‘I would rather be right and lose an election’

Rubio stands firm on abortion ban as Democrats attack

U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio says he’d rather lose his job in Washington than compromise his strong anti-abortion views, signing onto a politically risky 15-week nationwide ban just weeks before the midterm elections.

His Democratic opponent U.S. Rep. Val Demings and her allies are putting that to the test in the sprint to Election Day on Nov. 8.

They are blitzing the airwaves with ads slamming Rubio’s position that abortion should be prohibited even in cases of rape and incest, tapping into their base’s outrage over the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade and seeking to brand Rubio an abortion extremist. “The Republicans have done an extreme overreach,” said Florida Senate Democratic Leader Lauren Book, a Demings ally. “NPAs, Democrats and even some Republicans think this is too extreme to ban abortion without exceptions for rape, incest and human trafficking. It is beyond the pale for many Floridians.”

Nationwide, Democrats are investing more than $124 million this year in television advertising focused on abortion, more than twice the money invested on any other issue, according to an Associated Press analysis.

Rubio isn’t backing down from the abortion fight. In interviews, Rubio said he views abortion as a “moral issue about life.”

“I would rather be right and lose an election than wrong and win one,” he said at a recent campaign event with religious leaders covered by Local News 10 Miami, echoing a similar statement he made in 2016 when he ran for president.

Rubio is the only GOP senator up for reelection this year who co-sponsored the 15-week abortion ban introduced by U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, making Florida’s Senate race a flashpoint in the national debate over the issue.

In interviews, Rubio has said he personally supports a ban with no exceptions for rape and incest that would “protect innocent life from the moment of conception to the moment of birth.”

Despite his personal views, he said he would support legislation with exceptions because it would reduce the number of

abortions.

“I am in favor of laws that protect human life. I do not believe that the dignity and the worth of human life is tied to the circumstances of their conception, but I recognize that’s not a majority position,” Rubio told CBS Miami’s Jim DeFede in August. “Therefore, I have always said I support bills that have exceptions.”

Graham’s legislation, viewed as having a slim chance of passing, includes exceptions for rape and incest.

Demings slammed Rubio in an ad for wanting to criminalize abortion and calling it outrageous to “mandate what a woman can and can’t do with her body.”

“In the U.S. Senate, I will never stop fighting to codify Roe v. Wade and protect the fundamental freedom of women and girls to choose our own destiny,” Demings said in a statement Wednesday.

Rubio counters that Demings and the Democrats are the ones with extreme positions who haven’t specified exactly when they think abortion should be prohibited.

“Banning abortion after four months is consistent with Florida law and more permissive than all but two European countries,” Rubio said in a statement.

John Stemberger, president of the Orlando-based, anti-abortion Florida Family Policy Council, praised Rubio for co-sponsoring the 15-week proposal.

“Sen. Rubio has been a champion for life and the unborn, and we applaud his courage and clarity on this issue,” he said.

Rubio has claimed Demings supports abortion “up to the moment of birth,” which the Demings campaign dismissed as a “partisan smear” not rooted in reality.

Demings has said she supports abortion until fetal viability as determined by a doctor. Fetal viability is generally considered to be between 23 and 24 weeks of pregnancy.

Other Florida GOP leaders have been less vocal on the abortion issue.

Earlier this year, Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a 15-week state ban on most abortions with no exceptions for rape or incest.

He has promised to expand “pro-life protections” in the future but hasn’t answered questions about which proposals he would support.

U.S. Sen. Rick Scott sidestepped questions, too, about the federal 15-week abortion ban bill during a

Fox News interview, saying Republicans would prevail if “we stay on our message,” Florida Politics reported.

About 67% of Floridians want abortion legal in most or all cases, according to a Florida Atlantic University poll conducted in May. But respondents ranked other issues, such as inflation and immigration, as more pressing with 39% calling abortion as a high-priority issue compared with 84% for inflation.

Steve Vancore, a Democratic pollster, said he didn’t see even a “ray of optimism” earlier this year for Democrats in Florida, but he thinks the political climate as of late has shifted in their favor in part because of the Dobbs court decision overturning Roe v. Wade eroding some Republican support.

“Suddenly with the economy doing better, the price of gas coming down and now with the battle cry on Dobbs, you are seeing a significant shift both nationally and in Florida,” he said.

Still, Demings faces a tough challenge in unseating Rubio, an entrenched incumbent, Vancore said.

“There is a headwind for the Democrats, but that headwind seems much less than it did six weeks ago,” he said.

Rubio