue of abortion access had become more salient for women 18 to 49 years old, with a 14-percentage-point jump since February for those who say it will be very important to their vote in midterm elections, up to 73 percent.That is roughly equal to the share of voters overall who said inflation would be very important this fall — and a sign of how animating abortion has become for many women.Still, Republicans said they would not let their focus veer from the issues they have been hammering for months.“This fall, voters will consider abortion alongside of inflation, education, crime, national security and a feeling that no one in Democrat-controlled Washington listens to them or cares about them,” said Kellyanne Conway, the Republican pollster and former senior Trump White House adviser.Michael McAdams, the communications director for the National Republican Congressional Committee, said that if Democrats focused the fall campaign on abortion they would be ignoring the economy and record-high prices: “the No. 1 issue in every competitive district.”One of the most endangered Democrats in the House, Representative Tom Malinowski of New Jersey, agreed that “the economy is the defining issue for people.”“But there is a relationship here, because voters want leaders to be focused on fighting inflation, not banning abortion,” he said. Mr. Malinowski, who said he was planning to advertise on abortion rights, said the results in Kansas had affirmed for him the significance of abortion and the public’s desire to keep government out of such personal decisions.“There is enormous energy among voters and potential voters this fall to make that point,” he said.Peter Baker More

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      Where Trump Counties in Kansas Chose to Preserve Abortion Rights

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      Voters in Kansas on Tuesday overwhelmingly rejected a constitutional amendment that would have removed the right to abortion from the State Constitution. The decisive margin — 59 to 41 percent, with about 95 percent of the votes counted — came as a surprise in a deeply conservative state that President Donald J. Trump won by […] More

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      The Anti-Abortion Movement Needs Minority Rule

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      One side effect of Roe v. Wade was that it allowed the anti-abortion movement to pretend to be on the side of democracy. True, the decision was popular, and majorities since the 1970s have wanted to see abortion legal in at least some circumstances. But Roe prevented duly elected state governments from passing abortion restrictions that were in some cases also popular with their constituents. The goal of the anti-abortion movement was and remains national prohibition. Its language called for returning the matter to the state voters.The stunning result in an abortion referendum in Kansas on Tuesday, however, shows that even in a very red state, bans cannot necessarily survive contact with democracy. Kansas has its own version of Roe, a 2019 State Supreme Court decision holding that the state Constitution protects “a woman’s right to make decisions about her body, including the decision whether to continue her pregnancy.” The referendum, the first statewide test of electoral sentiment about abortion post-Roe, asked voters whether they wanted to change the Constitution so the Republican-controlled Legislature could ban abortions. They did not.When I spoke to pro-choice organizers last month, they were cautiously optimistic that the vote would be close, though they worried about its timing. Rather than scheduling the referendum for the general election, Republicans put it on the primary ballot, when conservative turnout is typically higher. The pro-choice side needed to get people to show up on a day when they weren’t used to voting. As far as I can tell, no one expected the 18-point landslide in a state that voted for Donald Trump by 15 points.Then again, maybe we should have. It’s not uncommon for abortion bans to fail in state referendums. In 2006, South Dakota voters overturned a strict abortion ban, a direct challenge to Roe, by 11 points. In 2011, Mississippi voters rejected a constitutional amendment defining a fertilized egg as a person by 17 percentage points. Even in the most conservative parts of the country, many people recoil from strict abortion bans.I hope Kansas sends a message to other red states that have passed draconian abortion prohibitions or are weighing them. I’m not sure it will, because those bans are often an expression not of democratic wishes, but of lawmakers’ insulation from democratic accountability. An extreme example is Wisconsin, a purple state with a Democratic governor that voted for Joe Biden in the last election. When Roe was overturned, there was widespread confusion about whether an 1849 abortion ban had gone back into effect, and as a result, abortion services have been halted.There is little reason to think that this is what the people of Wisconsin want, but it’s not clear if they can pass a law to change it, because state legislative maps are drawn in a way that gives Republicans an overwhelming advantage. According to a University of Wisconsin Law School analysis, if Democrats and Republicans got the same number of votes, Republicans would win 64.8 percent of State Senate seats, and Democrats around 35.2 percent.Obviously, this doesn’t mean that the backlash to the Supreme Court decision jettisoning Roe won’t have important electoral implications. Since it came down, polls show a shift toward Democrats in the midterm congressional vote. Some politicians, like Nicole Malliotakis, the only Republican member of Congress from New York City, will likely be damaged by their opposition to legal abortion.Still, votes for abortion rights don’t automatically translate into votes for Democrats, because partisan identification is often more powerful than issue preference. In 2020, Missouri voters approved a constitutional amendment expanding Medicaid eligibility, but the state has continued to favor Republicans overwhelmingly. The same year, Florida’s voters opted to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour even as they gave a majority to Trump.Clearly, however, there are substantial numbers of voters outraged by abortion bans and ready to express their anger at the ballot box. Kansas’s secretary of state predicted that turnout on Tuesday would be 36 percent. It ended up being closer to 50 percent, almost as high as in the 2018 general election.The anti-abortion movement has already been aided by minority rule. Roe’s end was made possible because a president who lost the popular vote was able to put three judges on the Supreme Court. The filibuster means that even with the support of the pro-choice Republican senators Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski, the Senate can’t codify any of Roe’s protections.As time goes on, and the harrowing consequences of abortion bans pile up, abortion opponents will need ever greater limits on popular sovereignty in order to impose their regime on an unwilling nation. The cause of “life,” as abortion opponents define it, will likely merge with the broader Republican campaign to disenfranchise those it defines as outside the blessed circle of real Americanness.In a recent New York Times Magazine cover story, Charles Homans described how the “Stop the Steal” movement transcended Donald Trump. “The hole he punched in American democracy, out of sheer self-interest, had allowed his followers to glimpse a vision of the country restored to its divinely ordained promise that lay beyond that democracy — but also beyond him,” wrote Homans. The Kansas referendum demonstrated that democracy in America can still work, and why the forces of religious authoritarianism are so set on destroying it.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More