If you’re pregnant and seeking an abortion, most Americans —including those who reside in New Jersey— believe you should be able to make your own decisions for your own reasons instead of having the government involved or subjecting a woman to the judgment of someone else who could force her to give birth to an unwanted child.
New Jersey Right to Life, an organization dedicated to banning abortion, sponsored a Marist Poll that used specific questions to generate misleading answers related to abortion. The same pollster conducted a similar nationwide survey that found remarkably different results.
The bias poll, which surveyed 1,024 registered voters in New Jersey from April 10th to April 12th, yielded skewed results that show people would make selective rules about abortion despite the broader feeling that the government should not be involved in the most personal decisions a person can make about sex and reproduction.
Despite the fact that a majority of New Jersey residents support abortion rights, the poll found that 60% of respondents say they believe that a woman’s choice to terminate her pregnancy should be limited to at most the first three months of a pregnancy.
This sentiment was echoed by 35% of respondents who either believe that abortion should never be permitted (6%) or limited to specific exceptions, such as in cases of rape, incest, or to save the life of the mother (29%).
Over six in ten (66%) residents said they opposed abortions in the last few months of pregnancy, a stage when it is very rare for women to terminate a pregnancy although the reasons why one might do so were not explained in the survey.
Just as being asked ‘would you eat moldy bread’ can elicit a different response than an inquiry that said, ‘would you eat moldy bread if it was the only way you could survive’ the New Jersey Right to Life-sponsored survey asked questions that get distinct answers from those which might result from a valid public opinion poll.
For example, pollsters claimed that 62% of residents said that individuals who have moral or religious objections to abortion should be able to opt out of paying for them in their private insurance plans. This question is apparently neglecting such details as whether employers should be able to impose their values on people who work for them.
That is like asking people who have no children whether they want to pay for education instead of inquiring about how they would feel living in a world occupied by feral and ignorant marauders that have no appreciation for civilized behavior.
The poll also found that 57% of NJ residents do not think that doctors, nurses, or other health care professionals who have moral objections to abortion should be required to perform them.
It claimed that 70% of adults believe that abortion providers should be required to notify parents before performing abortion services on minors, without suggesting that children who are raped or subjected to incest may have valid reasons for keeping their choice to end a pregnancy a private matter.
The results of the poll are being used to indicate that a majority of New Jersey residents oppose state tax dollars being used to fund abortion services for residents from other states who come to New Jersey seeking abortion services, putting a greedy perspective on things instead of appealing to the compassion that is often found when matters like this are thought out.
Right to Lifers claim a broad consensus of New Jersey residents (74%) believes that scientific evidence should inform the state’s abortion policy, although such anti-abortion activists are often motivated by their faith instead of empirical proof, observation or experimentation.
Drawing conclusions that are not supported by the poll results, Marie Tasy, executive director of New Jersey Right to Life, said, “Democrat leaders and Governor Murphy are clearly out of step with the majority of NJ voters…This poll shows that NJ voters do not support (Reproductive Choice Act), which shamefully legalized abortions all the way up to the moment of birth, removed conscience clause protections for individuals and health care professionals, and contained language to block the passage of future, common sense laws that would set popular limits on abortion and allow parents to be notified before their minor child has an abortion.”
Tasy’s remarks are not true.
According to Planned Parenthood, the law explicitly gives all New Jerseyans the right to make their own decisions about birth control, abortion, and prenatal care. No matter what the Supreme Court decided, this means that women can get an abortion in New Jersey.
The same pollster recently found that nearly six in ten Americans (59%) oppose the 2022 U.S. Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. 40% support the decision.
While Democrats (82%) and independents (56%) are more likely than members of the GOP to oppose the ruling, even 32% of Republicans disagree with the decision while 67% of them support it.
More than six in ten Americans (61%), up from 55% in June 2022, say they support abortion rights.
This includes 84% of Democrats, 62% of independents, and even one in three Republicans (33%). Driven by Republicans (65%), 37% of Americans say they oppose abortion rights.
Tasy urged the legislature to pass legislation that would repeal the Freedom of Reproductive Choice Act, arguing that it was passed during the last days of a lame duck session.
She also falsely claimed that the law legalized abortions up to the moment of birth, removed conscience clause protections, and blocked the passage of future laws that would limit abortion or allow parental notification—some of which is nonsense.
No law can block the passage of future laws, except by altering the Constitution, and even if that were changed, it could be revised again.
Prohibition prevented the legal manufacture, sale, and transportation of alcoholic beverages in the United States from 1920 to 1933 under the terms of the Eighteenth Amendment, which was repealed with the ratification of the Twenty-first Amendment.
No one is performing abortions up until the moment of birth.
There is no such medical procedure, and any suggestion otherwise is bad-faith propaganda aimed at hijacking and toxifying the public discussion.
In reality, more than 90% of abortions performed in the Unted States occur within the first trimester and many are done with medication that simply cause a woman’s menstrual cycle to begin.
Abortions later in pregnancy happen for differing, private reasons, and sometimes in instances when a pregnant person risks severe injury or death if they continue with their pregnancy.
For more information on the methodology or how the survey was conducted, visit the Marist polling site.
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