(LifeSiteNews) — Former President and 2024 Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump again criticized some state pro-life laws for going further than he would like this week, assuring a female audience that “too tough” abortion bans were going to be “redone.”
Appearing Wednesday at a women’s town hall hosted by Fox News, Trump took a question about state abortion bans. As he often does, he began by claiming that most Americans “wanted it back in the states for a vote of the people and that’s what we have it, and the states are now voting for it.”
“And honestly, some of them are going much more liberal, like in Ohio,” he went on, whereas “some of them, I agree, they’re too tough, too tough, and those are going to be redone because there already is a movement in those states … to redo it.”
Trump when asked about abortion in his town hall yesterday says that states that have strict abortion restrictions are going to be “redone.”
“Some of them I agree—they’re too tough. Too tough. And those are going to be redone.”
🤔I’m confused, is @realDonaldTrump only for… pic.twitter.com/7PmJzFU3DO
— Lizzie Marbach (@LizzieMarbach) October 17, 2024
Trump now opposes further federal legislation on abortion, supports letting abortion pills be distributed by mail, has criticized states for overly “harsh” abortion bans, and has even declared he would veto an abortion ban if it reached his desk. Through this work, he has taken credit for making the GOP “less radical” on abortion, including by having the national Republican Party platform rewritten to reflect his more liberal position.
He and his supporters argue that, in light of polls showing increased “pro-choice” sentiment in recent years, the best pro-life strategy at the moment is to leave abortion battles at the state level while national politicians focus on other issues, leaving federal policy to potentially be revisited after a cultural change more conducive to life.
While many pro-lifers argue that such analysis misunderstands the true role abortion plays in overall voting decisions, the more pressing concern of Trump’s latest comments is the possibility that his tactical endorsement of having pro-life laws “redone” will be used by the abortion lobby against pro-life state legislators in future abortion battles, strengthening efforts to weaken existing laws.
Trump’s turn on abortion has anguished many pro-lifers, who were key to his original 2016 victory, prompting debate among many about whether to vote or abstain in the November election.
At the same time, however, Democrats’ continued support for a comprehensive far-left policy agenda is expected to keep most conservatives and Republicans resigned to accepting him as preferable.
Trump’s opponent, Democrat Vice President Kamala Harris, is running on an absolutist abortion-on-demand platform that includes taxpayer funding of abortion, opposing any and all limits on the practice, signing a law forcing all 50 states to permit abortion again, and most recently abolishing the Senate filibuster to get such a law to her desk. In speeches, she has taken to promoting abortion – the destruction of innocent unborn children their mother’s womb – as normal and to be committed for whatever reason a woman wants, such as disposing of a child who would interfere with her career plans.
Harris currently leads Trump by 1.6% in RealClearPolitics’ popular vote polling average and by about 3% according to RaceToTheWH, but margins remain extremely close in the swing states that will decide the Electoral College outcome, thanks in large part to Harris’s association with, and refusal to distance herself from, the Biden administration and its economy and border record.