What Polling tells us about a candidate?

The Realist Perspective on Abortion and Other Women’s Health Care: Reply to Biden, Biden or a Continuum

Even though Biden sought to keep abortion center stage in his reelection bid, abortion advocates doubted that the president could be an effective standard-bearer as Republican efforts erode access to abortion and other women’s health care.

Ms. Harris could give the “double haters” what they wanted. Some voters, who were apparently begging the two major parties to give them other options, are referred to as double haters. Now there is one question: Is Ms. Harris a genuine alternative to Biden or just a continuation of his candidacy? She is likely to get a two-point increase over Mr. Biden among these voters.

A strong stance on abortion is not the only major contrast to the GOP that Harris offers: She is well versed in health policy. As a child, Harris often accompanied her mother to work on the weekends, visiting the lab where her mother, a biomedical scientist, was studying breast cancer.

“She deserves credit, she’s talked about them on the campaign trail. Democratic priorities on health care will not change if she is the nominee, says a vice president at a consulting firm.

Those views stand in contrast to those of many Republicans, especially women. A survey by KFF shows that half of Republican women think abortion is a legal option. Many women who vote Republican believe abortion should be legal in rape, incest, and a pregnant emergency.

In a survey conducted in April by the Pew Research Center, 63 percent of people think abortion should be legal in most cases. Thirty-six percent said it should be illegal in all or most cases.

Republicans have sought to distance themselves from their own victory on the issue. Trump angered some members of his base by saying he would not make decisions regarding abortion in the states.

Regardless, advocates caution that the GOP’s new moderation-by-omission on the issue masks their actual, more extreme stance. While running for Senate, he supported the national abortion ban, but now supports Trumps position of letting the states decide. The GOP platform adopted last week does not explicitly call for a nationwide ban on abortion, but does recognize the idea that when an egg is fertilized it becomes a person with full legal rights. It’s a legal theory that can lead to an end to abortion.

“It’s been one of, if not the main, issue she’s emphasized in the last year or two,” said Matthew Baum, Marvin Kalb professor of global communications at Harvard University. The Republicans are trying to make sure the issue stays that way. It’s been a disaster for them.”

Harris will need to do more than just campaign against the Republican proposal to roll back abortion access because there are many other important issues competing for the attention of voters, according to some pollsters.

“She has to say she is running for a federal law that will bring back Roe v. Wade,” said Robert Blendon, an emeritus public health professor at Harvard University. “She needs something very specific and clear.”

In one case, challenging the FDA’s 2000 approval of the abortion pill mifepristone, the justices ruled that the group of anti-abortion medical professionals who challenged the drug lacked standing to sue because they failed to show they were personally injured by its availability.

A federal law requires hospitals to give emergency care to pregnant patients even if they are not in danger of dying, but it doesn’t apply in Idaho, which doesn’t allow abortions for pregnant women who are at risk of dying.

In that case, the justices apparently failed to reach any majority agreement, declaring instead that they were premature in accepting the case and sending it back to the lower court for further consideration. That case, too, could return in relatively short order.

Biden-Harris Administration: What have we learned? What do we need to know about drug prices and the cost of insulin, diabetes, and birth control?

Harris would also have substantial leeway to talk about what are considered to be the Biden administration’s core health policy accomplishments. These include enhanced Affordable Care Act tax credits aimed at helping consumers get health insurance coverage, which were extended through the Inflation Reduction Act into 2025, the $35 monthly cap on copays some patients pay for insulin, and drug price negotiation in Medicare.

“I think she is well positioned. She is core to the administration and will be able to take credit for those things,” said Dan Mendelson, CEO of Morgan Health, a subsidiary of J.P. Morgan Chase.

The administration has taken necessary steps, but new expensive drugs keep coming out. “So if you look at the perception of consumers, they do not believe the cost of drugs is going down.”

Joseph Antos believed that Harris would say the Biden-Harris administration had already saved people money on diabetes drugs. She will have to keep talking about costs of drugs and other things, not just reproductive rights.

“She’s got to concentrate, if she wants to win, on issues that have a broad appeal,” Antos said. The access to treatments is a big issue.

Source: Harris, who is Biden’s voice on abortion rights, is likely to raise the volume

The turn-up of the 2024 race: what do you want to know about Kamala Harris? When do you look at the newsroom?

KFF Health News is a national newsroom that reports on health issues. It is an operating program at KFF.

There’s rarely a perfect time to be a pollster, but on Sunday afternoon, as my latest national survey of voters was wrapping up, President Biden announced that he was withdrawing from the 2024 race and endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris.

The selection of Mr. Trump’s running mate and the attempted assassination of Donald Trump were some of the events that pollsters were working on to measure the impact.

Suddenly, the 2024 race has been turned on its head. We need two things to get a full read on the change-up at the top of the Democratic ticket.

Time says that the idea of Ms. Harris as the Democratic nominee will take a few days. Even then, it will take a few days for pollsters to go back out, ask people their views and then crunch the numbers.

Republicans could fall into the trap of being online against Ms. Harris. It is hard to overstate the extent to which Republicans view Ms. Harris as unattractive. If you only learn about her from conservative media, you’re most likely steeped in “unburdened by what has been” video montages and criticism of her laugh. If you assume most voters think of her in this way, you’re at your own risk.

Source: Opinion | What Polling Tells Us About a Kamala Harris Candidacy

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