ban abortion. and yet in indiana, the state legislature instituting a near total ban with some exceptions on abortion. will abortion be an earthquake type issue for voters, going into the midterm election? kansas will certainly suggest. so if they would say the kansas is not a state s progressive, necessarily. it is a large number of people of color in kansas. if you look at the white population, progressive whites are roughly 40% of the population. so that calculation usually means that in kansas is very hard for democrats. so for that ballot measure to play at the way that it did, gives a strong message that the right-wing has overstepped. the dobbs decision, and their efforts to rollback the right supports for women. that goes back to the democrats
common sense regulations. this is really about a total ban on abortion. and i don t think that the indiana legislator is a big surprise. kansas legislator would ve done exactly the same thing. but now, they can t. charlie, let me bring you into this. and i wonder, do republicans understand their abortion extremism will backfire, or is my question overstating the point? sorry, we cannot hear you. sorry. i don t think, yes, i don t think they fully understand that yet. you can see difficulty in making the course correction in indiana. that referendum vote on one issue, it does not necessarily translate to votes on congress or senate. this really is a b f the out of kansas, it shows that the democrats are engaged, republicans are divided, and in fact there are swing voters. i think something is happening
attempts. he was successful, in both. certainly democrats have seemed concerned about this race. but this comes down to whether or not ron johnson is a good senator, he is going to lose. and steve, give us the lay of the land on the role that abortion will now play in the november elections. you just heard charlie say that folks don t quite know just how much of an impact this is going to have. well, what do you say? i was surprised this week to see republicans on capitol hill say this is a wake up call for them. in kansas for example, when they saw the margin, the fact that it was ready to go in this way, as a wake up call, that maybe the landscape is different than what we expected. what you see is what will follow next. the second step is what exactly? they are continuing to establish this, all along. they will ban abortion. whether americans want it or not, they want this at the state and federal level. well that is going to fail. that is a strategy which will
in ten seconds we have left then, charlie, does that to lieutenant governor mandala barnes, that is benefit to unseat the republican incumbent senator ron johnson? it changes the dynamic of the elections, no doubt about it. as does ron johnson s bizarre embrace of making social security and medicare discretionary spending. i mean, if that is not the definition of politically suicidal, i don t know what is. you have both candidates who will be defined by tens of millions of dollars in negative advertising. i think it is unclear how this will play out, especially giving the shifting grounds under abortion issues in states like wisconsin and kansas. and with that, we will have to leave it there. charlie sykes, kathleen sebelius, steve benen, thank you all so much for coming to the sunday show. and again, you are looking at a live shot from the senate floor on capitol hill, where senators continue to vote on amendments to the inflation reduction act. one of those senators, amy
not listening to voters and what they want, and their priorities. and that wasa bipartisan, single issue surge that we saw, that was a wave across kansas. it was, shocking, then to see that legislative counterparts just a couple of states to the north did not listen. the governor is an issue for voters has scrambled and will continue to scramble every assumption that has been made for the past year about the midterm landscape. and so, elise, is drawn right? i agree. a couple with unpredictable things legislation roads this passed bill has been missing run for health care. abortion is absolutely galvanizing women. and then is going to really help democrats charge their turnout in the midterms. so while i don t think it is going to be the only issue that is driving voters, it is really