House Democrats are launching a billboard campaign targeting Republicans in competitive districts over in vitro fertilization, the latest sign that reproductive care will be central to their efforts to retake the lower chamber in November.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has announced a five-figure campaign focused on six House GOP lawmakers and two former members for their support of the Life at Conception Act at one time or another. The DCCC and national Democrats have slammed the “extreme bill” in the past, and criticisms over its lack of IVF protections resurged after the Alabama Supreme Court ruled frozen embryos were children, threatening the IVF process and women who underwent such procedures.
The targets of the campaign are Reps. David Schweikert (R-AZ), Mike Garcia (R-CA), Michelle Steel (R-CA), Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R-IA), Don Bacon (R-NE), and Scott Perry (R-PA), as well as former New Mexico Rep. Yvette Herrell and former Texas Rep. Mayra Flores. Flores and Herrell are running in the 2024 election to return to the House after they were ousted by Democrats in 2022.
The GOP has since made efforts to distance itself from the court decision, with members such as Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) circulating a resolution expressing support for IVF. Republican Senate candidates also released statements supporting IVF at the urging of the National Republican Senatorial Committee.
However, Democrats have turned to the Life at Conception Act as a way to cast Republicans as being anti-IVF further. The Life at Conception Act, which was introduced by Rep. Alex Mooney (R-WV) in the 117th and 118th Congresses, states that a “human being” includes “all stages of life, including the moment of fertilization, cloning, or other moment at which an individual member of the human species comes into being.” It does not offer protections for IVF.
“House Republicans will stop at nothing — including outlawing in vitro fertilization — to reach their ultimate goal: banning abortion and restricting reproductive rights nationwide,” DCCC spokesman Justin Chermol said in a statement announcing the ad campaign. “We will not let Americans forget that extreme House Republicans, including those who pretend to be moderates, continue to put politics over families by championing out-of-touch legislation that chips away at freedom.”
All eight targeted Republicans were co-sponsors of the Life at Conception Act when Mooney introduced the bill in February 2021. However, Perry is now the only lawmaker among the eight who is still a co-sponsor of the Life at Conception Act, which Mooney reintroduced in January 2023.
Steel, who signed on as a co-sponsor of the 2023 Life at Conception Act in January this year, withdrew from the bill on March 7. When announcing her withdrawal, she stated on the House floor she does “not support federal restrictions on IVF” and that staying on as a co-sponsor of the bill would “create confusion about my support for the blessings of having children through IVF.”
The IVF ruling has forced Republicans to stake a position between their right flank and the majority of voters who support the procedure. The specter of the treatment being taken away could hurt the Republican Party this November as it tries to rally independent and centrist Republican voters.
Many Republicans have come out in support of IVF and blasted the Alabama court ruling, with some like Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) noting that the GOP cannot be the “party against family formation.”
As Democrats continue to zero in on IVF and abortion as their top issue, House Republicans’ campaign arm has pushed back and accused Democrats of fabricating the GOP’s stance on IVF and abortion to hide their own policy misgivings.
“Extreme House Democrats continue to lie about Republicans’ position on abortion,” NRCC national press secretary Will Reinert said in a statement to the Washington Examiner. “The reason why is simple: They’ve found their dangerous policies are on the wrong side of the American people — from border security to crime to skyrocketing inflation.”
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The DCCC’s five-figure buy will run in static, digital, and mobile billboards throughout April.
The Washington Examiner reached out to the eight House GOP lawmakers’ campaigns for comment.