Former President Donald Trump senior counselor Kellyanne Conway traveled to Capitol Hill on Wednesday to meet with congressional Republicans and urge them to take contraception access seriously or risk facing defeat in the 2024 election.
Conway, as well as lobbyist Susan Hirschmann and Independent Women’s Voice CEO Heather Higgins, were set to meet with GOP members and the staff in the House and Senate to warn them that if they did not start taking women's health seriously, including increasing access to birth control, they would risk losing voters and hand victory to Democrats, who have capitalized on claiming Republicans want to outlaw contraception along with abortion.
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The trio's visit comes over a year and a half since Roe v. Wade was overturned by the Supreme Court, allowing Republican-led states to enact strict abortion bans, some total and some with exceptions, that have drawn heavy criticism from Democrats and some Republicans who believe their party needs to change its message on abortion.
Conway and her allies argue that Republicans engaging in meaningful actions to expand contraception could give Republicans an edge among their female voter base and possibly sway some Democrats dissatisfied with President Joe Biden.
"You’ve got a fair number of Democrats saying that they want an alternative to Biden and Harris, or they may sit it out,” Conway said in an interview with Politico. “He’s especially bleeding young voters, who you would think would be animated and interested to hear about [contraception], and who are in the prime of their years and choosing to conceive or not to conceive.”
The trio is sharing polling information commissioned by Independent Women's Voice and conducted by Conway's firm, KA Consulting, which shows a majority of the public, including Republicans and those who identify as "pro-life," support policies that make contraception easier to access and more affordable. These contraceptives include long-acting versions such as IUDs, which conservatives have sought to block in some states.
Conway planned to tell GOP members that they would "lose precious political currency and votes" if they do nothing or take steps to place contraception further out of reach for women. The poll showed that nearly 50% of conservative women "would consider voting for a candidate from a different political party” if Republicans back birth control restrictions.
The message for Republicans, Higgins said, is that they need to talk more about their support and less about what they oppose when it comes to abortion and contraceptive care.
“Republicans are like your uncle, who really loves you and loves the women in his family, but he’s bad about showing it,” Higgins said in an interview with the outlet. “It’s just not in their natural vocabulary. And we’re trying to help them learn how to make this be more part of their vocabulary and tell them that they need to talk about these things that their constituents all support, and be more visible and vocal.”
Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) has been one of the most vocal Republicans in Congress to speak out against her own party for its approach to abortion and women's health. She has received heavy backlash for doing so, particularly from anti-abortion groups.
"It's interesting because I mostly talk about exceptions for rape, for incest, for life of the mother," Mace told the Washington Examiner in an interview in May. "I talk about women's access to birth control. I talk about adoption services. And that's too radical for some people on the far right."
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"You have to ask yourself, 'What the hell is wrong with you?' If you want to reduce the number of abortions in this country, then you also need to increase the number of women who can have access to birth control — safe access to birth control, because we have entire counties in this country that don't have a single OBGYN doctor," she said. "If we want to get serious about saving lives, then let's get serious about saving lives and also showing that you can be pro-life and you can be pro-woman at the same time. They're not mutually exclusive."
Mace and several others have warned that abortion policy will be a significant topic among voters heading into 2024. Abortion arguably was one of the biggest factors in the 2023 elections, particularly shown in the outcomes of the Virginia legislative and Kentucky governor's races, as well as the adoption of an abortion protection amendment in Ohio.