A 15-week ban nationwide, down from 20 weeks, is a signal that the GOP is fearful the Dobbs backlash will destroy them in November.
During most of the era in which the Supreme Court generally blocked pre-viability abortion bans, the Republican Party followed a dual-track strategy. They quietly espoused the most extreme positions available (e.g., a constitutional amendment banning abortion everywhere) when pressed by the anti-abortion activists who formed an increasingly powerful segment of the party’s base, but they focused almost exclusively on very narrow ground when trying to make abortion a campaign issue (promoting bans on late-term abortions, which are both rare and unpopular). While this dishonest tactic had its critics in hard-core anti-abortion circles, it was tolerated by the general public because it was all academic as long as Roe v. Wade and Casey v. Planned Parenthood were the reigning federal constitutional precedents.
Once Dobbs swept these precedents away, Republicans had to decide which track to pursue. The rush by Republican state lawmakers to go hog wild with extreme bans amid the Dobbs decision (with 12 states enacting total or near-total bans and three others trying to overcome court orders preventing such laws) represented the first and most activist-satisfying option. But now that the backlash to Dobbs is threatening to thwart a much-anticipated Republican midterm victory, a retreat from abortion extremism into a new phase of cynical gradualism appears to be fully underway.
