Abortion, the GOP, and the Pro-Life Movement
Americans Against Abortion Need to Think Hard About Their Vote
The abortion battle on the Right shows no signs of letting up. Two more matches were lit this past week that, if social media is in any way a reflection of real life, has angered some pro-life voters. First, J.D. Vance said on Meet the Press that a Trump administration would not pursue a federal ban on abortion—and that Trump would even veto a ban if one got to his desk. Second, Trump posted the following controversial message on Truth Social: “My Administration will be great for women and their reproductive rights.”
Did Trump and Vance sell out Americans who are against abortion and transform themselves into a pro-choice ticket? Will their rhetoric and actions depress anti-abortion turnout in November? These and similar questions that have been circulating need to be addressed, because with the election less than 70 days away, pro-life success in the 2024 election depends on having clarity on these matters.
Though the pro-life movement has helped persuade countless women to reject abortion since 1973, it is also clear that they’ve been having concerted problems navigating the post-Dobbs political landscape. As Brian S. Brown, President of the National Organization for Marriage, admitted earlier this week at Public Discourse, “The pro-life movement focused its efforts primarily on overturning Roe, on restoring democracy, on restoring the people’s right to have a say in the most essential questions of self-government. Unfortunately, we did not adequately prepare for what would happen when democracy was, in fact, restored.”
Brown notes that when abortion has been put to a vote in the states, the movement has gone zero for seven so far, with critical losses in ruby red states like Ohio and Kansas. Unless pro-lifers can string together some victories in the 10 upcoming state battles, Brown considers the startling possibility that pro-lifers could “end up zero for seventeen in a few short months. If we can’t even win in Florida, which requires the other side to get 60 percent, the pro-life movement will gain nothing from the next administration.”
During his presidency, Donald Trump held up his end of the bargain by the policies he backed and the justices he nominated for the Supreme Court. But if pro-lifers can’t deliver on their end, Brown rightly says that it won’t be “difficult to imagine how Donald Trump might feel about the pro-life community if we can’t win a single abortion battle in the states in the wake of his careful appointments of justices who overturned Roe.” And if this happens, it’s likely that a number of disaffected pro-life voters will walk away from the movement altogether.
It’s highly doubtful that any of the major pro-life names criticizing Trump and Vance are grifters—we should take them at their word that they care about ending abortion in principle. But it’s a fair question to ask, with the hundreds of millions of dollars they’ve spent in the past decades, what the pro-life movement has to show for itself apart from Trump.
Furthermore, though the Trump campaign is getting grief on their abortion stance, they have the added issue of winning a national election based on a plethora of factors that encompass more than anti-abortion policy. They’re attempting to traverse political circumstances that have changed markedly since the last time Trump ran for the presidency—and winning over an electorate that clearly doesn’t value the lives of the unborn as they should.
Trump also has to deal with opponents in Kamala Harris and Tim Walz who are being boosted at every turn by the ruling class and their allies in the media, the Deep State that’s looking to get revenge on him for being exposed in the Russiagate debacle, at least one major October surprise, a wave of “patriotic” former government staffers, advisors, and aides looking to derail him, and threats on his very life. And this doesn’t get into the myriad other policy considerations he must keep in mind. These include the mess at the Southern border, a sputtering economy with high inflation and food prices, the ever-present temptation to get into more wars, LGBTQ and trans ideology on the march in schools, and much, much more. His cannot be a single-issue candidacy.
Americans against abortion need to decide if some less-than-perfect messaging and contestable policy maneuvering is better than the full-throated abortion radicalism on display from Harris and Walz. Abortion, after all, is the glue currently holding the Democratic Party together. A March Wall Street Journal poll of registered suburban women voters in swing states shows that abortion is far and away the most important issue on their minds. Thirty-nine percent of those polled chose abortion as the most important issue to them in the 2024 election (immigration came in a distant second at 16%). This also comes as Gen Z women are trending Left in historic numbers. The New York Times has reported an almost unbelievable 51-point spread between Gen Z men and women, a gap that will further widen as the marriage rate continues to plummet.
Plus, a Harris-Walz administration won’t simply let states alone that have voted to protect more babies: they’ll likely attempt to roll back legislation such as heartbeat bills, mandatory 24-hour waiting periods, and parental consent. And Harris and Walz will be working hard to reinstitute the Roe regime at the national level, which for many leftists doesn’t go nearly far enough.
Another aspect of this political problem is the current climate. Though smart commentators have been pointing out that the majority opinion in Dobbs leaves open the possibility of pro-life federal legislation, and even that the term “person” in the 14th Amendment should be naturally interpreted to cover babies in the womb, clearly our political landscape is very far from realizing either of these options. It’s even doubtful that if Republicans had the numbers in Congress to pass federal abortion legislation right now, that a vote would even be scheduled, much less pass both houses of Congress. And a federal abortion ban, even under favorable conditions for Republicans, simply doesn’t have the hope of passing during the next four years.
And neither is a constitutional amendment feasible at this time. As Notre Dame Law Professor Gerard Bradley noted in a 2023 retrospective on the Dobbs decision, “The people could of course amend the Constitution to make equal protection of the unborn child’s right not to be killed more explicit than it already is in the Fourteenth Amendment. But given the strength of consensus, in both Congress and the states, required for amendments to the Constitution, this course has zero chance of success.”
One strategy Trump and Vance could take going forward is simply not mention abortion or IVF and deflect when pressed. But whereas the media allows Harris and Walz to get away with not talking to them (though they’ll be interviewed on CNN), they won’t let the Trump campaign do the same. It’s likely that such an approach could potentially backfire, allowing the Democrats to define Trump without him being able to return fire.
While Trump and his campaign need to be mindful of not depressing the anti-abortion vote, Americans against abortion must acknowledge the possibility that if Trump wins despite them, he will be less inclined to work with them going forward. Anti-abortion Americans who might be on the fence should also understand that some of the national voices who are launching cutting critiques of Trump have always despised him, and are likely searching for ways to sever the connection he has with the anti-abortion voting bloc.
Americans against abortion must be pragmatic, vote for incremental wins, and help babies live. Moreover, they should let the Trump campaign know their concerns. But they can do that without withholding their vote from Trump, who remains the only vehicle for the anti-abortion cause at the presidential level. If anti-abortion Americans don’t choose Trump, a rabidly pro-abortion candidate in Kamala Harris will win instead—which, despite what Nancy French claims, would be a moral catastrophe for our nation.
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