Former President Donald Trump made the right call Monday when he declared that abortion will be left to the states if he’s elected this November.
But politics will also likely push him to say where he, personally, would draw the line — as the opposition (including most of the media) will insist, falsely, that he’d actually ban it at conception unless he says otherwise.
Realistically, of course, it’s up to the states even if Trump loses: No particular limit is passing Congress anytime soon, nor is Democrats’ unlimited-abortion-rights bill going anywhere.
But Trump went further, declaring, “We have abortion where everyone wanted it” — meaning, no longer decided nationwide by Supreme Court decree.
He outright rejected the idea of any national limit: “Many [states] will have a different number of weeks, or some will have more conservative than others, and that’s what they will be. At the end of the day, this is all about the will of the people,” he declared in a video on Truth Social.
He reiterated his for support for abortion being generally legal in cases of incest, rape and to protect the mother’s life — and embraced legal in-vitro-fertilization “in every state in America.”
He also told a hard truth to dedicated pro-lifers: “You must follow your heart on this issue. But remember, you must also win elections to restore our culture and, in fact, to save our country, which is currently and very sadly a nation in decline.”
Of course, President Biden (whose only issue is abortion) responded by insisting, “If Donald Trump is elected and the MAGA Republicans in Congress put a national abortion ban on the Resolute Desk, Trump will sign it into law.”
Again, there’s no chance of any such bill passing any decade soon, but Biden’s handlers hope fearmongering will still work.
Which may well force Trump to say something about where he thinks the line should be drawn.
In a radio interview last month, he noted, “15 weeks seems to be a number that people are agreeing at,” which could refer to polling he’s seen, or to the fact that most of the democratic world has drawn the line for most legal abortions at around 12 to 15 weeks — which covers more than 90% of US abortions over the last half-century.
Of course, most people don’t want to even think about abortion.
The country’s still figuring it all out, state by state, after the Supreme Court in 2022 tossed the entire Roe v. Wade line of jurisprudence in the 6-3 Dobbs decision — with all three Trump-nominated justices in the majority.
Which leaves Democrats running hard on abortion because Biden’s been a disaster on the economy, the border, preventing wars and . . . heck, everything else.
