Opinion | Sorry, Trump. The Issue of Abortion Is Not Going Away.
If there is one thing we have learned from Republicans during this election, it is that they would like the issue of abortion to disappear.Donald Trump, who only eight years ago called for “some kind of punishment” to be meted out to women who procured abortions, now speaks of “reproductive rights,” a formulation preferred by proponents of legal abortion.References to abortion have been all but eliminated from the party’s platform.
Even JD Vance, whose opposition to abortion is perhaps his most firmly established political position, now says that the oral abortifacient mifepristone should remain accessible.This retreat is of course understandable.For years abortion appeared to be a mobilizing issue for Republican voters, particularly the evangelical base.
But ever since the Supreme Court eliminated the constitutional right to abortion in its Dobbs decision in June 2022, the issue has become a liability, and a serious one, for the G.O.P.From Kansas to Ohio, majorities have made it clear that they support at least some form of legal abortion.
In Michigan the issue arguably re-elected Gov.Gretchen Whitmer in 2022.
Mr.Trump blames abortion for his party’s losses during that year’s midterm elections.One could argue, with only the faintest hint of cynicism, that for Republicans, abortion has outlived whatever usefulness it once possessed.
It’s not that they want to reverse their previous position (always a delicate operation for any politician); they just want to forget they ever held it.But abortion will not go away.It resists all attempts at moderation and compromise.
To treat it as we do other issues is to fail to understand it.It is not a procedural legal matter for the courts.
It is not a prudential question to be negotiated by lawmakers.It is not within the scope of what we call “public health,” subject to the cost-benefit analysis of federal and state regulators.
Ultimately it is not a political question in the narrow sense of the word, ...