‘A slap in the face’: Va. House GOP forced to reject own member’s anti-abortion bill
‘A slap in the face’: Va. House GOP forced to reject own member’s anti-abortion bill
Democrats in the Virginia House of Delegates forced their Republican colleagues to take an up-or-down vote Monday on a sweeping anti-abortion bill one lawmaker called “a slap in the face” to women who have been raped or suffer life-threatening complications from a pregnancy.
So for those not following VA politics, I'll do up a bit of a TL;DR:
Pre-Nov-2023:
- Governor: Republican
- Legislature: 1 house was Dem, 1 house was Republican
- Abortion was used to try to drum up support to make both legislative houses Republican in the Nov 2023 elections (among other things)
Nov 2023 elections happen.
- Plan backfires. Dems get both legislative houses, but Gov seat is still Republican.
New Legislative session starts for 2024.
- Republican filed a bill to remove funding for abortions
- Dems were like "lol no", wanted to bring a floor vote on the bill to get votes recorded on where everyone stands on it
- Republicans tried to revoke and water down bill, Dems were like "lol no"
- Dems forced the bill to floor vote
- Almost every single Republican decided to vote "no" on bill, so it failed by 97 votes (out of 100).
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Just another episode of the GOP's fascist clownshow.
Not really, the GOP didn't get far at all in their shenanigans here. The national Dems could learn a thing or two from this...
If this was the normal clownshow, the Dems would roll over and be like "it's time for unity and reconciliation" or whatever crap they push.
This is a disingenuous take, considering the important distinction between these state Dems and the national Dems:
These guys have majorities in their houses, and thus have significantly more political power. The national Dems don't.
This is a disingenuous take
No it isn't. The national Dems are just incredibly ineffective and leadership pushes the bare minimum. Like the national party, Virginia has it's share of Democrats that are conservative and take issue with broader party goals too.
Let's look at the legislature make-up:
Virginia Senate: 21D-19R
Virginia House of Delegates: 51D-49R
There is very, very little room for defections.
Yeah this is how you let Republicans self-own, not by trying to pass a draconian border bill that expressly appeases fascists' sensibilities. It's far better and easier to drag their asses out into the open, show how awful they are, and then deny them.
Taking the 'high road' is Dems saying "We ain't doing shit about anything. Fuck you."