Fred Martinez's Monitor

Gallup Poll Finds Abortion Issue Helps John McCain Over Barack Obama With Women

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- Abortion advocates would like the American public to believe that the abortion issue is a drag on John McCain and causes a gender gap with women voters.

However, a new Gallup Poll finds abortion actually helps McCain because of the intensity of pro-life voters and the strength of the public’s opposition to partial-birth abortion.

The Gallup poll found McCain is gaining support from the Republican base with the selection of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin in part because 63 percent of Republican women who say they are pro-life compared with the smaller 32 percent who say they support legal abortions.

Although a third of Republican women are pro-choice, McCain's selection of Palin last Friday already appears to have helped him with his female Republican base. Republican women grew more likely to support McCain, not less likely, in polling from Saturday to Monday,” Gallup said in its poll analysis.

The poll also looked at Democratic women and found that 37 percent of them say they are pro-life -- which gives a five percentage point edge to the pro-life side when Republicans and Democrats are compared.

The new Gallup survey also found that while 32 percent of Republican women are pro-abortion, just 7 percent of Republican women are backing pro-abortion presidential candidate Barack Obama. On the other hand, Senator McCain draws the support of 9 percent of Democratic women in the poll -- giving him a two percentage point advantage in the cross-party vote.

posted by Fred Martinez @ 8:07 AM