Charlie Kirk spoke with Trafalgar Group founder Robert Cahaly on The Charlie Kirk Show, where the two discussed abortion and what the country at large believes about the pregnancy termination, which has now been restricted in several red states following the Supreme Court's Dobbs decision in June.
Cahaly also told Kirk about Joe Biden's ability to tank those he endorses in the polls.
"So, I'm very pro-life. I speak at pro-life dinners all the time and we talk about the need to end abortion in our country, however," Kirk noted, "I've said for some time that I do not think the conservative base is nearly as pro-life as I am or as pro-life as I'd like it to be. In private conversations people whisper to me and say, 'you have to cool it on the abortion issue,' and I see it reflected in our emails...that 50 percent of emails we receive are people that say, 'I'm somewhat pro-life but I think it should be okay at ten or fifteen weeks.' I disagree with that position, but I'm looking at this purely politically. Because I also don't want to have a delusion of my own opinion, where I act as if everyone is as pro life as I am, which I don't think is true."
"You have some polling about this," Kirk asked Cahaly, "what does it show?"
Trafalgar group, Kirk notes, is the most accurate polling firm in the US. "What does your polling tell us?"
"What is says is that there's a coalition of pro-life, and if you include in that coalition those who believe in saving the life of the mother only, rape and incest, and add heartbeat bans, we're at fifty five percent of the public... most these states believe in that," Cahaly said. "... We've seen, over the course, state by state, it's about a 55 percent average of a working coalition to eliminate abortion beyond those first few weeks past the heartbeat.
"… To me, when the Republicans are talking about, what exceptions, how many weeks, they're losing. When the Democrats are talking about defending abortion on demand," he said.
"Are you saying that there's a majority coalition on banning late-term abortion, is that correct?" Kirk clarifies.
"Yes, there's a majority coalition on anything beyond heartbeat," Calahy said. "We're at a 55 percent national coalition beyond that, and some people say after heartbeat isn't necessarily late term. So this argument has been won, but when we push a little too hard, your analysis is exactly right. Not everybody in the coalition is as pro-life as you or I are, and right now, it's about, 'we got here because we won elections, and we need to continue winning elections, and we don't want to lose elections because we keep grabbing too much at one time.'"
"I just want to be realistic," said Kirk, "and I'm not saying we should compromise on the abortion issue or how we talk about it, but I also see what's happening in front of me where people tell me all the time, 'cut it out, I don't agree with you, otherwise I vote Republicans,' and it's just that the country and the movement is not there, and if you think abortion is... Do I agree with you on the heartbeat thing, most people do, yes. But when I start talking about abortion bans, I think I lose half the room," said Kirk.
Kirk asked if he thinks that the Dobbs decision and the abortion issue would help energize Democrats, to which he said, "I don't think the decision is, I think the overreaction by some our side, pushing too hard, too fast after the decision has a bigger impact. We didn't see the polling number really move much in the Democrats' direction right after the decision, but after four or five states started to completely eliminate and go beyond heartbeat, then we say that reaction."
