Biden says his hands are tied on abortion following midterms
Mitt Romney took the lead as the Republican frontrunner after campaigning in five major primary states on Wednesday night, but Vice President Joe Biden said he and his Democratic challenger both had “no choice” but to remain quiet on the issue during the campaign.
“I was going to campaign on something, but there’s no way that we can talk about it in the primaries and have a discussion on it in the general election,” Biden said at a campaign event in New Hampshire. “We can have a discussion and talk about the issue. But you can’t talk about it in the primaries.”
“It’s clear they have no choice but to stay quiet,” he added.
But after visiting Iowa and New Hampshire on Wednesday, Romney came out of his Wednesday night rally in Nevada with a strong lead over Obama and Biden.
With polls showing each campaign getting to at least 10% in states where the candidates are locked in, it was clear the next battleground states would be decided by the GOP primary voters.
Yet that still did not stop Biden from making a point of saying he and Obama would not be able to talk openly about the subject of abortion in the general election.
It was a striking contrast to the Democratic leader who last week said his hands were tied on abortion and that he saw little reason to discuss them beyond a hypothetical conversation.
“President Obama has already spoken about his faith,” Biden told reporters at a campaign event in Iowa.
“I’m not about to talk about my faith, and I’m not going to talk about what I think is right and what I think is wrong. But let’s talk about the issues. Let’s talk about health care, let’s talk about economic issues and let’s talk about things that matter to the American people,” he added.
Biden’s comments were reminiscent of Romney’s own public comments about his position on abortion, during the primary race when he had been the clear frontrunner.
But polls conducted in the days leading up to the election showed a tight race between the two, with one survey showing the Democrat with a 7 point lead and another showing the Republican with a 5-point lead.
Earlier in the day, Romney had won his battle with the talk show host David Gregory in Iowa, and was leading with a 9 point lead in the state, also the site of a Democratic caucuses.
While the polls