Moulton gives Biden backhanded compliment over abortion reversal

Rep. Seth Moulton offered 2020 Democratic front-runner Joe Biden a backhanded compliment on Friday for reversing his position on federal funding for abortions, challenging Biden to do the same over his vote in favor of the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq.

“Bravo to @JoeBiden for doing the right thing and reversing his longstanding support for the Hyde Amendment. It takes courage to admit when you’re wrong, especially when those decisions affect millions of people,” Moulton, a 2020 presidential candidate, wrote in a tweet.

“Now do the Iraq War," the Massachusetts Democrat added.

Although Moulton suggested Friday that Biden has stood behind his past support for the Iraq invasion, the former vice president said in 2005 that he regretted his vote authorizing the invasion. Asked by then-"Meet the Press" host Tim Russert about his vote to authorize the use of military force against the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein, Biden, then a Democratic senator from Delaware, said "it was a mistake."

"It was a mistake to assume the president would use the authority we gave him properly," Biden said of then-President George W. Bush. "I never argued that there was an imminent threat. We gave the president the authority to unite the world to isolate Saddam. And the fact of the matter is, we went too soon. We went without sufficient force. And we went without a plan."

Biden on Thursday abandoned his stance in support of the Hyde Amendment less than 24 hours after having reaffirmed his position in favor of it. The provision, included in annual appropriations bills going back decades, bars the use of federal funding for abortions except in cases of rape or incest or to protect the health of the mother. Critics say it disproportionately affects low-income women and women of color.

The former vice president’s previous support for the Hyde Amendment prompted a quick backlash from 2020 rivals eager to ding the front-runner. In a Democratic primary field in which support for abortion rights has become a litmus test, Biden did an about-face.

"I can’t justify leaving millions of women without access to the care they need and the ability to exercise their constitutionally protected right," Biden said Thursday at a Democratic National Committee gala on empowering minorities. "If I believe health care is a right, as I do, I can no longer support an amendment that makes that right dependent on someone’s ZIP code."

Biden cited a nationwide “assault” by Republicans on abortion rights as the primary reason for his shift, saying the choking off of abortion clinics across the country necessitated his flip.

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But Moulton’s decision to go after Biden for his support of the Iraq War, which is still ongoing more than 15 years later, is reminiscent of a rift that dogged Hillary Clinton in her two presidential runs, in which her vote in favor of the U.S. invasion was leveraged against her in the 2008 Democratic primary and the 2016 general election.

A POLITICO/Morning Consult poll last month found that voters overwhelmingly see Biden’s foreign policy experience and time as vice president as assets. But nearly 3 in 10 respondents said they were put off by his 2002 vote in favor of invading Iraq, a figure that jumped to more than 40 percent when isolated to voters ages 18 to 29.

Moulton, a Marine Corps veteran who was among the first U.S. troops to land in Baghdad during the 2003 invasion, has made national security a key part of his campaign. He has frequently spotlighted a host of veterans issues, going as far as revealing his struggles with post-traumatic stress disorder, as he hopes to break through the crowded pack of Democratic presidential hopefuls

Moulton is one of 24 Democrats seeking his party’s nomination for president in 2020, but has struggled to gain early traction. He has failed thus far to qualify via either polling or fundraising for the party’s first primary debate, scheduled for later this month in Miami.