Republicans Vote Against Contraception
And Joe Biden takes action on the border.
The Republicans are coming for your birth control.
On Tuesday, June 4th, Senate Republicans blocked a vote on the Right to Contraception Act, which would have provided protections for an individual’s right to access and a healthcare provider's right to provide contraception and related information.
That’s a long way of saying that if the bill had passed, YOUR right to access condoms, birth control, IUDs, and other forms of pregnancy prevention would have been protected. Donald Trump and the Republican party do not want to do that.
First abortion, then IVF, and now birth control.
Make no mistake about it: if Donald Trump wins the presidency and Republicans control the House and Senate, they will pass federal legislation to outlaw abortion and dramatically restrict access to birth control. This is a cornerstone of the fundamentalist Christian’s Project 2025, which is the legislative agenda for a second Trump term.1
How do we talk about this?
The good news is that restricting birth control is VERY unpopular. Support for birth control access cuts across age, gender, and political affiliation. This is a winning issue for Democrats, and we should be talking about it.
President Biden’s administration has taken some significant steps to protect and expand access to birth control. We should highlight these:
Signed an executive order to strengthen access to birth control.
Worked to expand access to free birth control, including for women with and without insurance.
Led a whole-of-government effort to protect and expand access to reproductive health care amid ongoing Republican attacks.
A few things to consider:
The Times/Siena battleground state poll showed that 17% of voters blame President Biden for overturning Roe v Wade, and another 13% don’t know who to blame. So, 30% of the voters in battleground states don’t blame Donald Trump for losing access to an abortion. That’s a problem. We need to use this opportunity to remind people that Donald Trump overturned Roe v Wade.
The inner workings of the Supreme Court, Executive Branch, Congress, and State Governments can be confusing. Focus instead on a woman’s rights to control her body and use direct terms like abortion and birth control.
Ultimately, this is taking your rights and control over your body. Donald Trump and his Supreme Court judges took a right away enshrined in US law for 60 years. Now, they want to take your right to access birth control and other contraceptives away. In this election, your rights are on the line. We need to remind people of this.
Our friends at Demcast created a great toolkit with content and social posts. Please share these messages widely.
I’ve created a few things as well, you can download these images from this Substack and use them on your social feeds.
Here are some share copy suggestions:
“Donald Trump’s MAGA Supreme Court took away your right to an abortion when they overturned Roe v Wade. Now they are coming for your birth control.”
“Republicans want to make healthcare decisions for you. Abortion was just the beginning. Now, they want to restrict your access to birth control. If Donald Trump wins the presidency, there will be no birth control and no abortion access. Forced pregnancy will be the law of the land.”
“President Biden protected and expanded access to birth control. Donald Trump tried to take it away. If you care about access to birth control and control of your body, the choice is clear. Biden will protect it, Trump will attack it.”
Biden takes action on the border.
Now, to discuss a topic where Biden and the Democrats are quite vulnerable: Immigration.
On Tuesday, June 4th, President Biden signed an executive order that will temporarily shut down asylum requests once the average number of daily crossings tops 2,500 at our southern border. The border will only reopen once that number falls to 1,500.
There is no sugarcoating this issue. Biden and the Democrats are very vulnerable on this issue. But we shouldn’t shy away from talking about it.
How to talk about the border.
Messaging Bottom Line: Joe Biden is working to address our immigration system in a humane way that respects America as a nation of immigrants. He is limited by a MAGA-controlled Republican congress, which refuses to take any action at the direction of Donald Trump. Trump and his MAGA goons killed a bipartisan immigration reform bill because they wanted to preserve the issue for the general election.
Donald Trump’s immigration policy is motivated by the racist replacement theory that wants to turn America into a white Christian fundamentalist country. He wants to end immigration in America altogether, deport millions of people without due process, and limit who can come to this country based on their religion and ethnicity.
Candidate Breakdown: Immigration
President Biden has:
Proposed increased funding to enhance border security and immigration enforcement. This includes $40 million to combat fentanyl trafficking.
Proposed increased funding to process asylum cases faster to achieve the administration’s goal of processing 125,000 refugees.
Proposed improving the immigration courts, including an extra $1.5 billion to mitigate the backlog of 1.8 million immigration cases.
Donald Trump has promised to:2
Revive his Muslim ban.
Shut down the asylum program entirely.
Speed up mass deportations, not requiring any due process hearing.
Deputize local law enforcement to carry out this extreme mass deportation, granting them immunity from prosecution.
Use the military budget to build mass deportation camps.
Cancel the Visas for foreign students who participate in anti-Israel protests.
Kickout tens of thousands of Afghans who were evacuated amid the Taliban takeover.
End birthright citizenship for babies born in the US to undocumented parents.
They would do all of this through executive order, circumventing the legislative process in this country.
If you want humane and orderly immigration policies in this country, the choice is clear.
Message to upset Biden supporters and people on the left.
Many of you reading this post are probably upset at Biden’s executive order. I’m not crazy about it either. Policy decisions made for purely political reasons are never a good thing. Criticism of this action is valid.
My suggestion is to focus on what we want in a proper immigration reform bill. Then, once Biden is reelected and the Democrats take back the House and Senate, we work like crazy to ensure they listen to us.
One thing we should NOT do is buy into the messaging, coming from some on the left, that Biden is acting like Trump here. Conflating this executive action with Trump’s immigration actions as president and his plans for a second term is inaccurate and strains credibility.
As stated above, Donald Trump:
Prevented people from entering the country based on their religion.
Used family separation as a preventative tool, attempting to inflict the maximum amount of pain on asylum seekers.
Dramatically reduced legal immigration into this country.
Has promised to use local law enforcement to deport millions of people and give the police immunity from prosecution to do so.
Joe Biden:
Is shutting down the border temporarily if crossings reach 2,500.
These are not the same thing.
We will break down Project 2025 soon. Spoiler alert: it’s crazy.
The NY Times article is not speculation or from a leaked document. This all came straight from Stephen Miller’s mouth. Not only are Trump’s plans for immigration scary, they are openly bragging about them.
Right on. This is such important messaging. Thank you for your clarity; i hope this gains traction.
I would add to trump’s immigration policy list his insanely inhumane practice of separating children from their families.