Big Life's Cowardice Is Cementing Its Own Irrelevance
Signaling that professional pro-lifers don't care if their standard-bearer throws their cause under the bus: what could go wrong?
In an election cycle defined by those who make their livings purporting to represent conservatives disgracing themselves, one of the worst has been the way the professional pro-life establishment (let’s call them Big Life) has been giving Donald Trump a near-total pass for throwing the movement under the bus.
To recap, after spending months scapegoating the pro-life cause for the 2022 midterm election disappointment that he and the GOP establishment were actually responsible for, Trump sat down for a wide-ranging Meet the Press interview in September in which he repeatedly touted plans to find an abortion cutoff point “that’s going to make people happy” in both parties and allow America to put the issue “behind us,” repeatedly refused to say if he thinks the preborn have constitutional rights, condemned state heartbeat laws as “terrible,” expressed indifference as to whether abortion is resolved at the state or federal level, and lectured pro-lifers that pro-life laws must make exceptions for rape and incest.
A few pro-life leaders, such as Abby Johnson, Kristan Hawkins, and my old boss Lila Rose, condemned this absolute nonsense that would have destroyed the candidacy of any other Republican, but most groups and “leaders” kept their mouths shut, with arguably the biggest disgrace of them all, Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America president Marjorie Dannenfelser specifically refusing to criticize Trump (presumably to avoid a repeat of her embarrassment of drawing a line in the sand only to back down last April). The incident, like so many times Trump has disqualified himself to the satisfaction of sane, attentive conservatives, was quickly forgotten.
One person who didn’t forget was Ron DeSantis, who brought it up last week during a CNN town hall:
“This is a guy that was at the March for Life in January of 2020, and he said that all life was a gift from God, he said the unborn was made in the image of God, he said that there should be protections. That’s what he was saying when he was president at the March for life. Now he’s saying it’s a terrible, terrible thing,” DeSantis said. “So, how do you reconcile those two views? Did he flip flop? Did he not believe it at the time?”
“But then to go even further, he actually has said, elevate this issue to the federal government,” DeSantis continued. “What he wants to do is find a time – I think he floated, like, 18 or 20 weeks. Have that be the limit. But then override any protections that states have done that are more than that. Well, that is not going to be advancing the cause of life. So, I think, for pro-life voters in Iowa, Donald Trump is taking positions that are way different than what he professed to believe when he first ran for president in 2016.”
CNN host Kaitlan Collins, a former White House correspondent for the Daily Caller, asked if DeSantis was saying Trump wasn’t pro-life.
“When you’re saying that pro-life protections are a terrible thing, by definition you are not pro-life. When you say that you want to have a federal law at 18 weeks or 20 weeks that would override a state like Iowa that has enacted pro-life protections, that would mean more abortions, not less abortions because very few abortions are happening that late anyway,” DeSantis told Collins. “So, he has flip-flopped on this issue. I don’t know if it’s because of political convenience or this is where he always believed in. But here’s the thing: Some issues are pretty fundamental. How do you flip flop on something like the sanctity of life?”
Good question, and deep down, every single conservative commentator, pro-life talking head, and Republican officeholder knows the answer: because the only core conviction Donald Trump has ever held in his life is his self-image, and understanding issues and policies in any real depth means nothing to him. Just like they know the only reason conservatives got as much out of Trump’s presidency as we did (including the judges who overturned Roe v. Wade) is through conservative pressure that is now almost entirely gone. Just like they know DeSantis’s pro-life record is better than Trump’s (as it is on every single issue they’ve gotten wealthy by claiming to fight for).
And yet, how many of you saw more than a fleeting news article (if that) about DeSantis hammering Trump for betraying life? Did you hear any of the big talk radio names bring it up? Did you see any columns, blog posts, or podcasts focusing on it? Did you get any email updates or newsletters from Big Life drawing attention to it? I sure didn’t.
At a time when the pro-life movement is on the defensive both within and outside the ostensible pro-life party, when even longtime allies are turning on us, Big Life seems to have decided it’s no big deal whether our nominee for President of the United States is a smart and sincere true believer, or a clown who is openly dictating terms to us, trashing one of the movement’s greatest legislative advancements in decades, and already advertising his desire to compromise with the enemy.
In just a few days, we’re going to find out with the Iowa caucuses whether DeSantis’s campaign has what it takes to save us from another MAGA coronation. But even if they don’t care about their own stated cause, the big brains behind Big Life better hope Ron can pull off an upset for the sake of their own relevance. Because if Donald Trump because the Republican presidential nominee again after everything he’s said about the pro-life cause since November 2022, no national Republican will ever again have reason to fear betraying pro-life voters, or those who lobby on their behalf.