Congress “Certainly Could” Ban Abortion Nationwide, McConnell Says

“I don’t think it’s much of a secret where Senate Republicans stand.”

J. Scott Applewhite/AP

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

Since Politico published a draft Supreme Court opinion indicating that Roe v. Wade will likely be struck down, Republicans have been reluctant to take the usual victory tour, instead focusing their attention on just how the opinion leaked. But late last week, Sen. Mitch McConnell hinted at “possible” federal anti-abortion laws if Roe is overturned. 

“If the leaked opinion became the final opinion, legislative bodies—not only at the state level but at the federal level—certainly could legislate in that area,” McConnell, the top Republican in the Senate, ​told USA Today. “I don’t think it’s much of a secret where Senate Republicans stand on that issue.”

A final Supreme Court ruling that scrapped Roe, McConnell said, would mark the “point that it should be resolved one way or another in the legislative process.” But he seemed to hedge his bets, acknowledging that a total ban “would depend on where the votes were.”

Thirteen states, including McConnell’s home state of Kentucky, have passed “trigger laws” in anticipation of Roe being struck down. The bills would ban abortion statewide as soon as the Supreme Court reversed the Roe ruling. The draft opinion still isn’t in effect, but its leak will only embolden other GOP-led state legislatures to follow suit. 

Though Republican senators laid the groundwork for scrapping Roe by establishing a conservative supermajority on the Supreme Court, they have taken care to avoid making the case for a federal ban. 

A strategy memo from the GOP’s Senate fundraising arm actually urged senators to “be the compassionate consensus builder on abortion policy.” Various Republican senators, in comments to the press, have downplayed the draft opinion, tried to shift focus to the leak itself, or, like Donald Trump, claimed that the ruling won’t “have a tremendous effect.” 

It’s a bit weird for Republicans to avoid discussing a crowning achievement in their campaign to decimate reproductive rights. But the response from US voters has already been hostile, a potential liability for some Republicans in November’s midterm elections.

Nearly two-thirds of Americans want Roe v. Wade’s protections to remain in place, according to a CBS News poll released on Sunday. Close to 70 percent of respondents in that poll opposed a national abortion ban, including a majority of Republicans.

Even if a ban were on the table, McConnell would likely be forced to abandon the filibuster in order to pass it—an upheaval the senator told USA Today he wouldn’t support “for any subject.” Which would be easy to believe, if not for McConnell’s entire political history.

WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we need readers to show up for us big time—again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

payment methods

WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we need readers to show up for us big time—again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate