In 2016, the Republican Party platform took such a strong position against abortion that it endorsed the notion that the 14th Amendment to the Constitution , which guarantees a right to life, liberty, and property, should be interpreted to include an abortion ban.
At the time, Roe v. Wade was still the law of the land, there was a vacant seat on the Supreme Court left by the death of Justice Antonin Scalia, and the GOP had just nominated for president a billionaire who had never held elected office and had publicly flip-flopped on abortion.
Of course, what happened afterward is no secret. Donald Trump, in no small part because of his promise to nominate pro-life judges to the federal bench, secured much-needed support from the religious wing of the party and won the presidential election against former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
As president, Trump nominated Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, and in June 2022, the court, with those three Trump appointees, overruled Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey. This returned the issue of abortion legality to the legislative bodies of each state and the federal government.
It was the biggest victory for the pro-life movement in the nearly 50 years since Roe established a national right to abortion in 1973. Abortion immediately became illegal in several states controlled by Republicans, while Democratic governors and attorneys general refused to enforce existing bans in states that they controlled.
In November 2022, voters had their first opportunity to make their voices heard in a national election since the fall of Roe. It was supposed to be a massive Republican victory. President Joe Biden was historically unpopular, inflation was a major drag on the economy, and the border crisis had pushed the problem of illegal immigration to the forefront of the political discourse. Everything was lining up for a Republican sweep of Congress, state legislatures, and governor’s mansions in swing states.
But on election night, the highly anticipated "red wave" failed to materialize . Incumbent Democrats who were seen as dead in the water proved stubbornly competitive. When all the votes were counted, Republicans managed to scrape together a meager four-seat majority in the House of Representatives, lost a seat in the U.S. Senate, lost majorities in several state legislative chambers, and flipped only one governorship in their favor. It was hardly the sweeping victory that had been predicted.
The election results proved something had changed. For one, unlike previous midterm elections, Democratic voters were now more educated than Republican voters and, therefore, more likely to vote. But the effect of abortion and the end of Roe could also not be ignored as a factor.
Prominent pro-life organizations, meanwhile, were quick to claim victory despite the middling results. Pro-life governors all won reelection after enacting abortion bans, and J.D. Vance defeated then-Rep. Tim Ryan to win an open Ohio Senate seat. The candidates who lost had all fallen short because they were not pro-life enough, according to these activist groups.
Except none of that was true. The incumbent Republicans who won reelection did so on the strength of other issues or the partisan leans of their states, not because of abortion. At the same time, swing-state challengers who embraced tough approaches to abortion all lost, squandering a golden opportunity to deprive the Democratic Party of some of its biggest rising stars.
Tim Michels, who unsuccessfully ran against Gov. Tony Evers (D-WI), openly campaigned on signing an abortion ban. Tudor Dixon, the Republican nominee for governor in Michigan, opposed abortion under all circumstances except to save the life of a mother and was handily defeated by incumbent Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D-MI). And Kari Lake, who supported an abortion ban at the time, narrowly lost a race for an open governorship in Arizona against Democrat Katie Hobbs.
The only Republican gubernatorial candidate who defeated an incumbent Democrat was Joe Lombardo, who defeated then-Gov. Steve Sisolak in Nevada. Lombardo was unique among swing-state Republican candidates in that he was the only one to oppose an abortion ban in his state.
But the electoral liabilities of the pro-life position could not be fully understood until abortion itself became an issue in ballot referendums in blue and red states alike. These results have provided the most tangible evidence that not only is the pro-life movement far more of a minority than was previously thought but that the damage of 50 years of legal abortion to the national conscience has been substantial.
Since the overturn of Roe in 2022, not a single statewide abortion referendum has passed, including in states where Democrats never or rarely win statewide elections.
Republicans control every lever of power in Montana's state government. Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT) is the only remaining Democrat to hold statewide office and is widely considered an underdog in his reelection bid this year. By all accounts, it is a state that is favorable to the pro-life movement if there ever was one.
But in 2022, the people of the state voted against a referendum that would have provided legal protections for babies born alive during an attempted abortion. The referendum would not have banned abortion. It was a mandate to care for babies already born, but it failed.
In Kansas that same year, nearly 60% of voters opposed an amendment that would have removed language from the state constitution that prohibits limits on abortion access. And in Kentucky, another solidly red state, a majority of voters opposed a state constitutional amendment that would have given state lawmakers the ability to pass abortion bans.
During the presidential campaign of 2016, the pro-life movement repeatedly argued that anyone who is pro-choice is already voting for Democrats, so any Republican who supports abortion is only losing voters on his own side. And with Roe v. Wade the law of the land, there was a lot of truth to that. The issue had little electoral consequence because no legislature could pass a bill to ban abortion as long as Roe stood.
But once Roe fell, that has ceased to be the case. Election result after election result has shown that significant numbers of Republican voters and Trump voters are voting to keep abortion legal in their respective states. Last year in Ohio, a state that had banned abortion after six weeks, voters overwhelmingly passed an amendment to the state constitution that ensured abortion would remain legal in the state up to the point of viability. The language of the amendment was so overly broad that it affected parental consent laws. In 2020, Trump won Ohio by 8 points and is likely to do so again this year. The referendum could not have passed without a significant amount of support from Trump voters.
As much as pro-life activists have claimed that all of these losses are due to being significantly outspent by pro-choice groups in these campaigns, it can no longer be said that every pro-choice voter is a Democrat. But even today, pro-life activists are still repeating their campaign talking points from 2016 and acting as if the politics of the issue have not changed. The end of Roe exposed the United States for what it is: a nation that is extraordinarily comfortable with allowing abortion, at least until about 20 weeks' gestation.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
Trump’s political instincts have served him well enough on the issue that he is now openly campaigning on a centrist position on abortion. He supports limits on abortion but no bans. At the same time, major pro-life organizations have excoriated him and accused him of casting them aside by not embracing a call for a national abortion ban.
But whether they like it or not, Trump is appealing to a broad majority of the country with his position as he tries to reassemble an electoral coalition that can win the presidency. He has recognized the reality that the politics of abortion have changed. If the pro-life movement wants to achieve its goal of saving as many babies from abortion as possible, it also has to adapt to the realities of the political climate of 2024. Running the same playbook from eight years ago and from a different political climate will not achieve any of those goals. And the pro-choice side will only continue its recent winning streak.
Local News
