Support for abortion rights drove women to the polls in midterm elections, helping Democrats to deny Republicans the sweeping victory they had expected nationwide.
But President Joe Biden said Monday that Democrats still lack the votes needed to codify abortion rights into law despite his party's stronger-than-expected performance in the midterm elections.
Overall, about a quarter of voters said the U.S. Supreme Courtâs reversal of Roe v. Wade was a top factor in their vote, according to AP VoteCast, a nationwide survey of more than 94,000 voters in the midterm elections. Women, Democrats and abortion-rights supporters were especially likely to say that.
The results of Tuesdayâs election sent a clear message that the issue of abortion rights has not faded for voters in the months since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.
Republican candidates did gain ground in some states, potentially paving the way for more state bans on womenâs abortion access. In many states, the GOP lost contests that would have allowed the party to easily advance restrictions on access to abortion.
Abortion rights supporters won in five states where access was on the ballot, including in blue California and Vermont and the swing state of Michigan, where voters enshrined it in the state constitutions. In Montana and GOP stronghold Kentucky, voters rejected anti-abortion amendments.
Many Democratic candidates advocated for abortion rights on the campaign trail. But they also cast their Republican rivalsâ âextremeâ attitudes on abortion as one example of a broader threat to the countryâs democratic institutions, including its election systems.
Abortion âmay have made the difference in some key races where the elections were really competitive,â said Ashley Kirzinger, director of survey methodology at KFF, which designed questions for and published an analysis of VoteCast.
A look at 50 years of Supreme Court abortion decisions
1973
Updated
The court legalizes abortion nationwide in the landmark Roe v. Wade decision.
In photo:Â Norma McCorvey, Jane Roe in the 1973 court case, left, and her attorney Gloria Allred hold hands as they leave the Supreme Court building in Washington, DC., Wednesday, April 26, 1989.Â
1976
Updated
The court strikes down a Missouri law requiring a married woman to get her husband's consent for an abortion.
1986
Updated
The court strikes down portions of a Pennsylvania law it said attempted to intimidate women into continuing pregnancies by, among other things, requiring them to be told the risks associated with abortion.
1989
Updated
The court declines to overrule Roe but allows more state regulation of abortion.
1992
Updated
The court reaffirms its decision in Roe and says states can't ban abortion before viability, the point at which a fetus can survive outside the womb, around 24 weeks of pregnancy.
2000
Updated
The court strikes down a Nebraska law that barred an abortion procedure used during the second trimester of pregnancy. The law didn't have an exception to the ban for the health of the pregnant woman.
2007
Updated
In a decision weakening Roe, the court upholds the 2003 Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act passed by Congress, which is similar to Nebraska's law.
2016
Updated
In its strongest defense of abortion rights in 25 years, the court strikes down Texas rules forcing clinics to meet hospital-like standards and doctors to have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals.
2020
Updated
A more conservative court strikes down a Louisiana law nearly identical to the Texas one it struck down in 2016.
2021
Updated
The court declines to take emergency action and allows a Texas law banning abortion beginning at around six weeks to take effect.
2022
Updated
The court overturns Roe v. Wade, ending constitutional protections for abortion that had been in place nearly 50 years.
