(LifeSiteNews) – Pro-lifers are rejecting Donald Trump’s claim that the GOP experienced disappointing results during the 2022 mid-term elections because candidates “poorly handled” the “abortion issue.”
“It wasn’t my fault that the Republicans didn’t live up to expectations in the MidTerms,” the former president stated on Truth Social this past Sunday. “I was 233-20! 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.”
“Also,” Trump continued, “the people that pushed so hard, for decades, against abortion, got their wish from the US Supreme Court, & just plain disappeared, not to be seen again. Plus, Mitch stupid $’s!”
The former president’s remarks have been received by the political right with near-universal disapproval, with many commentators believing that the swipe at his most loyal supporters could be the most significant political error of his career.
“No candidate who wants to give up on the abortion issue will be the Republican nominee in 2024, especially one who blames pro-lifers for being a drag on the party,” columnist Ben Domenech wrote for The Spectator.
“Whoever is now advising President Trump to the contrary on life issues should be fired immediately,” said Roger Severino, the vice president of domestic policy at the Heritage Foundation.
Pro-life activists also voiced strong opposition to Trump’s comments. Hitherto, many pro-lifers called Trump “the most pro-life president in US history,” thanks primarily to his Supreme Court nominees overturning Roe v. Wade and his participation in the March for Life.
“Trump is way out of line here on life,” Live Action founder Lila Rose tweeted. “The fault of midterm losses has ZERO to do with the pro-life cause & more to do with poor election strategies that the Republican Party has been employing for years.”
The fault of midterm losses has ZERO to do the pro-life cause & more to do with poor election strategies that the Republican Party has been employing for years.
Hardcore pro-lifers won re-election in states across the country; bad candidates & bad campaign strategies lost.— Lila Rose (@LilaGraceRose) January 3, 2023
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Labour MP Stella Creasy has threatened to table an amendment to the Government’s upcoming Bill of Rights to give women the “fundamental right to an abortion”.
Ms Creasy has already been instrumental in imposing abortion on Northern Ireland, promoting DIY abortion, and banning pro-life vigils around abortion clinics. Now she wants to remove any restrictions on abortion. She even wants decisions on abortion law to be taken out of the hands of elected politicians by making it a “right”.
Sign this petition calling on Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to resist any attempt to make abortion a right.
There is no right to abortion in international law. None of the nine core treaties of the United Nations recognises abortion as a human right (including the Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Against Women).
Instead, several human rights instruments recognise the right to life of children before birth. The Declaration of the Rights of the Child states: “… the child by reason of his physical and mental immaturity, needs special safeguards and care, including appropriate legal protection before as well as after birth…”
There can be no right to end the life of an innocent unborn child.
The UK already has some of the most permissive abortion legislation in Europe. A right to abortion would make the situation here even worse. Creating an absolute “right” to abortion would logically mean removing any restrictions. The worst implications of this could include:
• The removal of any gestational limits, allowing abortion up to birth
• Abortion based on the gender of the baby
• The removal of medical safeguards, including the involvement of doctors
• Erosion of conscience rights for medical professionals
Sign this petition to tell Mr Sunak not to make abortion a right.
The overturn of a Court decision in the United States has no direct implications for abortion law in the UK, which is regulated by Acts of Parliament. The regulation of a controversial issue such as abortion should lie with democratically elected MPs, not the courts. Robert Buckland MP, the former Justice Secretary, has warned that enshrining abortion as a right “risks bringing our courts into the political arena as in the United States”.
Tell Mr Sunak to stand up for parliamentary democracy and a true understanding of human rights, and resist any attempt to make abortion a right.
The DC-based Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, which had a close relationship with the Trump White House, echoed Rose’s perspective. Trump’s former vice president Mike Pence re-tweeted the group’s statement.
“The approach to winning on abortion in federal races, proven for a decade is this: state clearly the ambitious consensus pro-life position and contrast that with the extreme view of Democrat opponents,” SBA Pro-Life America wrote.
“We look forward to hearing that position fully articulated by Mr. Trump and all presidential candidates.”
Well Said @sbaprolife!🇺🇸 https://t.co/6hfDroJpOr
— Mike Pence (@Mike_Pence) January 2, 2023
John Gibbs, endorsed by Trump in his race for the 3rd Congressional House seat in the state of Michigan, voiced disagreement with the former president on social media, though never mentioning Trump directly.
So-called ‘candidate quality’ and alleged pro-life ‘extremism’ have nothing to do with the 2022 results. There’s little empirical evidence to support either. These are nothing but attack vectors used by the establishment to attack outsider candidates. Don’t buy the BS.
— John Gibbs for MI-03 (@votejohngibbs) January 3, 2023
Meanwhile, former Trump lawyer Jenna Ellis defended her former boss, tweeting that Trump is simply trying to get to the bottom of what really happened during the mid-terms.
Donald Trump is not a fraudulent pro-lifer.
He has been the most stalwart pro-life president since Roe v. Wade and it was because of his SCOTUS appointments that this unconstitutional decision was finally rightly overturned.
He simply hates losing, and calls it as he sees it.
— Jenna Ellis 🍊🦅 (@JennaEllisEsq) January 2, 2023
A minority of accounts on social media agreed with Trump’s assessment.
Trump is right. As I’ve been saying, Republicans went too far, too fast. @LindseyGrahamSC federal abortion ban is to blame for a lot of Republican defeats. The pro-life movement needs to focus on abolishing abortion in red states and passing a federal late-term abortion ban. pic.twitter.com/0aGaJjHXiy
— Nathan | Classical Conservative (@TheClassicalCon) January 1, 2023
Others pointed to the large disparity in ad spending by pro-abortion groups versus those who held anti-abortion views to support Trump’s claim that pro-lifers “just plain disappeared.”
Trump writes that “the people that pushed so hard, for decades, against abortion, got their wish from the U.S. Supreme Court, JUST PLAIN DISAPPEARED NOT TO BE SEEN AGAIN.”
A graph on abortion ad spending.👇🏼
Not only did Dems outspend, but note the GOP drop off after the ruling! pic.twitter.com/XybjkMUEft
— Yossi Gestetner (@YossiGestetner) January 2, 2023
While debates about who is “to blame” for the Republicans’ sub-par showing during the mid-terms will likely continue well into the 2024 GOP primary season, exit polls have repeatedly shown that Democrats were effective at leveraging abortion as a tool to turn out younger voters to the polls this past November.
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According to the Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement, voters under the age of 30 ranked abortion as their number one motivating issue. “4 in 5 youth who believe abortion should be legal in most or all cases voted for a Democratic candidate to the House of Representatives,” the group discovered.
Statistics like these may have compelled Trump to argue in December that abortion was a “trap” issue for Republicans and that pro-lifers running on a no-exceptions platform might not be “capable of being elected … in certain areas.”
As of the publication of this story, the former president has not clarified or elaborated upon his initial remarks. LifeSite will provide updates if a statement is given.