Let the Pro-Life Movement Declare Independence

S omething unintentionally and perversely healthy has happened in American politics. There is a newfound freedom, and it was overdue. If you are a fellow one-issue voter, realize: You are not bound to the Republican Party.

During the last presidential election, the Republican Party’s leadership decided that it would no longer call for an end to abortion as part of its platform, which is a betrayal of decades’ worth of investment that pro-life voters have put into the GOP. Every summer, for decades, the substance of the party’s platform had been a contentious fight to make sure that GOP candidates were running on an agenda dedicated to providing legal protection to unborn lives. But, unless you want to be known as a cheap date, it must be acknowledged that for Republicans the issue of abortion has become a matter only of votes. That wasn’t always the case.

The latter-day turning point was the Trump administration’s decision to be weak on the issue of federal funding for abortion. It is an invitation for a declaration of independence for the pro-life movement. The movement was never a partisan one in principle, though it became one in practice. Obviously, Donald Trump was never a stalwart anti-abortion activist, but he chose the occasion of budget debates in January to tell pro-lifers to be flexible. January is the very month we mark Roe v. Wade. It is the reason pro-life Americans march in Washington, D.C., every January in the cold. Even liberal icon Ruth Bader Ginsburg noted that this Supreme Court decision, now overturned, had placed unprecedented pressure on women — the expectation of abortion.

Trump decided this year that he wanted us to be flexible on the Hyde Amendment — a legislative provision that disallows federal funding for abortion — which has been the line in the sand for both parties. By doing so, he made clear that he didn’t have an appreciation for how hard-fought that provision was and that, in the United States at the moment, neither major party is pro-life. We might have known that for a while, but the end of Roe v. Wade, with the Dobbs decision, made things more transparent.

During Trump’s first term, I believe that Mike Pence thought he could be the administration’s pro-life, traditionalist conscience. Trump 2.0 doesn’t have such a conscience, and it’s showing. Many of us had hoped that maybe JD Vance would play that role, but he has made clear on the record that he’s not going to fight on the issue of abortion pills. That also shouldn’t be a political, partisan fight. It should be an opportunity for people who consider themselves pro-life and those who consider themselves pro-choice to talk about how to protect women. I, obviously, don’t want these abortion pills to exist, period. But a year into the second Trump administration, making sure simply that women must see a doctor to access these pills is not even a priority for the White House.

Yes, Trump appointed Supreme Court judges who wound up overturning Roe v. Wade. But Amy Coney Barrett, for example, is not an activist justice. In a world with saner politics, she might have even been heralded as a feminist hero for how she excels in motherhood and in her career. She did not swear in at the Supreme Court to end abortion. She did so to uphold the law, and Roe v. Wade was bad law. Trump got the credit — or the blame, however you choose to look at it — for overturning Roe, but it was a long time in the making, and I think we all know that Trump did not run for president because he believes that abortion is the civil rights issue of our time.

Conflating Republican politics and the abortion debate is a mistake — one that I, too, have made for decades and must apologize for. These need to be two separate things. I want both political parties to fight for the unborn. There should be competition for the pro-life vote. Abortion is about human rights, and that includes the right of women to not be pressured into ending the lives of their unborn babies. I want to end abortion in America, but I know that many others don’t have the same view. Nonetheless, don’t we all want to know that women are safe? Let’s focus on that.

Trump just gave us an opening to stop looking at this issue as a partisan one: Pro-life voters do not have to vote for Republicans. We need to fight on both parties — or start a new one (the American Solidarity Party has already done some of the work). If American politics needed to be shaken up for the sake of the voiceless, here we are.

This column is based on one available through Andrews McMeel Universal’s Newspaper Enterprise Association.