Tim Sheehy, the Republican Party’s Senate nominee in Montana, was caught on a recently surfaced audio recording arguing that women have been “indoctrinated” to have pro-abortion-rights views. Sheehy’s comments echo rhetoric from other Republican candidates minimizing the importance of the abortion issue ahead of this fall’s election.
“Young people—listen up, they’ve been indoctrinated for too long. We don’t even try to talk to them anymore,” Sheehy said. He went on to complain that after speaking to a group of young people, “[Y]oung women between the age of 19 and 30, abortion is their No. 1 concern. That’s all they want to talk about. They are single-issue voters.”
In the recording, which was made in 2023, Sheehy also repeated the false Republican claim that Democrats support abortion after birth, noting, “It’s called murder. That is the position of the American Democrat Party.”
Sheehy is locked in a close race against Democratic Sen. Jon Tester, who has held the seat since 2007 and supports abortion rights. Montana’s Senate seat could determine which party holds a majority after the November election.
“My opponent called young women ‘indoctrinated’ for caring about their freedom to make their own decisions,” Tester said in an Instagram post on Monday. “Tim Sheehy believes Montana women can’t think for themselves. I think that’s total bull. Women know their health and their bodies better than any out-of-state millionaire.”
Sheehy’s comments follow in the footsteps of other Republicans running this year who have tried to find their way around their unpopular anti-abortion views.
Bernie Moreno, who is seeking the Ohio Senate seat held by Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown, said in a recently released video that it is “crazy” for women over age 50 to be concerned with abortion rights.
In Wisconsin, Eric Hovde is running against Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin, and in 2012, he told reporters he was “totally opposed” to abortion. However, faced with elections where pro-abortion-rights candidates have triumphed—including in Wisconsin—Hovde now claims he favors the “right to make a choice.”
Arizona Senate candidate Kari Lake, best known for promoting pro-Trump election conspiracies, praised an 1864 state law that banned all abortion, calling it a “great law” when she was running for governor in 2022. But when the state brought back the ban after the conservative Supreme Court gutted the protections afforded by Roe v. Wade, Lake argued that the legislation was “out of step” with the state. This year, Lake is running against Rep. Ruben Gallego for a Senate seat.
Democratic Sen. Bob Casey of Pennsylvania is being challenged by Republican David McCormick. When running for office in 2022, McCormick said he opposed abortion rights, but now he claims that there needs to be “common ground” on the topic. Casey backs legislation to codify Roe v. Wade in federal law.
In Nevada, Republican Senate candidate Sam Brown previously supported an abortion ban that did not contain exceptions for victims of rape or incest. However, in his race against Democratic Sen. Jacky Rosen, Brown has tried to argue that he is personally opposed to abortion rights but that the issue is a state issue and wouldn’t play a role in federal legislation.
The argument is similar to the one made by Donald Trump, but the destruction of Roe has led to Republican-led legislatures putting in place severe abortion bans, which have endangered lives.
A Republican majority in the Senate would prevent the passage of legislation to restore Roe protections and could mean support for a federal abortion ban, which officials like Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina have previously proposed.
In addition to attempting to maneuver around abortion, Republican candidates have been making strange statements on issues relating to women.
Trump referred to himself as a “protector” of women, even as his actions have forced women to give birth to children born from rape and incest. His running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, infamously referred to high-profile Democrats as “childless cat ladies” and has gone on at length about the supposed inferiority of women who haven’t given birth.
Further down the ticket, Lake has repeatedly said that women are “not equal” to men, and in a comment from 2016, Hovde said women “spend too much time with what’s going on in Hollywood” versus current events.
In a discussion about political tactics, Sheehy said, “People ask me, how do you fight back? Number one, I can’t, because it’s like, if you’re not a rapist, how do you prove you’re not a rapist? I can’t prove it, it’s impossible.”
Republicans have historically had a hard time convincing women to vote for them. In 2020, 57% of women voted for Joe Biden. And the party’s current slate of candidates doesn’t seem to be helping to improve the odds.
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