Donald Trump does not care about the issue of abortion. That’s why if he’s elected, he will sign a national ban on the procedure the second he has a chance. If, heaven forbid, he gets back to the White House, it will be because the Christian right carried him. Banning abortion in all 50 states will be a way to pay them back, without having to give up anything he cares about.
This should be obvious, and yet, somehow, many in the press are being fooled by Trump’s latest public posture about abortion, even though it’s transparently dishonest. During his recent NBC News interview with Kristen Welker, Trump tried to strike a “moderate” pose on abortion. Referring to what the press misleadingly calls a “six-week” ban (it’s really a two-week ban) on abortion in Florida, Trump said it was “a terrible mistake” for Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis to sign the draconian legislation.
“You will win on this issue when you come up with the right number of weeks,” Trump asserted about a topic that has dogged the Republican Party at the ballot box since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.
Trump then went on to talk about this medical procedure like he was negotiating alimony for his next ex-wife.
“We’re going to agree to a number of weeks or months or however you want to define it,” he said, boldly claiming, “Both sides will come together. And for the first time in 52 years, you’ll have an issue that we can put behind us.”
The pomposity of that statement should have been a reminder that Trump should be assumed to be lying about his abortion position, just as he lies about most things. And yet, much of the press took his statements at face value, even going so far as to report that he had angered anti-choice activists, which of course, only helps bolster Trump’s false claims of moderation.
Never-Trump Republican Matt Lewis swallowed Trump’s bait whole in a Daily Beast response that assumes Trump’s “true” position is pro-choice. “[A]t some point, Trump’s presidency might even be a net-negative for pro-lifers,” Lewis wrote, arguing anti-choice voters “will have no one to blame but themselves” for believing Trump will back their cause. But Lewis is wish-casting here. It’s a fantasy to think that all of these anti-abortion Republicans will wake one day, rueful that they sold out their “family values” to back a guy who wouldn’t even ban abortion for them. However, the evangelical voters who appear ready to hand Trump the GOP nomination soon are making a very safe bet. They know that Trump is just lying to Welker and that he will sign a national abortion ban if he wins — likely within a few weeks of being inaugurated.
Evangelical voters know Trump doesn’t care about abortion and has likely caused a few himself. But that’s why they’re right to believe he’ll sign any ban put in front of him, no matter how draconian. Trump takes a wholly transactional view of politics, and his only concern is amassing power for himself. Certainly, he doesn’t care how many women die or are maimed because of a ban. If he wins the White House, he’ll want to keep the religious right on his side, and giving them a total or near-total ban on abortion is a way to do that that costs him nothing.
In a political environment where very little is predictable, there is one thing we can count on: If Trump is returned to the White House, a national abortion ban is a near-certainty. After all, if Trump wins, that means Republican turnout was high and Republicans are probably taking Congress, as well. Looking at state legislatures should kill any hope that Republicans will show constraint on this issue. Republicans keep banning abortion, despite strong public opposition. And when voters turn out to protect abortion rights in the states, Republican politicians retaliate by passing more laws to curtail voting rights.
For Trump, who opposes democracy, this is a win-win.
Anti-choice fervor in the GOP is driving anti-democracy fervor, which only makes it easier for Trump to sell his “why not end democracy altogether” plan. Giving evangelicals an abortion ban will just ensure their support for Trump’s unsubtle yearning to be dictator-for-life. And if it makes Trump less popular with the larger public, well, that’s why he wants to destroy democracy. The end goal is to put his power out of the reach of voters.
It’s always wiser to look at what a politician does more than what he says, but with Trump, it’s triply important. No other politician lies as much as Trump. No other politician has been less interested in keeping his promises. Trump himself doesn’t even really bother to hide that he’s lying. To one audience, he pretends to be “moderate” on abortion. To others, he brags that “I was able to terminate Roe vs. Wade.” There is simply no relationship between what he says and what he does. What he says is worse than useless.
On the “what he does” front, the track record is clear: Trump gives all the power to fundamentalist Christians.
During his first term, Trump nominated judges from a list compiled by the far-right Federalist Society, which was initially founded for the purpose of banning abortion. Trump also let anti-choice radicals use White House powers to wage war on birth control access, filling health care offices with people who oppose any effort to prevent unwanted pregnancy. Trump’s Department of Health passed rules making it harder for women to use their insurance to pay for birth control, and his administration repeatedly tried to cut funding for contraception services for low-income women. Trump officials spent the entire four years of his administration trying to destroy Planned Parenthood altogether.
This will all be much worse if Trump takes office again, starting with the near-inevitable national abortion ban he’ll sign. He won’t be worried about voter backlash. After all, he won’t legally be able to run for a third term, so his focus will be on trying to find a way to install himself illegally in office on a permanent basis. To get that done, he will need the most fanatical forces in the GOP on his side. One way to do that is give them what they want, which is an abortion ban. From Trump’s personal point of view, there’s no downside and only upside to banning abortion. And the smartest bet of all is that Trump will always do what he thinks benefits him, no matter who gets hurt in the process.
How many abortions do you think this motherfucker paid for?
3-5 fewer than he should have sadly.
Did you guys hear about Jared’s laptop? Real scary stuff. People are talking about it.
Him personally? Not a single one, he’s a tight fisted cunt. How many abortions he probably caused other people to pay for is a significantly higher number.
He could have afforded five more…
It will happen suddenly, unilaterally, and in that weird messy way where it gets tied up in court for forever but somehow goes into effect anyway, or it gets blocked but has a “chilling effect” on the population such that the ultimate goal is nonetheless achieved.
It will be stupid, there will be countless of hours of argument wasted on whether he can “actually” do it even though he just did, and people will be screwed over.
If you don’t like how that sounds, please do something now.
Trump lying, who would have guessed that?
I laughed when I heard him say he’ll take a moderate position and make everyone happy or whatever he tried to pull. Trying to play both sides and it makes no sense.
Every headline like this can be shortened to “Trump is lying”
Hey, if his mouth is moving, lies are coming out.
How is this walking meat bag of cocaine and cholesterol still alive ?
*Congress will ban it nationwide.
It will start with Trump appointed judges slowly attacking Blue States rights.
No he won’t, because he can’t even if he wants to. Overturning Roe sent the issue back to the states, it is no longer a Federal matter. This is fear porn for the Left base.
Lol, “the Supreme Court can’t reverse Roe v. Wade, it’s settled law. The left is always needlessly fear mongering.”
“Brett Kavanagh swore under oath he would not be a part of overturning Roe v. Wade. The left ruined this poor man’s reputation.”
“Mitch McConnel won’t force through a justice in an elec…” who am I kidding no one thought that.
It is absolutely not. The Republican party voters cannot leave this as a states issue.
If you watched the first Republican National Debate, there is almost widespread agreement that the republican party will start attacking Blue states rights in the courts until they can get a federal ban passed somehow.
I cannot state how incredibly wrong you are about this.
Republican voters will not elect people who want to leave it up to the states and think the abortion issue is settled.
Your comment reads like “Don’t threaten me with the supreme court!” in 2016. Overturning Roe was fear porn for the Left too, but the Right was crazy enough to actually do it. It’s incredibly foolish to write this off, only for the next Republican administration to ban it.
If precedent mattered, then Barrett wouldn’t have been considered by the Senate, since they had just established in 2016 that you can’t confirm a judge in an election year. The hypocrisy clearly isn’t a disqualifier in Barrett’s eyes. Alito thinks the Court is quite literally above the law. And Thomas has a sweet gig where he’s getting loads of free shit and vacations in return for being as conservative as possible.
Don’t assume that the Court will be consistent, especially since they were already inconsistent by overturning Roe. They’d already blowing up in their face, and I say we should toss barrels of gasoline on that fire. We need a heavily blue Congress to remind Alito that he is a servant, not a king.
since they had just established in 2016 that you can’t confirm a judge in an election year
In a President’s second term, I believe that was the description.
McConnell certainly wasn’t that craven when he made up his stupid rule that he would go back on only 4 years later.
Drinking age is a state issue too, but the federal government controls it fully.
Yes, with the club of Highway funding. What pretense can they use for abortion? Neither party is going to go after medicare/medicaid, or anything health related, they would be destroyed at the polls.
Anything they want. Republicans are already planning way to go after Medicare. Don’t put it past them to figure out how to do it.
“The left base” that supports Joe fucking Biden.
If he was going to do that, wouldn’t he have done it the first time around? If the president could do that without Congress, wouldn’t Biden sign an executive order for the right to choose?
Not necessarily. A second presidential term is a final term, constitutionally.
The first time around, he was limited in the deeply unpopular things he could advocate for, because he was trying to get re-elected (though he still did a lot of vile and unpopular shit).
If, heaven forfend, he wins in ‘24, he will go full scorched-earth, because he has nothing to lose.
People said similar things during his first term, warning he was going to start wars with everyone, yet he is the first president in decades to not start a new conflict, and some stuff settled down at the same time. I’m not fan of Trump, but the fear of what he will do often seems worse than the reality of it.
His biggest issue is the way he speaks and his fragile ego, which ultimately led to January 6th and that whole shit show. My guess is that if Trump spoke as well as Obama he wouldn’t be nearly as divisive, Trump’s personality is utter dog shit. I don’t think his dad every said he was proud of him, and we have to deal with the results, because he won’t get therapy.
A lot of the stuff that seemed unpopular… how did it play out? The tariffs against China to get stuff back in the US… getting things back in the US seems more popular than ever after what we saw during the pandemic and with China getting close to Russia. Tik Tok ban… still being discussed and banned for government phones. Immigration… we’re not seeing busses of people getting dumped in cities that don’t know what to do with people.
I’m not going to pretend everything done under his watch was good, it wasn’t. But if some of the things he was talking about are still being talked about by the current administration and getting pretty broad support from the people, maybe it wasn’t the policy, maybe it was more of his god awful delivery.
I think the point of the article is that a Trump win in 2024 means that the Christian right will put him and other officials in power. Congress, with those people in power, would push through an abortion ban that Trump would then sign into law
It sounds like the Democrats need to ask themselves why they haven’t gained any seats since 2018 and address it. Then maybe also find a candidate to run against Trump that isn’t 80 years old. Maybe they’re holding back so Biden doesn’t become a lame duck, but he is not the person to go up against anyone, let alone Trump. And if the DNC wants to give the people a chance at a real primary and not some hand picked plant, like Hillary and Biden, they need to get started.
Trump is really good and spinning the media and getting attention, but he shouldn’t be that hard to beat. He’s a buffoon. How the Democratic Party has failed so badly against Trump has boggled my mind. Both parties are such trash right now.
Biden already beat Trump, why would he lose this time?
Biden beat Trump by the skin of his teeth. Biden had the most votes ever in a presidential election. Trump had the second most. People showed up to get Trump out, will they show up to keep him out? Trump fans love Trump… do you know anyone who loves Biden? He’s tolerated.
You also can’t ignore the last 3 years. Inflation is bad and people are hurting because of it. Interest rates are up, making it harder to buy a home. Biden can barely speak and there are serious questions about his cognitive abilities, and at 80 years old people really need to ask themselves if they are ready for President Harris (his DEI pick for VP, it’s insane to me that be said this flat out before he even picked someone). When people can’t put food on their table, they look to kick out whoever was in office when that happened, and Biden is not inspiring any confidence that he can right the ship. He just seems like a puppet sitting in the White House just so Trump wouldn’t be there.
They can do better. The country deserves better than either of these two dipshits. I don’t think I could bring myself to vote for either of them.
Biden vs Trump… people are going to ask what life was like in 2019 and almost everyone is going to say their life was better in 2019 than it is right now.
Biden won the last contest because he was a better option than Trump.
Biden is still the better option than Trump, why would you change to a different person now?
I’m not taking about me, I won’t vote for either of them, and didn’t do it last time either. Neither of them are qualified for the job.
People who will pick one of them are likely going to prioritize the economy over all else. They can’t afford to put food on their table. That happened with Biden in charge. Why would they continue to back the guy who is at the helm while they can’t afford food?
People voted against Trump, not for Biden. When Biden turned out to be worse than neutral, will they make the same choice again? Will they simply sit out? Time will tell. One thing is for sure, Trump voters are going to show up.
Food prices are up worldwide, Bobby.
Biden only president of the US.
I think most people are smart enough to know that.
