CV NEWS FEED // Former President Donald Trump reportedly told his advisors in private that he is open to supporting a national pro-life law prohibiting most abortions after 16 weeks of gestation.
The New York Times reported Friday that Trump “told advisers and allies that he likes the idea of a 16-week national abortion ban with three exceptions, in cases of rape or incest, or to save the life of the mother.”
The Times also noted that Trump “studiously avoided taking a clear position on restrictions to abortion since Roe v. Wade was overturned in the middle of 2022, galvanizing Democrats ahead of the midterm elections that year.”
CatholicVote President Brian Burch suggested Trump’s strategy could backfire.
“Trump is clearly trying to find a safe path on abortion given recent defeats in several states, not to mention the hundreds of millions of pro-abortion ad dollars set to be unleashed to cover for Biden’s failure on nearly every other policy voters care about,” Burch said.
“Whether it’s six-week, 15-week, or some other ‘ban’ legislation, Trump will gain little from playing defense,” Burch argued. “We’d prefer that he reaffirm the goal of the pro-life movement, namely a world where all mothers and children are protected in law.”
Burch pointed out that Trump could simply “say he is committed to the pro-life cause and is open to any and all legislation that can help mothers protect their children and unborn babies from the Biden-led effort to impose abortion, including late-term abortion, on every state in America.”
“The New York Times and the mainstream media are doing the bidding of the Biden campaign,” Burch concluded. “Trump shouldn’t take the bait.”
Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America President Marjorie Dannenfelser welcomed the report of Trump’s openness to a federal pro-life law.
“We strongly agree with President Trump on protecting babies from abortion violence at 16 weeks when they feel pain,” Dannenfelser stated.
Students For Life America President Kristan Hawkins encouraged Trump to go further in his pro-life advocacy.
“Mr. President, we ask you to stand for the needs of the innocent over the business interests of a billion-dollar abortion enterprise,” Hawkins wrote in a statement sent to POLITICO.
“A limit on abortion at 4 months – 16 weeks – would allow for more than 9 in 10 abortions and will make no one happy,” she indicated. “Not those who want to protect life in law, and not those whose entire agenda in 2024 is death by abortion at any cost.”
>> PRO-LIFE CATHOLIC HIGHLIGHTS TRUMP’S WINNING MESSAGE ON ABORTION <<
In September of last year, Trump told a group of pro-life women: “We can win elections on [abortion], but it’s very delicate and explaining it properly is an extremely important thing.”
“You have to be able to speak and explain it properly,” he continued. “A lot of politicians who are pro-life don’t know how to discuss this topic.”
In a Wall Street Journal op-ed last month, Napa Institute co-founder Tim Busch praised Trump’s recent messaging on abortion as a winning formula for the pro-life movement.
Busch wrote that Trump’s stance “offer[s] exactly what Americans are looking for: consensus.”
“Polls show that voters want something of a compromise—neither strict bans nor limitless access,” Busch added.
CatholicVote reported in January:
A Gallup poll from May of last year (Gallup’s most recent on the topic) found that 44% of Americans considered themselves to be pro-life compared with 52% who called themselves “pro-choice.”
The same poll, however, found that only 34% of respondents believed that abortion should be “legal under any circumstances” – down one percentage point from the year before. Therefore, the remaining 66% believed that abortion should be limited.
Gallup’s finding was consistent with a Knights of Columbus poll from earlier in the same month, which also found that 66% of Americans favored some limits on abortion.