Voters reject Republican extremism on women 'time and time again': Ex-GOP lawmaker

Republicans are leading their party off a cliff when it comes to abortion rights, because they simply can't take feedback from the electorate and moderate their absolutist positions, argued former Rep. David Jolly (R-FL) on MSNBC Friday.

This comes in the wake of a devastating defeat for Republicans in Ohio, where this week a constitutional amendment they proposed to try to make it harder to pass an abortion protection measure on the ballot this November was defeated in a double-digit blowout.

"I want to get your take on something that Sean Hannity said," said anchor Alicia Menendez, playing a clip of Hannity on Fox News saying, "I think the American people — and I consider myself pro-life, I believe in the sanctity of life — but I think, politically, that there is, Republicans have got to say, as Bill Clinton once said, I never thought I would quote him, rare, legal, and I'd add the word very early in a pregnancy, that seems to be politically where the country is. Maybe I'm wrong. But we'll see. That vote in Ohio was pretty sobering."

"Why can't Republicans figure out a cohesive, coherent message on this," said Menendez. "Why are they trying to send their base in the direction of a national ban?"

"Because they're following their passions and not looking dispassionately at the data," said Jolly, a frequent critic of the former president and the state of his longtime party. "The national data overwhelmingly is, time and time again, coming out of Dobbs — when we see state-level referendums that started with Kansas after the Dobbs decision and the Ohio measure this past week, when you look at special elections where the issue of a woman's choice is put up in front of voters, voters continue to reject the Republican position."

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"I think what is interesting — Sean Hannity quoted Bill Clinton, he could actually quote a Republican," said Jolly. "I know progressives have a lot of heartburn over George Bush, but when Bush 43 was asked about this in 2000, he said, 'Listen, I think the way to approach this is by changing hearts and minds,' and I suppose that could be true for either side of this debate. What George Bush 43 recognized is, politically, many of the hardened positions of the Republican Party are out of step with where general election voters are. This is a deeply passionate issue for so many people. All you have to do is dispassionately look at the data and it tells you the American people prefer a Roe framework over a Dobbs framework, and Republicans keep falling on their faces trying to go the other direction."

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