As you all know by now April 9th, 2024, is a dark day in Arizona as the Arizona State Supreme Court, packed with all Republican Governor appointees, ruled that an 1864 law banning nearly all abortions (including cases of rape and incest) must stand.
We now know that when the MAGA party says make America Great Again, they aren’t thinking take us back 60 years to pre-Civil Rights Act 1964, so much as they are thinking take us back 160 years to 1864!
In the almost two years since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade with the Dobb’s ruling in July 2022, Republicans have slowly discovered that extreme positions on banning abortion which they once extolled with great fervor, aren’t exactly politically popular.
So as the Court made its Draconian decision today, Arizona Republicans either scrambled to reverse their previous position, or they simply disappeared and said nothing at all,
Two illustrative examples are the two Arizona GOP Freshmen of Congress, Juan Ciscomani and Eli Crane.
Juan Ciscomani, who represents Arizona’s 6th Congressional District (a swing district that mixes parts of Tucson and rural Southeastern Arizona, and narrowly went for Biden over Trump in 2020) today declared:
Today’s ruling is a disaster for women and providers...The territorial law is archaic. We must do better for women and I call on our state policymakers to immediately address this in a bipartisan manner.
Of course, this Juan re-inventing himself, because on the day Roe was overturned, he sung a different tune when he proudly exclaimed:
A historic day! I applaud the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. These policies should be set by states...
And I suppose it would be inconvenient to point out Ciscomani was a Senior Advisor to Governor Doug Ducey, whose judicial appointments to the Supreme Court were all four of the votes that upheld the 1864 law. So, Ciscomani owns this and can’t run from his past.
If Ciscomani, panicking and trying to reverse course to save his electoral prospects is one cowardly approach, it is not the only one.
Rep. Eli Crane (AZ-2) (a single digit lean R district in rural Northern and Central Arizona) who can’t keep his mouth shut when it comes to his concerns about a woke military, and who loves grilling administration officials over petty grievances and cultural issues, has suddenly lost his voice altogether. Given his deep-throated endorsement of Trump at every turn, including when Roe was overturned, you’d think Crane would be celebrating today’s court ruling loud and proud, after all in July 2022 he proclaimed:
Roe v Wade was a mistake...This moment also reinforces the need for Republicans to be fearless fighters for our core convictions, Overturning Roe would not have been possible had President Trump and courageous Senators not been aggressive in confirming three Supreme Court Justices in his first term. [see full Tweet in image box above]
Of course, now that the decision to ban nearly all abortions even in cases of rape and incest is politically detrimental, the ex-Navy Seal who exhorted Republicans to “be fearless fighters for our core convictions” has retreated into a foxhole, hidden from view. The man with so many opinions about DEI, transgenders, and “colored people” in the military, ghosted his constituents on this fateful day, and can’t summon one word to say maybe it's not okay to force a 13-year-old rape victim to carry a pregnancy to term. His silence speaks volumes.
You can help defeat both these Republicans, the panicked flip flopper (Ciscomani), and the cowardly Congressman who ghosted us all (Crane), by contributing to their opponents here:
Kirsten Engel for Congress (AZ6 challenging Ciscomani)
Jonathan Nez for Congress (AZ2 challenging Crane)
