Abortion-Rights Group Faces Backlash After Obama Endorsement

May 15, 2008

Abortion-Rights Group Faces Backlash After Obama Endorsement

NARAL Pro-Choice America, the abortion-rights group, is feeling a backlash after endorsing Barack Obama for president on Wednesday.

Allison Fine, author of A. Fine Blog, writes that “e-mails started to fly around yesterday” from supporters of Hillary Clinton, who is challenging Mr. Obama for the Democratic nomination.

“In pained tones the senders, my circle of Hillary supporters, expressed their shock that one of the preeminent pro-choice organizations, one that they have supported in good times and bad, had double-crossed them in the eleventh hour of the presidential campaign.”

Ms. Fine, an author and senior fellow at Demos: A Network for Change and Action, a public-policy research organization in New York, criticizes NARAL for “spitting in the eye of the strongest woman candidate in the history of the country,” rather than waiting for three weeks, when the Democratic primaries will be over.

NARAL may be suffering from the panic that is afflicting many “last century” membership organizations as their donors age, prompting them to “flail around” trying to attract young people, she adds. “I would be happy to tell you about far more graceful ways to enter the connected age than scorning your core constituency,” she writes.

In explaining on the Huffington Post why NARAL’s political action committee backed Mr. Obama, Nancy Keenan, the group’s president, praises the senator’s record on reproductive-health issues and says he will be able to unite Americans with different viewpoints.

“He has reached new generations and energized young voters, independent voters, and Republican voters,” she writes. “He’s the candidate of the future.”

The reaction to that post was mixed, but many commenters praised NARAL’s move. “Although the backlash may seem overwhelming please understand that a new generation of young ladies is ready to take up the call for action,” one wrote, saying it made no sense to support a candidate simply because she is a woman.

What do you think? Did NARAL make the right decision to back Senator Obama? Will it suffer by alienating some of its donors? Or win by attracting new ones?

— Suzanne Perry

Comments

NARAL will suffer – and rightly so.

— ch May 15, 04:11 PM #
I’m 37 and I haven’t met a lot of women younger than me who are even aware that they need to work to maintain choice. I understand I’m generalizing, but it was our mothers and grandmothers who fought for all women to have choice, and many of those people were Hillary supporters. Not just because she’s a woman, either. This endorsement did nothing for the Obama campaign, so NARAL makes clear that they are simply searching for new pocketbooks. Good idea because they just lost the old ones.

— Andrea May 15, 04:44 PM #
This endorsement will do nothing to attract younger women who never had to worry about the right to a safe abortion. There is no way I would ever contribute to that organization again!

— Arlene Kessler May 16, 07:47 AM #
What a slap in the face to a Senator who been a pro-choice supporter throughtout her career. This endoresement will not only do NOTHING to secure younger women’s votes, but may instead alienate other legislators who may now be weary to stand by an organization that they know may not support them in the 11th hour. What a horrible move on NARAL’s part.

— daniela torres May 16, 11:00 AM #
I am also in my mid thirties and I do agree that most younger women do not realize that their right to vote is in jeopardy. I am a feminist and come from a generations old democratic, catholic, pro-choice family. I want more than anything to see a woman in the white house. But I am not dismayed that Naral has supported Mr. Obama. Because of his unique ability to see the big picture, to not be afraid to take on the “establishment” and his vision for America to be respected in the world, he is the candidate of choice. That is what our mother’s fought for. An outside of the box candidate unfraid to have a conversation with such places like Iran, to stand up and say “I AM PRO COICE”, to stand with dignity unwavered against racism, classism, etc. I am pissed at the sexism that has come forth with having Ms. Clinton as a candidate. But I won’t vote for her merely to “show them.” I have a larger vision for America, one that involves a future for my child full of economic, environmental, and global safety. He will bring the younger folks into the fold. And he will turn them on to ALL of these issues. HE is a true leader and I hope that the hurt felt by Clinton supporters will be put aside to unify the party. We NEED to beat John McCain. Plain and simple. So let’s all take a collective sigh, and hold each other in the highest esteem for having such passions, and let’s kick some BUTT!!

— Rebecca Peterson May 16, 11:04 AM #
There are few times in American history when one is fortunate enough to have a presidential candidate with the gravitas to rally the nation to create fundamental change in Washington. Barack Obama is that candidate and NARAL is wise to recognize both the need for the need for change and the candidate best able to deliver it.

— Todd Ruopp May 16, 02:02 PM #
Perhaps the move (or stance rather) by NARAL could have been manuevered and communicated differently. I think there should have been a better system in place to work with their existing constituency while attracting a younger donor crowd. After all, donor relationship building (and bridging) is never a black and white process.

— Ken D. Grunke May 16, 02:14 PM #
A white woman in my 60’s, I am delighted at NARAL’s endorsement. Barack Obama is the best person at this point in time, for our country and for the world at large, and I think he has the potential to be the next Gandhi or Nelson Mandela. I believe he is likely to move our country forward overall more readily than Hillary Clinton- tho I greatly appreciate and respect Sen. Clinton’s work and commitment, and would vote for and support her if she were our candidate. This is not a male/female issue – it is about who can do the best job for a variety of reasons. Thank you, NARAL, for being willing to take a stand even tho you undoubtedly knew it would anger some of your supporters. And people on both sides of the Clinto/Obama race who are threatening to not vote or vote for McCain if the other person is the candidate – please keep in mind what would happen in the Supreme Court if McCain becomes our next president, and what that would do to women’s rights!!!

— Jane Bleeg May 16, 02:14 PM #
I’m an over 50 woman and I’m here to tell the younger women that it was African Americans fighting for civil rights that made the women’s movement possible. The enormous strides made by Black Americans put equal rights — for women as well as non-whites — in the forefront of American politics. If you wish to chose your candidate simply for color or gender then your choice should be color, since Blacks brought us the equal rights amendment.

— AW May 16, 02:39 PM #
We are ALL pro choice or this would not be an issue. Both candidates are pro choice, as is NARAL. It’s not about who we, as individuals support. It is not about who is more pro choice. The question is why did NARAL short circuit the process by endorsing one of the two pro choice candidates before all the primary votes were cast? Whether pro choice individuals support Clinton or Obama is not at the heart of this debate. I want to know why NARAL, a national non-profit that readily accepts donor dollars, chose this timing for endorsement. It undermines the primary process.

— Jane Howe May 16, 04:30 PM #
I agree with Jane H. that although Clinton has a long history of pro-choice work, that doesn’t mean that Obama isn’t just as pro-choice (or at least I think that’s what she was saying). The reason why Naral probably decided to do this now is because the race is over – it has been over ever since Obama won twelve primaries in a row. Someone should really tell Hillary Clinton that.

The problem isn’t that Naral jumped the gun and endorsed too early, the problem is that they dawdled and endorsed too late to make any difference in the outcome. Not that it really matters all that much – it’s not like Obama is going to get back at them by changing all of his positions on the issue to the pro-life side. This was the biggest yawner of a political story – a pro-choice organization endorsed the pro-choice candidate that has pretty much sewn up the nomination to run against the pro-life guy. Ho hum.

— Bif May 16, 05:02 PM #
There are more voters (and more donors) than commentators. So NARAL listen to the commentators if you want to . . . but . . .

— Karla May 17, 03:21 AM #
NARAL made a big mistake. They should have endorsed the one who had been there for them the longest, and that would be Hillary. And they should have done it early on when it could have made a difference. Even a young woman can’t trust an organization that betrays its own loyal supporter.

— JJ May 19, 07:51 AM #
As someone who used to work at NARAL Pro-Choice America as well as a former New Yorker I can tell you two key things:
1) NARAL has almost never made an attempt to reach out to younger women, women of color or poorer women. They rely on their middle-aged, white, middle- and upper-class female base for support. I don’t think this endorsement was really a move to engage younger voters, though it may make some sit up and take notice. Its NARAL’s basic political calculus: who can get them the most attention and the most money? Barack Obama is the obvious choice at this point.
2) Hillary Clinton is a pro-choice Democrat. She has also done more than her fair share to continue to oppress and penalize poorer women and young women. Though NARAL’s primary focus is reproductive rights, one should view this endorsement as involving a bigger picture of women’s rights. In that instance, Clinton certainly does not rank higher. Simply voting in favor of the Iraq War put her far below Obama in supporting women’s rights.
I understand that people disagree and they have every right to. I just wish that the people who have gotten up on their high horse to denounce this decision would get off for a second to see the bigger picture.

— Marie May 19, 11:41 AM #

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