A very different GOP

In 2012, when I became the president and CEO of Care Net, a pro-life pregnancy center ministry, the Republicans and Democrats supported very different national policy positions on abortion.

The Democrats’ policy position has remained largely unchanged: abortion on demand at any time during the pregnancy, for any reason, no exceptions. In fact, supporting abortion is now a litmus test for the party. However, the Republican national policy position has changed dramatically. Indeed, the implications of this change should transform the national dialogue around the issue of abortion. Whether it will do so remains to be seen.

In 2012, when Mitt Romney was the Republican nominee for president, he and the Republican Party opposed all abortions, except in cases of rape, incest, and the life of the mother. This exceptions-based position would make nearly 98 percent of abortions illegal. Furthermore, even the exceptions were evaluated through a moral lens that aimed to balance compassion for vulnerable women with compassion for the vulnerable babies they carry.

Today, the Republican policy position is in disarray. Presidential candidate Donald Trump recently announced that, essentially, the Republican Party does not have a national position on abortion, but that the issue should be left to “the will of the people” at the state level. Other major Republican figures have publicly supported anything from a 6-week ban to a 15-week ban, which would include the 2012 exceptions. The most recent CDC abortion statistics indicate that a 15-week ban, with the exceptions, would allow nearly 98 percent of abortions.

While a few states, such as Texas and Florida, have passed stricter limits on abortion, it is clear that the Republican Party’s varied positions are very different from the unified 2012 Republican position. Despite the rhetoric on both sides, the abortion debate from a national policy perspective is no longer about bans but rather about abortion availability.

As a result, the inconvenient truth when evaluating each party’s policy positions through the metric of saving babies in the womb from abortion is this: Both parties are essentially pro-choice—one pro-choice with no exceptions and one pro-choice with some exceptions.

Now, I certainly acknowledge and appreciate that many Republican politicians at all government levels are deeply pro-life. They speak forcefully for the cause of life and are working earnestly to put in place policies and initiatives to support women at risk for abortion so that they do not feel compelled to make that decision. Moreover, I am thankful for the significant work that was done to make the Dobbs decision to overturn Roe v. Wade a reality.

But the impact of the rhetoric and these efforts will be muted and short-lived if the overall national policy position is either nonexistent or allows for 98 percent of abortions. Indeed, embracing the current policy position cedes the abortion issue to the pro-choice side even before one steps up to the debate podium. No doubt, the Democrats would not consider a politician to be pro-choice if he or she indicated that we should just “leave it up to the states,” or if he or she embraced a policy position that allowed abortion in just 2-3 percent of cases, would they?

That said, I am not naïve to the political dynamics at play here. But one needs to be clear regarding what the abortion debate is about. It seeks to answer the question, “When is it acceptable for the powerful to take the life of the vulnerable, for the sake of the powerful?”  Indeed, when considering this important question, every politician is faced with the same dilemma that Pontius Pilate faced when he sent an innocent man, Jesus, to His death.

Specifically, should one be swayed by the shouts of a powerful and vocal crowd to give them what they think will make them happy, even if one must sacrifice the innocent to do so? It takes a level of moral clarity to resist these voices. After all, the politics of abortion do not change the morality of what happens in an abortion. In the 2012 Presidential election season, the Republican Party had this moral clarity. I hope the GOP can have it again, and that the Democratic Party can get this clarity now, because vulnerable lives in the womb are at risk.