The Patriot Post® · Trump Gets Strategic on Abortion

Joe Biden and the Democrats have made abortion rights a major policy issue because they see it as a winning campaign message. Ever since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, sending the issue of abortion legality back to the states where it belongs, Democrats have zealously — and effectively — labeled Republicans as anti-abortion extremists.

Focusing on abortion arguably blunted the widely projected red wave in the 2022 midterms, as Democrats, aided by the mainstream media, took advantage of the Republicans’ failure to offer a clear, concise, and unified position on abortion.

Donald Trump was quick to recognize this weakness following the midterm disappointment, as he charged at the time, “It was the ‘abortion issue,’ poorly handled by many Republicans, especially those that firmly insisted on no exceptions, even in the case of rape, incest, or life of the mother, that lost large numbers of voters.”

Last May, Trump, seeking to stave off any potential challenge from Ron DeSantis, blasted the Florida governor over his support for a six-week abortion ban. “If you look at what DeSantis did, a lot of people don’t even know if he knew what he was doing,” Trump stated. “But he signed six weeks, and many people within the pro-life movement feel that that was too harsh.” Months later, Trump hit DeSantis on abortion again, calling the Florida governor’s signing of the six-week abortion ban a “terrible thing and a terrible mistake.”

With such apparent flip-flopping on the pro-life position from the self-declared “most pro-life president” in history, Trump’s pivot on abortion has been jarring.

So, what is Trump’s position on abortion?

Well, over the weekend, he clarified his view. Calling into the “Sid & Friends in the Morning” radio show, Trump finally teased his official abortion position by stating, “We’re going to come up with a time — and maybe we could bring the country together on that issue.” He explained: “The number of weeks now — people are agreeing on 15. And I’m thinking in terms of that. And it’ll come out to something that’s very reasonable. But people are really, even hardliners are agreeing, seems to be, 15 weeks seems to be a number that people are agreeing at.”

Well, that is a compromise position. The immediate objection from many conservatives and pro-life advocates in Republican-run states that have passed legislation severely restricting, if not outright banning, abortion is that it is an apparent repudiation of the Supreme Court’s rationale for overturning Roe v. Wade. Trump recognized this, however, saying: “Everybody agrees — you’ve heard this for years — all the legal scholars on both sides agree: It’s a state issue. It shouldn’t be a federal issue. It’s a state issue.”

Trump argues that Republicans have been boxed into the “extremist” corner by the abortion-on-demand Democrats, while they are the party of actual abortion extremism. Democrats want abortion to be enshrined as a constitutional right and the law of the land, with no limits even to the point of birth.

Trump sees a middle ground on the issue that is appealing to the broadest swath of Americans. The majority of Americans, like the Clinton-era Democrats, want abortion to be legal but rare. Furthermore, the majority of Americans favor an abortion limit, generally as Trump noted, after the first 15 weeks.

This is Trump seeking out the strategic middle ground in an effort to defend against the abortion extremist charge while at the same time exposing the Democrats and the “good Catholic” Joe Biden as the real extremists. They are the ones demanding that the U.S. remain one of only seven nations in the world allowing abortion all the way through pregnancy — just like China, Vietnam, and North Korea. Let’s face it: Our membership in that club is a disgrace.

Will Trump’s 15-week marker work? Time will tell.