Poll Shows Support for Pro-Abortion Health Care Bill Falling After Obama Speech

National   |   Steven Ertelt   |   Sep 15, 2009   |   9:00AM   |   WASHINGTON, DC

Poll Shows Support for Pro-Abortion Health Care Bill Falling After Obama Speech

by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
September 15
, 2009

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) — The bump that the pro-abortion health care plan in Congress received from President Barack Obama’s speech last week has already subsided. A new Rasmussen survey shows the opposition to the plan has returned to the pre-speech levels its surveys showed.

Following Obama’s speech, the level of support for the bills, which open the door to massive abortion funding in both the public option and taxpayer subsidies, increased steadily to a peak of 51% yesterday.

"However, the bounce appears to be over. The latest daily tracking shows that support has fallen all the way back to pre-speech levels," Rasmussen reports today.

Forty-five percent of all voters nationwide now favor the plan while 52% are opposed. A week ago, 44% supported the proposal and 53% were opposed.

The latest figures show that 23 percent strongly favor the pro-abortion health care restructuring bills while 41 percent are strongly opposed to them — giving the intensity advantage to the pro-life side. In late August, 23% were strongly in favor of the plan and 43% were strongly opposed.

The Rasmussen Reports daily presidential tracking poll is another indicator of the speech’s impact, and there, too, the bounce in approval Obama has been getting since the Wednesday night speech appears to have ended.

With Congress back in session, pro-life groups are re-engaging in the effort to remove the abortion funding from the health care bills or defeat them if they continue to allow funding for hundreds of thousands of abortions.

The effort to educate Americans that the health care plan would force them to pay for abortions could be a factor in getting the bills amended or defeated as polls show a strong majority of Americans don’t want abortions funded in the bills.

Conducted by Public Opinion Strategies, a new poll released last week shows 43 percent of adult voters would be less likely to support a health care reform bill that funds abortions while just 8 percent would be more supportive.

The poll found voter intensity is strong with over one-third (36%) of voters saying they would be much less likely to support the plan.

Public Opinion Strategies found 58% of Americans disagree with the statement, “If the government is going to make a public health plan available for all Americans it has an obligation to provide abortion services under that plan.” Just 38 percent support it.

The analysis shows 80 percent of Republicans disagree, 60 percent of independents disagree and 39 percent of Democrats disagree.

Sign Up for Free Pro-Life News From LifeNews.com

Daily Pro-Life News Report Twice-Weekly Pro-Life
News Report
Receive a free daily email report from LifeNews.com with the latest pro-life news stories on abortion, euthanasia and stem cell research. Sign up here. Receive a free twice-weekly email report with the latest pro-life news headlines on abortion, euthanasia and stem cell research. Sign up here.