Whoa, whiplash: GOP Senate candidate Blake Masters flips again on abortion

As we await a ruling on whether Arizona women will have any right to control what happens to our own bodies, let’s take a quick quiz on Senate Republican candidate Blake Masters and his ever-evolving view of abortion.

Does Masters support:

A.      A national ban on abortion.

B.      A national ban on abortion but only in the third trimester.

C.      A national ban on abortion at 15 weeks.

If you answered, A, then congratulations. You’re right.

But wait. If you answered B, then you, too, are right.

And if you said C? Yep. Nailed it.

Blake Masters has been all over on abortion

Masters seems to change his view on abortion like some people change their shoes. Depends on who you’re trying to impress.

He started out his campaign calling for the overturning of Roe v. Wade and for passage of a federal personhood law, noting that abortion has become a “religious totem” for liberals.

“It’s a religious sacrifice for these people,” he told conservative podcaster Allie Beth Stuckey last September. “I think it’s demonic.”

In January, he chided his Republican opponents who said the issue should be left to the states.

Where do they stand? Mark Kelly, Blake Masters answer policy questions

“What good is actually winning elections if you don’t do what you promised to do when you get in?” he said, during a Jan. 27 forum in Gilbert.

In May, Masters expounded on his call for a federal personhood law.

“I think the 14th Amendment says you have the right to life, liberty and property,” he said, during an event in Carefree. “You can’t deprive someone with that without due process. Hard to imagine a bigger deprivation of due process than killing a small child before they have a chance to take their first breath. So I think you do need a federal personhood law.”

Masters changed again after the primary

The Arizona Legislature in 2021 passed a personhood law, conferring constitutional rights on all fetuses, embryos and fertilized eggs starting at the point of conception. It was blocked by a federal judge.

Everything changed after Aug. 2.

After winning the Republican primary, it seems Masters suddenly had an epiphany – purely coincidental, I’m sure, to his need to now win over the moderate Republican and independent voters who will decide the race between him and Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly.

Suddenly, Masters was scrubbing his website of his vow to be "100% pro life" and the hard-line abortion policies that were his hallmark when he was pitching himself to the Republican primary voters.

Suddenly, he was all for states setting their own abortion laws, saying he's "OK" with the Arizona law passed earlier this year, banning abortion after 15 weeks.

“I think it’s a reasonable solution, which reflects where the electorate is," he told The Arizona Republic's Ronald J. Hansen in August.

And as for that federal personhood law? He told Hansen that he only wants to ban abortion in the third trimester.

“The federal government should prohibit late-term abortion, third-trimester abortion and partial-birth abortion,” he said. “Below that, states are going to make different decisions that are going to reflect the will of the people in those states, and I think that’s reasonable. I think that’s what most people certainly in this state and nationwide are looking for.”

What does he want? Whatever gets him elected

Fast forward to Tuesday, when Sen. Lindsey Graham proposed a national ban on abortion after 15 weeks.

And Masters, the candidate who just a month ago said it’s a decision that should be left to the states?

“Of course I support Lindsey Graham’s 15-week bill, and I hope it passes,” Master told the Associated Press.

Even as Masters was making his remarks, his spokesman, Zach Henry, was retweeting a message that seemed to sum up the GOP response to Graham’s timing:  “Why why why why why.”

Graham's bill comes less than two months before the Nov. 8 election and perhaps just days before a Pima County judge decides whether:

A.      Abortions in Arizona will be outlawed after 15 weeks, with no exceptions for victims of rape, as passed earlier this year.

B.      Abortions will be outlawed, with no exceptions for victims of rape, under a territorial-era law passed in 1864.

I’d ask Blake Masters which one he supports, but we already know.

Whichever one will get him elected.

Reach Roberts at laurie.roberts@arizonarepublic.com. Follow her on Twitter at @LaurieRoberts.

Support local journalism: Subscribe to azcentral.com today.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Blake Masters has another epiphany, this time on Graham's abortion ban