So what does the new AP poll on abortion tell us?

The headline on the Associated Press story reads, “Support for legal abortion rises to nearly 6 in 10 Americans, poll finds.” Let’s see what this poll “conducted after three people were killed last month in a shooting at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado” does and doesn’t tell us.

According to the AP’s Nancy Benac and Emily Swanson, “Nearly six in 10 Americans — 58 percent — now think abortion should be legal in most or all cases, up from 51 percent who said so at the beginning of the year, according to the AP-GfK survey.” The AP story tells us

“The Associated Press-GfK poll on abortion was conducted by GfK Public Affairs and Corporate Communications Dec. 3-7. It is based on online interviews of 1,007 adults who are members of GfK’s nationally representative KnowledgePanel.”

Are we really supposed to believe that support for abortion legal in all or most cases actually rose a total 7 points in eleven months—from 51% to 58%? Or did it represent an immediate visceral response to the deaths of three people at a PPFA clinic that was attributed, directly and/or indirectly, to pro-lifers? The obvious answer is we won’t know for at least a few more months but that it is plausible the figure will recede back to 51%.

You can examine the numbers for yourself here.

Click here for the originating article from National Right to Life.