I tried, I really tried to explain to the GOP donor and pundit class that fighting abortion is part of a winning political strategy. The old “truce strategy” is just a way of letting the Democrats define what being pro-life means. It takes a winning issue and turns it into a liability.

If you don’t believe me, look at the way Democrats are scurrying to figure out how to deal with videos proving Planned Parenthood, which donates big bucks almost exclusively to Democrats in order to ensure its taxpayer money keeps flowing, is bargaining cash for unborn babies’ lungs and livers.

Take Hillary Clinton. After the videos broke, Clinton waited more than a week before issuing a vigorous statement in support of Planned Parenthood, from whom she has accepted both cash and awards: “I think it is unfortunate that Planned Parenthood has been the object of such a concerted attack for so many years. And it’s really an attack against a woman’s right to choose.”

But by Tuesday, when she sat down with the New Hampshire Union Leader, Clinton was singing a different tune, calling the videos “disturbing” and urging a national investigation — just not into Planned Parenthood in particular. “I think there are two points to make. One, Planned Parenthood for more than century has done a lot of really good work for women: cancer screenings, family planning, all kinds of health services. And this raises not questions about Planned Parenthood so much as it raises questions about the whole process. That is, not just involving Planned Parenthood, but many institutions in our country.”

#related#Investigate all abortion providers? Is that what the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee is really calling for?

At a press conference, Iowa Republican senator Jodi Ernst deftly used Clinton’s own words to validate pro-lifers’ outrage at the videos:

“The American people, Republicans and Democrats alike, are horrified by the utter lack of compassion showed by Planned Parenthood for these women and their babies. In fact, now, Hillary Clinton is calling these Planned Parenthood images disturbing, and I agree.”

As a result the Left is grumbling at Clinton’s remark, but in truth, neither Bernie Sanders nor Martin O’Malley wants to wade into this morass, either, according to the Washington Post:

On July 17, when the videos broke, [Sanders] cited Richards’s statement and averred that ‘the tone was terribly wrong’ in the fetal tissue conversation. ‘He has not gone out of his way to defend the group,’ wrote Mother Jones reporter Molly Redden in an article shared nearly 3000 times on Facebook.

Meanwhile O’Malley commends Planned Parenthood in vague terms for providing “health care,” rather than defending its role or its practices as one the nation’s largest abortion providers:

I haven’t seen the videos. And I don’t generally make a habit of responding to right-wing videos. I do know that 97 percent of the work that Planned Parenthood does is about mammograms and preventative health. So that’s what I know but I’ll defer to others for commenting on that video and whatever videos they’re pumping out there.

Videos? What videos? Abortions? What abortions?

The fact that Democrats in the middle of a primary fight are running for cover should tell the GOP pundit and donor class they were wrong to think abortion is a losing issue for the GOP. The unborn and their mothers need fearless and courageous champions. And hard-line Democrats must be held accountable for their pro-abortion extremism.

But we must also acknowledge those Democrats who stand up and do the right thing. This week in Ohio, State Representative Bill Patmon, a Black Democrat, called for defunding Planned Parenthood in Ohio. Patmon pointed out that 63 percent of the mothers undergoing abortions in Cuyahoga County, which he represents, are Black. And then he said this:

You hear a lot of demonstrations across the country now about #BlackLivesMatter. Well, they skipped one place. They should be in front of Planned Parenthood. They skipped one place, not just the police department, stand in front of Planned Parenthood. Black lives matter. American lives matter.

Amen to that.

— Maggie Gallagher is a senior fellow at the American Principles Project. She blogs at MaggieGallagher.com.