Women are incapable of making and standing by their own voting decisions. At least, this is the message in a new ad from Vote Common Good, a progressive, faith-based political activist group.
The 30-second spot, narrated by Julia Roberts, opens with, “In the one place in America where women still have a right to choose … you can vote any way you want. And no one will ever know.” It ends with, “What happens in the booth stays in the booth.”
The ad features a woman who goes to the polling station with her husband. She reluctantly and nervously goes to vote, and when she locks eyes with another woman over the barrier, there is a moment of connection. While they both arrived with and will leave with their apparently Trump-loving husbands (decked out in American flag and/or eagle gear), the name they select on the ballot, with no one else forcing them, is theirs alone. And it’s Vice President Kamala Harris.
The ad, laughably meant to encourage women, is demeaning and sexist. The individuals behind it seem to believe female opposition to Harris can’t be organic and personal in nature. Instead, it must be driven by forceful Republican husbands who can’t abide women who think for themselves. The caricature of the husband is such that it quietly suggests emotional and mental abuse is part of the marriage relationship.
What’s not subtle are the words “where women still have a right to choose.” This is an obvious dig at a post-Dobbs America where the abortion issue is decided state by state. Never mind the fact that abortions have gone up in recent years. American women have one freedom left: a secret vote for Harris while their loutish MAGA husbands wait.
In the minds of the most ardent Harris-Walz supporters, women on the right side of the aisle are incompetent and need all the help they can get.
According to FiveThirtyEight, current national polls show Harris at 48.1% and Trump at 46.7%. And RealClearPolitics battleground state averages give a slight advantage to Trump. The fact that Harris isn’t running away with the election at present isn’t proof of some patriarchal ground campaign to keep women in the kitchen and in line.
Harris is not only abysmal at running for president, as her 2019 attempt clearly showed, but she is a known quantity who has been in the White House, teamed up with President Joe Biden, for the last four years. It’s not surprising she is disliked by men and women alike. Her domestic and foreign policy ideas would take America further to the left. Rejecting Harris-Walz and selecting Trump-Vance is a decision disgruntled Republicans, even housewives, will make.
The ad is so terrible Republican Party operatives should be thankful it exists. The message it sends is that Democrats only value women who fall in line with them. It also supposes that a woman’s opposition to a leftist candidate only exists because a man has pressured her to follow that route.
This lack of value for women is hardly surprising. It comes from a party that believes women are powerless to take on the role of motherhood if a child comes at an inconvenient time. Of course, the same helplessness would extend to political decisions in the privacy of the voting booth.
Leftist activists love the ad because it confirms their priors. Gun control activist Shannon Watts shared it on X, where it garnered 2 million impressions. And the co-founder of Vote Without Fear proudly endorsed the message, tweeting: “Friendly reminder that you do not have to tell your husband or boyfriend who you voted for.”
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It is delusional thinking that concludes women are not able to make their own political decisions. Those who think so believe a major threat to Harris isn’t the candidate herself, but Republican men nationwide who will force compliance on Election Day.
The Vote Common Good ad is meant to be some revelation about the state of women in America. Instead, it reveals a shocking lack of self-awareness from the Democratic Party. If Harris loses on Nov. 5, Democrats will have only themselves to blame.
Kimberly Ross (@SouthernKeeks) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog and a contributing freelance columnist at the Freemen News-Letter.