Renee Ellmers Feels the Blowback from Killing 20 Week Ban

Chris Cillizza of the Washington Post declared Ellmers to have had “the worst week in Washington” last week because of the vote, despite acknowledging that in the long run, killing the bill was probably in the best interest of her own party. “While dumping the bill might have been the right thing for Republicans heading into the 2016 election — I argued that point here — it’s going to make Ellmers’s life a lot more complicated between now and then,” writes Cillizza, adding, “Timing is everything in politics. And being the public face of an effort to sack pro-life legislation as half a million pro-life activists descend on Washington is the epitome of bad timing. Renee Ellmers, for standing up only to be asked to sit back down, you had the worst week in Washington. Congrats, or something.”

Perhaps it was bad timing, but it was the only timing she was offered. Had the GOP not been insistent on scheduling the vote to coincide with the March for Life and the 42nd anniversary of Roe in order to give a gift to the anti-abortion activists that once more helped sweep them through another successful midterm election, the betrayal wouldn’t have been so great.

In fact, Ellmers had been trying for days to pull the bill, only to have the rest of the party stoically ignore her until she was finally able to grab enough supporters to truly offer a threat. “All systems were go until North Carolina Republican Rep. Renee Ellmers went to the press just about a week ago to announce she was reaching for the chicken switch and pulling hard,” writes U.S. News’ Peter Roff.

More here:

http://www.care2.com/causes/republican-rep-renee-ellmers-feels-the-blowback-from-killing-20-week-ban.html