Trump Says He Will Leave Abortion to the States
Hot tip: Don't believe liars.
Donald Trump is a lot of things — narcissistic, possibly sociopathic, certainly fabulistic — but he’s not politically insane. And so he has of course declined to endorse a national abortion ban, knowing full well that abortion is a losing issue for Republicans. Instead, he said, he will leave the abortion question to the states.
Here’s what he didn’t say:
Whether he would sign a national ban if one came to him — and his party is definitely trying to put one on his desk, should he win the White House.
Whether he would do exactly what his advisors and policy-makers are planning to do, which is to use his executive powers to severely restrict or even ban abortion without ever signing a ban.
Whether he will do exactly what the anti-abortion movement is pushing him to do, which is to invoke the 1873 Comstock Act, which could radically restrict abortion — and contraception — nationwide, or even ban both. And invoking Comstock would not require approval from Congress or any big court decision. That’s one reason why it seems to be the top choice of the savviest anti-abortion agitators — and why they’re encouraging their fellow travelers to keep quiet until after November.
To put a finer point on it: Donald Trump is not going to leave the abortion issue to the states. Donald Trump didn’t actually tell the country what his position on abortion will be as president. All Donald Trump did in his statement was characterize the current state of abortion law in America: That it is left up to the states, a reality only in place because of the Supreme Court justices Donald Trump appointed in order to overturn abortion rights, and only because Democratic president Joe Biden supports abortion rights. What Trump will do as president, if he’s elected? That went unanswered.
Luckily we know the answer: He will use whatever powers he has to make abortion difficult or impossible to get for as many American women as possible.
Trump also accused Democrats of supporting “execution after birth” — he meant abortion after birth, which isn’t possible, and it also seems worth noting that it’s Republicans who have long supported actual executions, including of children.
Since the Supreme Court issued its decision in Dobbs and overturned Roe v. Wade, Trump has been bragging that he put the justices on the court who ended the era of legal abortion in America. And he’s right: That’s exactly what he did. And he did it not because he has any great personal objection to abortion — Trump, I suspect, does not care one whit about abortion rights one way or the other — but because he owed a solid to the conservative misogynists who elected him and he wanted to cement in their loyalty.
Now, he has a different immediate want: To win an election. But once he’s in office, he will absolutely return to doing the bidding of the people he thinks put him there. And this time around, he’s pushed out any establishment Republicans and has leaned on far-right and religious conservative groups to craft his policies and implementation strategies. Last time, he had a bunch of ideologues coming up with wild ideas, but establishment and establishment-adjacent guys were in charge of doing the implementation — and when that second group couldn’t or wouldn’t go as far as the ideologues wanted, the ideologues, blessedly, weren’t savvy or competent enough to put Trump’s agenda fully into place. This time, Trump has learned his lesson. He’s kept on the ideologues, but also brought on people who actually know how government functions and who are not hesitant to pull any lever of power to implement their agenda — and to break American democratic processes if that’s what it takes.
Abortion is far from Trump’s number-one issue. But it is a top issue for many, many of the people he has tapped to run his administration. And because Trump doesn’t really care — he’s not someone who is going to draw the line at curtailing abortion rights — he will absolutely let the anti-abortion extremists doing his policy-making implement whatever anti-abortion policies they want. The anti-abortion policies they want? Abortion bans. Contraception bans. IVF bans. They may not outright pass laws saying “abortion, contraception, and IVF are banned.” They will pass laws that make abortion, contraception, and IVF functionally impossible to access.
That’s the Trump plan. Don’t believe anything he says otherwise.
xx Jill
And it seems that we've been having the states'rights debate since the very beginning. On one hand, you had the Federalists, let by Washington and Hamilton. On the other, you had the Democratic Republicans, founded by Jefferson and Madison. They had different visions of what America should become
I'm reading Ron Chernows biography about George Washington. My brother bought it for me as a Christmas gift. It is by far the largest book I've ever read.
Something about Washington stood out to me. Whenever he assumed a new office, the first thing he did was dampen people's expectation. "I am not qualified for this office. But my country calls upon me, so I will try my best."
He didnt brag about how he was going to make America great. He didn't talk about how we're going to win, win, win. No, he gave an honest assessment of his abilities.
I thought that was interesting because it's such a contrast to Trump - and most other politicians today.