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    Why Yes-or-No Questions on Abortion Rights Could Be a Key to 2024

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    In states that will help decide control of the White House and Congress, Democrats are campaigning furiously alongside ballot measures to protect abortion rights, putting Republicans on their heels.As Democrats confront a presidential race against a resurgent and resilient Donald J. Trump as well as a brutally challenging Senate map, they believe they have an increasingly powerful political weapon: ballot measures to protect abortion rights.Two crucial presidential and Senate battlegrounds, Arizona and Nevada, are expected to put such measures directly before voters. So are other states with top Senate races, including Maryland and potentially Montana. And abortion rights measures are set or could appear on ballots in states like New York, Florida and Nebraska, where competitive contests could help determine whether Democrats win back the House.Hopeful Democrats — and worried Republicans — are acutely aware that in all seven states where abortion has been put directly to voters since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the abortion rights side has won, in both red states like Ohio and Kansas as well as swing states like Michigan. Those measures have sometimes fueled surges in liberal turnout that have lifted Democratic candidates to victory, as well.So in every state where an abortion measure is already on the 2024 ballot or could yet appear, Democratic candidates, state parties and allied groups are campaigning furiously alongside the ballot initiatives, running ads, helping pour money behind them and bringing up the measures in speech after speech.In Arizona, where Democrats are trying to flip the Legislature, the party’s candidates have gone so far as to collect signatures for the state’s ballot measure as they knock on voters’ doors.“When the abortion petition initiative came out, it was a no-brainer that I would carry it with me,” said Brandy Reese, a Democrat running for the Arizona House who said she had gathered dozens of signatures while campaigning. “I introduce myself as a pro-choice candidate running, and you can instantly tell in people’s body language that they’re excited to hear that.”The wave of abortion referendums — some of which are not officially on the ballot yet but most of which have enough signatures to get there, according to organizers — is adding new unpredictability to an election season already convulsed by Mr. Trump’s criminal cases and wrenching questions about the future of the country’s democracy.With polls showing that a majority of Americans think abortion should be legal in all or most cases, the measures could serve as a political life raft at a time when President Biden faces stubbornly low approval ratings and skepticism within his party. Democrats hope the ballot initiatives will increase turnout among core voters like suburban women, young people and African Americans.“The ballot initiatives are well-funded and well-organized efforts,” said Christina Freundlich, a Democratic strategist. “It’s creating a tremendous sense of energy not only within the Democratic Party but with voters across the board.”Party leaders are echoing that message.“Momentum is on our side,” Vice President Kamala Harris said at an abortion rights event on Wednesday in Jacksonville, Fla. “Just think about it: Since Roe was overturned, every time reproductive freedom has been on the ballot, the people of America voted for freedom.”Beyond electoral politics, the ballot initiatives regarding abortion have driven huge interest and turnout because of their direct impact on voters’ lives. In Florida, for example, a newly enforced ban on nearly all abortions in the state has cut off a critical access point to patients across the Southeast. In Arizona, lawmakers this week repealed a near-total ban on abortions — but the state is now set to enforce a 15-week ban with no exceptions for rape or incest.Medical practitioners have also expressed concerns about facing criminal penalties under the bans.“The fear of that is just devastating,” said Mona Mangat, board chair of the Committee to Protect Health Care, an advocacy group that is supporting ballot initiatives in several states. “It’s going to be devastating for practitioners and devastating for patients.”Ms. Mangat said the restrictions could affect whether doctors wanted to move to those states to practice medicine or attend residency programs.In Nevada, abortion is legal within the first 24 weeks of pregnancy. Organizers there are collecting signatures to place an amendment on the ballot that would establish a right to an abortion in the State Constitution. Key Democrats in the state, including Senator Jacky Rosen, who is facing a close re-election fight, have signed onto the petition.Representative Dina Titus, another Nevada Democrat, said in an interview that the amendment would still motivate voters to turn out, especially young people, even without the driving force of overturning far-reaching restrictions. “We’ll talk about it in terms of how this will really protect women,” Ms. Titus said. “And we’ll use it to attract young women and just young people generally to the polls, because they will suddenly realize something they took for granted is not going to be available.”Representative Dina Titus and other Nevada Democrats believe that the state’s proposed amendment to enshrine abortion rights in its Constitution will drive up liberal turnout.Elizabeth Frantz/ReutersRepublican candidates and their allies have appeared reluctant to directly campaign against ballot measures to protect abortion rights, though some G.O.P. leaders have voiced opposition. In Ohio, Gov. Mike DeWine recorded a video opposing the state’s initiative last year, and in Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis has said the current ballot measure is too broad. “To nuke parental consent for minors is totally unacceptable,” he said at an event last month.Some Republicans openly worry that restrictive measures like Florida’s may play into the hands of Democrats, given how abortion referendums in recent cycles have unfolded.“Kansas and Ohio to me is what everyone should be looking at,” said Vicki Lopez, a state representative from Miami who was one of a handful of Republican legislators to vote against Florida’s six-week ban. Voters will now decide in November whether to add a right to an abortion to the State Constitution, with a question known as Amendment Four. “This will be a test.”But Ms. Lopez added that it would be a mistake to assume that “everyone who votes for Amendment Four is actually going to then vote for Biden.”Regardless, Democrats believe they have the advantage. In a memo last month, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee wrote that “reproductive freedom will remain a driving issue for voters this November” and that the group would “ensure that House Republicans’ efforts to ban abortion nationwide are top of mind as voters head to the polls.”The D.C.C.C. said it had identified 18 competitive House seats in states where abortion measures are likely to be on the ballot. Republicans are trying to protect a slim House majority.Money for the ballot measures has cascaded in from both major liberal groups and small donors. Some so-called dark money organizations, whose donors are not disclosed, have contributed millions, including the Open Society Policy Center, the Sixteen Thirty Fund and the Fairness Project. Other advocacy groups, like Planned Parenthood and the American Civil Liberties Union, have also contributed seven figures.Think Big America, an abortion rights group started by Gov. J.B. Pritzker of Illinois, has spent heavily to support abortion initiatives. After dropping $1 million in Ohio last year, it has already spent $1 million in Arizona and Nevada and has made what it called a “quick investment” of $500,000 in Montana, where the issue is not yet on the November ballot.“This has a power to not only turn out Democrats but also make sure that folks that are on the fence — swing voters, independents, persuadable voters — are coming over to the side that has had a longstanding belief in reproductive freedom,” said Michael Ollen, the executive director of Think Big America.In Arizona, Gov. Katie Hobbs has directed her well-funded state political action committee, Arizona Communities United, to focus heavily on the ballot initiative.Ms. Hobbs, who has navigated slim Republican majorities in the Legislature for the first two years of her term, has made flipping both chambers a main goal for 2024, and she views the ballot measure as a central part of that effort.Gov. Katie Hobbs of Arizona has directed her state political action committee to focus heavily on the state’s ballot measure. Mark Henle/The Republic, via USA Today NetworkIn Nevada, the Biden campaign has invited ballot initiative organizers to collect signatures at events featuring Jill Biden and Ms. Harris.Giving a speech in the state last month, Ms. Harris thanked the signature gatherers in the audience. They responded by holding up their clipboards and cheering.“We’re going to win this ballot initiative,” the vice president said. “And Joe Biden and I are going back to the White House.”Patricia Mazzei More

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      Under Pressure From Trump, Arizona Republicans Weigh Response to 1864 Abortion Ban

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      Facing mounting pressure to strike down a near-total abortion ban revived last week by Arizona’s Supreme Court, Republican state legislators are considering efforts to undermine a planned ballot measure this fall that would enshrine abortion rights in the Arizona Constitution, according to a presentation obtained by The New York Times.The 1864 law that is set to take effect in the coming weeks bans nearly all abortions and mandates prison sentences of two to five years for providing abortion care. The proposed ballot measure on abortion rights, known as the Arizona Abortion Access Act, would enshrine the right to an abortion before viability, or about 24 weeks. Supporters of the measure say they have already gathered enough signatures to put the question on the ballot ahead of a July 3 filing deadline.Republicans in the Legislature are under tremendous pressure to overturn, or at least amend, the 1864 ban. Former President Donald J. Trump, the national standard-bearer of the Republican Party, directly intervened on Friday, calling on Republican legislators, in a frantically worded post online, to “act immediately” to change the law. A top Trump ally in Arizona who is running for the Senate, Kari Lake, has also called for the overturning of the 1864 law, which she had once praised.Abortion rights have been a winning message for Democrats since the Supreme Court, with three justices appointed by Mr. Trump, overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022. And even though it is an objectively unpopular aspect of his White House legacy, Mr. Trump has repeatedly bragged that he is personally responsible for overturning Roe.Republicans in Arizona, however, have already resisted efforts to repeal the 160-year-old law and are bracing for the potential for another floor battle on the ban that is looming for the Legislature, which is set to convene on Wednesday. The plans that circulated among Republican legislators suggest the caucus is considering other measures that would turn attention away from the 1864 law.The presentation to Republican state legislators, written by Linley Wilson, the general counsel for the Republican majority in the Arizona State Legislature, proposed several ways in which the Republican-controlled Legislature could undermine the ballot measure, known as A.A.A., by placing competing constitutional amendments on the ballot that would limit the right to abortion even if the proposed ballot measure succeeded.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Wisconsin Voters Approve Bans on Private Aid for Election Offices

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      Voters in Wisconsin approved adding language to the State Constitution on Tuesday that will forbid officials from accepting donations of money or staffing to help run elections, The Associated Press said.The questions were placed on the state’s primary ballot by the Republican-controlled Legislature. They were rooted in complaints raised about the 2020 election, including objections to donations that a group supported by the billionaire Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan, his wife, made to local election offices, as well as assistance given to election administrators by nonprofit groups. The donations could be used to defray any of a wide variety of costs, like polling-place rental fees, drive-through voting sites or training for poll workers.Mr. Zuckerberg has said he no longer planned to award grants to election offices.President Biden narrowly won Wisconsin in 2020, a result that some Republicans tried and failed to overturn afterward. Voters in the state, which Donald J. Trump carried in 2016, tend to split about evenly between the two major parties, and the state could be decisive in this year’s presidential race. Republicans have argued that funding for running elections should be provided solely by the government and should be allocated equitably to all jurisdictions.Opponents of the ballot question concerning outside staffing for election offices said Wisconsin law already made clear who could or could not work as an election official, and that passing the amendment could have unintended consequences.By opting for a statewide vote on the proposed election limits, Wisconsin Republicans were able to maneuver around Gov. Tony Evers, a Democrat who vetoed a bill in 2021 that would have banned private grants for elections.“Regardless of the source of additional funding for election administration, election administrators must always run elections according to state and federal law,” Mr. Evers said in his veto message.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Chicago Voters Reject Real Estate Tax Change to Fund Homeless Programs

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      The referendum, backed by progressives but criticized by the real estate industry, called for raising transfer taxes on properties that sell for more than $1 million.Chicago voters rejected an increase to the city’s transfer tax on high-value properties in a Tuesday referendum, The Associated Press said, leaving unfulfilled a longtime goal of Mayor Brandon Johnson and progressive Democrats who wanted to use new revenue to address homelessness in the country’s third-largest city.The result came after days of counting ballots, including mail-in votes, that were not able to be reported on Election Day.Real estate groups had warned that the new rates would have been a potentially catastrophic blow to the downtown office market, which was already losing value and struggling with vacancies.The vote came at an uncertain political moment in Chicago, a Democrat-dominated city where homelessness has become more visible since the pandemic and an influx of migrants has strained resources. And the result raised questions about the strength of the city’s progressive movement, led by Mr. Johnson, which has become the dominant force in City Hall over the last decade and which mobilized its army of volunteers to knock on doors in support of the tax change.“Yes, it is a loss for Mayor Johnson and is a loss for the progressive movement,” said Dick W. Simpson, a former Chicago City Council member and an emeritus professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago who campaigned for the tax change.The referendum called for raising transfer taxes on properties that sell for more than $1 million while lowering that rate on properties that sell for less. Supporters described it as a chance to level the playing field and help the city’s most vulnerable residents. Some referred to it as a “mansion tax,” versions of which have been approved by voters in Los Angeles and Santa Fe, N.M.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Venezuela Orders Arrest of Top Opposition Figures on Treason

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      The move is the latest of several that undercut prospects of free elections next year, despite commitments made to the Biden administration in return for sanctions relief.Venezuela’s top prosecutor accused several top opposition figures of treason and ordered their arrest on Wednesday, the latest blow to prospects for credible elections that the government has agreed to hold next year in exchange for the lifting of crippling U.S. economic sanctions.The attorney general, Tarek William Saab, said that opponents of the leftist government had accepted money from ExxonMobil to sabotage President Nicolás Maduro’s recent referendum on annexing a large, oil-rich region in Guyana. The oil company could not immediately be reached for comment.Mr. Saab did not say what, specifically, the accused had done to thwart the referendum, but he said they would be charged with treason, conspiracy, money laundering and criminal association. He announced arrest warrants for 15 people, some of them prominent opposition members, including people who live abroad and two U.S. citizens.The Biden administration has tried to coax Venezuela into holding elections, relaxing some of the damaging American sanctions. In October, the government reached an agreement with the opposition on steps toward a vote, and it agreed last week that candidates who have been barred from running for office could appeal that penalty to the country’s top tribunal.But Mr. Maduro’s government has also repeatedly undercut the opposition’s ability to mount a meaningful challenge.More than 2.4 million Venezuelans voted in October in an opposition primary election for president, held without official government support. Since then, the government has questioned the primary’s legitimacy, has taken legal aim at its organizers and has barred the winner of the primary, María Corina Machado, from running for office for 15 years, claiming that she did not complete her declaration of assets and income when she was a legislator. Three of those Mr. Saab accused on Wednesday are members of Ms. Machado’s political party who live in Venezuela.Since Mr. Maduro took power in 2013, after the death of Hugo Chávez, the combination of growing oppression, rampant corruption and sanctions has made life much harder for ordinary Venezuelans, and millions have left the country. Under Mr. Maduro, international observers have called the country’s elections illegitimate.With the allegations of treason, President Biden must decide whether to continue betting that sanctions relief will persuade Mr. Maduro to allow a real vote, said Geoff Ramsey, a senior fellow for Venezuela at the Atlantic Council.“I think Maduro is really forcing Biden’s hand here,” he said. “It’s become clear that he can’t win a free and fair election, so he needs Washington to snap back the sanctions to justify a crackdown that allows the regime to revert to the status quo.”On Sunday, Venezuela held a referendum, backed by Mr. Maduro, on whether to annex the Essequibo region in Guyana. Mr. Maduro has cast the issue as a fight with ExxonMobil, the American oil company that has a deal with the Guyanese government. His critics say the vote was no more than a bid to divert attention from his political troubles by stoking nationalist fervor.Jorge Rodriguez, president of Venezuela’s National Assembly, with a map on Wednesday showing Essequibo as part of Venezuela.Pedro Rances Mattey/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe government reported a vote of more than 95 percent in favor. Though political analysts, social media users and New York Times journalists reported sparse turnout, the government claimed that it was heavy, with 10.5 million ballots cast.“With the inflated vote numbers, they’ve just become a mockery,” said Christopher Sabatini, a senior research fellow for Latin America at Chatham House, an international affairs research group in London. “Things really do seem to be falling apart.”The Essequibo region, with immense mineral and oil wealth but few people, is almost as large as Florida, taking up nearly three-quarters of the total area administered by Guyana. Venezuela and Britain both claimed it in the 19th century, and the dispute has continued since Guyana gained independence from Britain in 1966. The question is under consideration by the International Court of Justice in The Hague.At the same time that Mr. Saab was giving his news conference, Ms. Machado, a center-right former lawmaker, was holding one of her own at her party’s headquarters in Caracas, saying that the referendum had damaged the electoral authority’s credibility.As news of the charges and arrest orders spread on social media and through the room where Ms. Machado was speaking, her assistant pulled her campaign chief off the stage and whispered in her ear. Afterward, another party leader took the stage to say they were waiting for formal notice from the attorney general.The three party members who were charged left the headquarters without giving statements. They are the international relations coordinator, Pedro Urruchurtu; the political coordinator, Henry Alviarez, and the communications coordinator, Claudia Macero.The Americans accused by Mr. Saab are Damian Merlo, a consultant who has advised the authoritarian president of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele; and Savoi Jandon Wright. Mr. Saab gave no information about Mr. Wright, except that he was already imprisoned in Venezuela. More

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      Maduro activa referéndum sobre el Esequibo

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      El presidente venezolano realizará un referendo para reclamar la soberanía sobre el Esequibo, una importante franja rica en petróleo de Guyana.El presidente de Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, se encuentra ante un dilema político. Está bajo la presión de Estados Unidos para que celebre elecciones libres y justas tras años de gobierno autoritario o se enfrente al restablecimiento de sanciones económicas agobiantes. Sin embargo, los analistas afirman que es poco probable que renuncie al poder y que es muy posible que pierda en unas elecciones confiables.Ahora, Maduro ha reavivado una disputa territorial con un país vecino mucho más pequeño. Es una maniobra que parece estar motivada, al menos en parte, por un deseo de desviar la atención de sus problemas políticos internos a través del impulso del fervor nacionalista.Maduro alega que la región rica en petróleo del Esequibo en Guyana, un país con una población estimada de 800.000 habitantes, forma parte de Venezuela, una nación de aproximadamente 28 millones de personas, y realizará un referendo consultivo no vinculante este domingo para preguntarle a los votantes si apoyan la posición del gobierno.El argumento de Maduro se basa en lo que muchos venezolanos consideran un acuerdo ilegítimo que data del siglo XIX que le otorgó a Guyana la región del Esequibo.Los expertos afirmaron que aunque la mayoría de los países han aceptado que el Esequibo pertenece a Guyana, y dado que el tema sigue siendo un asunto polémico para muchos venezolanos, es probable que el referéndum sea aprobado.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?  More

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      Maduro’s Vote to Annex Territory From Guyana Is Seen as a Diversion

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      The Venezuelan president is holding a referendum to claim sovereignty over Essequibo, a large oil-rich swath of neighboring Guyana.Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro, finds himself in a political bind. He is under pressure from the United States to hold free and fair elections after years of authoritarian rule or face a reinstatement of crippling economic sanctions. But analysts say he is unlikely to give up power and would most likely lose in a credible election.Now, Mr. Maduro has reignited a border dispute with a much smaller neighboring country in a move that seems driven, at least in part, by a desire to divert attention from his political troubles at home by stoking nationalist fervor.Mr. Maduro claims that the vast, oil-rich Essequibo region of Guyana, a country of about 800,000, is part of Venezuela, a nation of roughly 28 million people, and is holding a nonbinding referendum on Sunday asking voters whether they support the government’s position.Mr. Maduro’s argument is based on what many Venezuelans consider an illegitimate agreement dating to the 19th century that gave the Essequibo region to Guyana.Although most countries have accepted that Essequibo belongs to Guyana, the issue remains a point of contention for many Venezuelans, and the referendum is likely to be approved, experts said.President Irfaan Ali of Guyana has said that “Essequibo is ours, every square inch of it,” and has pledged to defend it.For Mr. Maduro, stoking a geopolitical crisis gives him a way to shift the domestic conversation at a moment when many Venezuelans are pressing for an election that could challenge his hold on power.“Maduro needs to wrap himself in the flag for electoral reasons, and obviously a territorial dispute with a neighbor is the perfect excuse,” said Phil Gunson, an analyst with the International Crisis Group who lives in Venezuela’s capital, Caracas.Analysts say that President Nicolás Maduro’s push for a referendum on Essequibo is aimed at stoking nationalist fervor to distract from his lack of popular support.Ariana Cubillos/Associated PressVenezuelan groups and activists opposing Mr. Maduro organized a primary in October without any official government support to choose a candidate to run in elections that are supposed to be held next year. More than 2.4 million Venezuelans cast ballots, a large number that suggests how engaged voters could be in a general election.But since then, the Maduro government has questioned the vote’s legitimacy and has taken legal aim at its organizers, raising concerns that Mr. Maduro will resist any serious challenge to his 10-year rule even as his country continues to suffer under international sanctions.Turnout on Sunday is expected to be large given that, among other factors, public sector employees are required to vote. A turnout larger than that for the opposition’s primary could bolster Mr. Maduro’s standing, analysts said.“It’s aimed at producing the impression that the government can mobilize the people in a way that the opposition can’t,” Mr. Gunson said.Essequibo, a region slightly larger than the state of Georgia, is a tropical jungle rich in oil, as well as minerals and timber. In recent years, many people have migrated there from Venezuela and Brazil to capitalize on the illegal mining industry.Bartica, Essequibo, is the gateway to what the Guyanese call “the interior,” a sparsely populated region of forest and savanna that is rich in natural resources. Meridith Kohut for The New York TimesGuyana has increased its police presence along the Venezuelan border, while Brazil has sent troops to the region. So far, Venezuela has not deployed any additional forces to the border. More

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      The New Republican Party Isn’t Ready for the Post-Roe World

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      Ohio is not a swing state, not any longer. Donald Trump won it by eight points, twice. It has a Republican governor, and while its senators are split between the parties, its U.S. House delegation is made up of 10 Republicans and five Democrats. And yet Ohio just passed an abortion-rights referendum by a margin of more than 13 points.There’s no way to spin this result. There’s no way to spin every other pro-choice result in every other red-state referendum. The pro-life movement is in a state of electoral collapse, and I think I know one reason.In the eight years since the so-called New Right emerged on the scene and Trump began to dominate the Republican landscape, the Republican Party has become less libertarian but more libertine, and libertinism is ultimately incompatible with a holistic pro-life worldview.I’m not arguing that the pro-choice position is inherently libertine. There are many millions of Americans — including pro-choice Republicans — who arrive at their position through genuine philosophical disagreement with the idea that an unborn child possesses the same inherent worth as anyone else. But I’ve seen Republican libertinism with my own eyes. I know that it distorts the culture of the Republican Party and red America.The difference between libertarianism and libertinism can be summed up as the difference between rights and desires. A libertarian is concerned with her own liberty but also knows that this liberty ends where yours begins. The entire philosophy of libertarianism depends on a healthy recognition of human dignity. A healthy libertarianism can still be individualistic, but it’s also deeply concerned with both personal virtue and the rights of others. Not all libertarians are pro-life, but a pro-life libertarian will recognize the humanity and dignity of both mother and child.A libertine, by contrast, is dominated by his desires. The object of his life is to do what he wants, and the object of politics is to give him what he wants. A libertarian is concerned with all forms of state coercion. A libertine rejects any attempt to coerce him personally, but he’s happy to coerce others if it gives him what he wants.Donald Trump is the consummate libertine. He rejects restraints on his appetites and accountability for his actions. The guiding principle of his worldview is summed up with a simple declaration: I do what I want. Any movement built in his image will be libertine as well.Trump’s movement dismisses the value of personal character. It mocks personal restraint. And it’s happy to inflict its will on others if it achieves what it wants. Libertarianism says that your rights are more important than my desires. Libertinism says my desires are more important than your rights, and this means that libertines are terrible ambassadors for any cause that requires self-sacrifice.I don’t think the pro-life movement has fully reckoned with the political and cultural fallout from the libertine right-wing response to the Covid pandemic. Here was a movement that was loudly telling women that they had to carry unwanted pregnancies to term, with all the physical transformations, risks and financial uncertainties that come with pregnancy and childbirth, at the same time that millions of its members were also loudly refusing the minor inconveniences of masking and the low risks of vaccination — even if the best science available at the time told us that both masking and vaccination could help protect others from getting the disease.Even worse, many of the same people demanded that the state limit the liberty of others so that they could live how they wanted. Florida, for example, banned private corporate vaccine mandates.This do-what-you-want ethos cost a staggering number of American lives. A 2022 study found that there were an estimated 318,981 vaccine-preventable deaths from January 2021 to April 2022. Vaccine hesitancy was so concentrated in Republican America that political affiliation was more relevant than race and ethnicity as an indicator of willingness to take the vaccine. Now there’s evidence from Ohio and Florida that excess mortality rates were significantly higher for Republicans than Democrats after vaccines were widely available.And this is the party that’s now going to tell American women that respect for human life requires personal sacrifice?It’s not just that libertinism robs Republicans of moral authority; it’s that libertinism robs Republicans of moral principle. The Ohio ballot measure could fail so decisively only if Republicans voted against it. The same analysis applies to ballot referendum losses in pro-Trump states like Kansas, Montana and Kentucky.In each state, all the pro-life movement needed was consistent Republican support, and it would have sailed to victory. All the Democrats in the state could have voted to protect abortion rights, and they would have lost if Republicans held firm. But they did not.“Do as I say and not as I do” is among the worst moral arguments imaginable. A holistic pro-life society requires true self-sacrifice. It asks women to value the life growing inside of them even in the face of fear and poverty. It asks the community to rally beside these women to keep them and their children safe and to provide them with opportunities to flourish. It requires both individuals and communities to sublimate their own desires to protect the lives and opportunities of others.As the Republican Party grows more libertine, the pro-life movement is going to keep losing. Of course, it’s going to keep losing with Democrats and independents, many of whom have always been skeptical of pro-life moral and legal arguments. But it’s also going to lose in the Republican Party itself, a party that is increasingly dedicated to outright defiance.An ethos that centers individuals’ desires will bleed over into matters of life and death. It did during Covid, and it’s doing so now, as even Republicans reject the pro-life cause.The challenge for pro-life America isn’t simply to raise more money or use better talking points. As Republican losses in Virginia demonstrate, advocating even a relatively mild abortion ban — a 15-week law, not a so-called heartbeat six-week bill — is fraught. The challenge is much more profound. Pro-life America has to reconnect with personal virtue. It has to model self-sacrifice. It has to show, not just tell, America what it would look like to value life from conception to natural death.At present, however, the Republican Party is dominated by its id. It indulges its desires. And so long as its id is in control, the pro-life movement will fail. There is no selfish path to a culture of life.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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      Sánchez’s Deal With Catalonia Separatists Creates Turmoil in Spain

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      Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s agreement with Catalan separatists will likely keep him in power, but it has provoked an upheaval.Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez of Spain sealed a deal to extend amnesty to Catalan separatists on Thursday in exchange for their political support, likely allowing him to stay in power but causing turmoil throughout Spain, doubts in Europe and questions about the country’s stability.Mr. Sánchez, 51, who is currently acting as a caretaker prime minister after inconclusive snap elections he called in July, backed the amnesties related to an illegal referendum that shook Spain in 2017 to receive the critical support of the Junts party, which supports independence from Spain for the northern region of Catalonia.With their support, Mr. Sánchez will likely avoid new elections, win parliamentary backing for another stint as prime minister and solidify his place in the European Union as its standard-bearer for progressive politics.But the proposed amnesties, something Mr. Sánchez had previously said he would never do, triggered an uproar..Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez of Spain speaking with the media last month.Virginia Mayo/Associated PressEarlier in the day, Mr. Sánchez’s allies, eager to avoid the appearance that the deal had been struck out of pure political calculation, sought to frame the proposal as instrumental in putting a tense and violent period of Spanish history behind the country.It was “a historic opportunity to resolve a conflict that could — and should — only be resolved politically,” Santos Cerdán, a top negotiator with the Socialist Party, who had performed shuttle diplomacy between Madrid and separatist exiles in Brussels, said after the deal was announced. “Our aim is to open the way for a legislature that will allow us to progress and to build an open and modern society and a better country.”The deal potentially marks a remarkable reversal of political fortune for Mr. Sánchez, who has made a career out of bold, long-shot bets, but who seemed on the brink of a political abyss after his party received a drubbing in local and regional elections in May.But the Junts party is not a reliable partner, and has already made clear it will continue to seek to extract concessions in exchange for its support in close votes in Parliament.The deal, and the violence, come after thousands of protesters angrily surrounded the Socialist Party headquarters in Madrid in past days and called on Mr. Sánchez not to make a deal with the separatists, whom many conservatives consider an existential threat to Spanish nationhood.Protesters holding independence flags in September during a demonstration to celebrate the Catalan National Day in Barcelona.Emilio Morenatti/Associated PressThe mainstream conservative Popular Party, which had been expected to win elections over the summer but fell short of enough votes to form a government, has called for major demonstrations throughout Spain’s major cities on Sunday.It is about “privileging a minority to the detriment of a majority, and ending the equality between Spaniards that is enshrined in the Constitution,” said Alberto Núñez Feijóo, the Popular Party leader, who said that Mr. Sánchez had clearly aligned himself with enemies of the state. “The humiliation to which Sánchez is subjecting our country is complete.”In Brussels, the European commissioner for justice, Didier Reynders, sent a letter to Spain’s justice and presidency ministers about the “serious concerns” raised by the amnesty proposal.In regional and local elections in May, Mr. Sánchez’s party took such a shellacking that he pulled the plug on his government, opting to try his chances with an early national election instead. He was expected to lose.But while Mr. Sánchez did not come out on top in the July election, he and his progressive allies won enough support to stun the favored conservative and hard-right parties, depriving them of the necessary parliamentary support to form a government.Mr. Sánchez, who has served as the prime minister since 2018, a position he won in a daring confidence vote, instead had a narrow path to building a government, but it ran right through the issue of Catalan independence, among the most prickly and fraught in Spanish politics.In 2017, leaders of the Catalan separatist movement provoked Spain’s greatest constitutional crisis in decades when they staged an independence referendum that Madrid called illegal.Carles Puigdemont, Catalonia’s exiled former leader, at a news conference in Brussels. Mr. Puigdemont has been in exile in Belgium.John Thys/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesAfter enormous demonstrations in Barcelona and a tense national climate, the heads of the movement balked. Their leader, who was president of Catalonia at the time, Carles Puigdemont, fled the country and has remained in self-imposed exile in Belgium since. His allies have faced convictions.But on Thursday, Mr. Sánchez won the support of seven lawmakers from the Junts party that Mr. Puigdemont essentially leads, in exchange for the Socialist Party proposing a new law granting amnesty to him and everyone else in the failed independence referendum. The new law could affect many separatists who have been convicted or are currently facing trial for pro-independence activities.The specifics of the agreement have not yet been made public, and it is expected to be proposed in the Spanish Parliament next week. The deal was not a given, and required more than two months of negotiations between Sánchez’s Socialist party, his own, more progressive allies, and the Catalan and Basque independence movements that, despite a lackluster showing in July’s election, retained enough leverage to force a deal.Mr. Puigedemont said on Thursday at a news conference in Brussels that he would still support the cause of independence, and he celebrated the deal, saying that it took the issue out of the judiciary and brought it back in the public sphere where it belonged.“It is a way to return to politics,” he said, “what is politics.”Rachel Chaundler More