Many point to the flap as having contributed to the loss for Mello, a pro-life Democrat. NARAL Pro-Choice America and Planned Parenthood had lashed out against Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, and deputy DNC chair Keith Ellison, for saying they would stump for Mello in Omaha, calling it "politically stupid."


Day disputes that assertion. Demanding adherence to a right to abortion "got us to where we are today," she said, with 38 of the 50 states having Republican electoral majorities -- 27 of them under full GOP control -- compared to just five states where Democrats have full control. "The numbers kind of speak for themselves," she said. "And when we push pro-life Democrats out of the party, this is what happens."

At the federal level, "this abortion litmus test has hurt us dramatically. If you look at 30 years ago in the United States House, we had 135 pro-life Democrats and a 292-seat majority. Today, we have 30. We can't get the majority we want without electing pro-life Democrats. The number of pro-choice Democrats has stayed at about 185, 180. If we want to follow NARAL and Planned Parenthood's strategy, we're going to stay there" in the minority, Day said.

She added Mello didn't help his own cause when he said he was "personally pro-life" after "NARAL came into the district and badgered him." "It's not a winning position. You can't do that with any issue," Day said. "It just sounds ridiculous. If you say, 'I believe climate change is real but I'm not going to vote that way,' or 'I believe guns are harming society but I'm not going to vote for any gun control legislation,' nobody would vote for you."

The definition of "pro-life" is "different in different parts of the country," Day told CNS. "In some districts, like in Michigan where I'm from, if you run in Detroit, running as pro-life won't get you very far but if you run as a pro-life Democrat in the Upper Peninsula, you have a pretty good chance of winning, or in Bay City. The party needs people who match the district rather than finding people with California values and running them instead."

Despite the recent controversy, or maybe because of it, "I expect it be a really good meeting," Day said. "Actually with Dean, there were 18 of us. It was a pretty good dialogue."

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Follow Pattison on Twitter: @MeMarkPattison.