Donald Trump’s 11-word statement in support of ‘reproductive rights’ sets off panic among pro-life Republicans

One seemingly innocuous post on Donald Trump’s social media platform has led some on his own side to accuse him of betraying them.

Conservatives in the United States have accused Donald Trump of backflipping on his anti-abortion stance, with potential ramifications for his support in the upcoming election.

“My administration will be great for women and their reproductive rights,” Mr Trump, the Republican nominee for president in November’s election, wrote on his social media platform, Truth Social, on Friday.

In American political discourse, the term “reproductive rights” is often used as a stand-in for women’s access to abortion, though it can also refer to things like IVF and birth control.

Former president Donald Trump. Picture: Emily Elconin/Getty Images via AFP

Mr Trump’s personal views on abortion have evolved repeatedly and in, it must be said, quite politically expedient ways over the years.

In the late 1990s, long before he entered politics, the future president described himself as “very pro-choice”. That changed in 2011, when he was considering a run for president as a Republican, and declared himself to be “pro-life” – pretty much a precondition for being a viable presidential candidate on the American right.

During his campaign for the party’s nomination in 2016, Mr Trump took things a little further, infamously saying, “there has to be some sort of punishment” for women who seek abortions.

(He walked back the remark afterwards, though that obviously hasn’t stopped the Democrats from resurfacing the clip ever since.)

Here is Donald Trump saying “there has to be some form of punishment” for women who get an abortion. pic.twitter.com/BtJdbOKsbG

— The Democrats (@TheDemocrats) September 20, 2023

Ultimately, when he was president, Mr Trump appointed three conservative justices to the Supreme Court, shifting the court’s balance to a 6-3 conservative majority. That led, in 2022, to the controversial nullification of Roe vs Wade, the landmark Supreme Court decision that had underpinned abortion rights in the US since 1973.

The new ruling freed Republican-run states to impose far stricter bans on abortion than had been allowed under Roe, which made it legal nationwide until the point of foetal viability – about 24 weeks into pregnancy. Some states now have bans in place from as early as six weeks, when most women don’t even know they’re pregnant.

The bans differ in practice. Some include exceptions for cases of rape, incest, or the mother’s life being in danger. Others do not.

The dog that caught the car

And that is a political problem for both Mr Trump and other Republican candidates. Their decades-long ambition of overturning Roe realised, they now find themselves having to defend wildly unpopular bans. Polling consistently shows more than 60 per cent of Americans think abortion should be legal in most cases.

That’s a bit oversimplistic – the numbers are more malleable when you start to ask about particular trimesters, for example – but the basic fact remains. The strictest bans do not have anything even approaching popular support.

Exit polling showed abortion rights were a major factor in the 2022 midterm elections, which saw Republicans underperform relative to their expectations, claiming a sliver-thin majority in the House of Representatives and actually losing ground in the Senate.

So, Mr Trump is stuck between claiming credit for Roe’s demise, which endears him to pro-life conservatives, and distancing himself from it, which might limit the damage the issue can do among progressive and independent voters.

Hence his seemingly innocuous post about “reproductive rights” on Friday. Clearly, Mr Trump wishes to neutralise abortion as an issue as much as possible.

Over the weekend, his chosen nominee for vice president, Senator J.D. Vance, told NBC Mr Trump would veto a nationwide abortion ban if a Republican-run Congress passed one during his second term.

“I can absolutely commit to that,” Mr Vance said.

They’re hoping to defuse a potential scare campaign.

Donald Trump is in a tough situation here. Picture: Emily Elconin/Getty Images via AFP

‘Trump is joining the other side’

But there’s another layer to the problem. Voting, in the United States, is not compulsory. So while trying to win over voters in the political centre, candidates also need to motivate their more ideologically committed supporters to show up at the polls.

How many Americans are there, among the 74 million who voted for Mr Trump last time, who broadly dislike him but have supported him anyway because of his anti-abortion position? The number isn’t zero.

“It’s one thing to argue that abortion should be left up to the states, which is a position of disagreement among pro-lifers of good faith and one to which I am sympathetic,” wrote Philip Klein, editor of the conservative magazine National Review.

“The latest Truth Social post is different. The idea that his administration would be ‘great’ for ‘reproductive rights’ is hard to interpret in any other way than as an affirmatively pro-choice statement. By the common usage of the term, if you support reproductive rights, it means you want broader access to abortion.

“Overturning Roe was only the necessary first step of a much longer battle to protect the lives of the unborn. And on that battle, it increasingly looks like Trump is joining the other side.

“In addition to being a moral abomination, it’s unclear what this does for him politically. With this post, Trump will further alienate pro-lifers and divide his own party.”

Donald Trump. Picture: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images via AFP

“Republicans are wary of abortion as an issue this year. That’s understandable,” conservative activist Pedro Gonzalez wrote on Twitter.

“But this from Trump just reeks of fear and desperation. It’ll do little to convince critics, and probably alienate allies.”

Dwight McKissic, a conservative pastor, accused Mr Trump of “now using Democratic lingo”.

“Literally, there’s now no difference between Democrats and Republicans regarding abortion. Never thought I’d hear the words ‘reproductive rights’ written affirmatively from a Republican nominee for president.”

Tony Perkins, head of the Family Research Council, suggested Mr Trump was “in a hole” and should “stop digging”.

“The (Democrats have) the corner on the abortion market. Trump is not only suppressing his own support, he is going to hurt the vast majority of Republican candidates who are 100 per cent pro-life,” he said.

Former Indiana governor Mike Pence, who served as Mr Trump’s vice president in his first term (though he is not supporting him this time), said “the former president’s use of the language of the left” should be “concerning for millions of pro-life Americans”.

In a statement responding to the backlash, Mr Trump’s campaign insisted the candidate’s position on abortion had been “consistent”.

“He supports the rights of individuals in their respective states to determine their laws on abortion,” said press secretary Karoline Leavitt.

“President Trump also strongly supports ensuring women have access to the care they need to create healthy families, including widespread access to IVF, birth control and contraception.

“He always will.”

Originally published as Donald Trump’s 11-word statement in support of ‘reproductive rights’ sets off panic among pro-life Republicans