Under the direction of Donald J. Trump, the Republican National Committee released a modified party platform ahead of the party’s national convention last month. Pro-life advocates drew attention to the toned-down stance on abortion in particular.
Under the subhead “Republicans Will Protect and Defend a Vote of the People, from Within the States, on the Issue of Life,” it reads:
We proudly stand for families and Life. We believe that the 14th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States guarantees that no person can be denied Life or Liberty without Due Process, and that the States are, therefore, free to pass Laws protecting those Rights. After 51 years, because of us, that power has been given to the States and to a vote of the People. We will oppose Late Term Abortion, while supporting mothers and policies that advance Prenatal Care, access to Birth Control, and IVF (fertility treatments).
This is the only place in the document where the word “abortion” is used—in the same sentence where the platform expresses support for contraception and in vitro fertilization. Compare this with the 2016 platform, which affirmed that “the unborn child has a fundamental right to life which cannot be infringed” and backed a federal 20-week abortion ban.
That year, Republicans opposed embryonic stem cell research. This year, it is not mentioned. The party that once staunchly supported pro-life positions has adopted a milder posture—likely in hopes of capturing more votes.
It is a politically understandable strategy. Since 2022, when Roe v. Wade was overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court, voters in seven states have approved access to abortion on statewide ballot initiatives. And while 14 states have introduced almost-total bans on abortions, the country saw a 10 percent increase in annual reported abortions from 2020 to 2023. Abortion-related questions are on the ballot in several states in November, including in the battleground states of Arizona and Nevada.
For decades, the Republican Party could count on significant backing from pro-life voters who wanted to see Roe v. Wade overturned. Now that the Supreme Court has done that, it’s uncertain how pro-life advocates will direct their electoral support.
“If the Trump campaign decides to remove national protections for the unborn in the GOP platform, it would be a miscalculation that would hurt party unity and destroy pro-life enthusiasm between now and the election,” Marjorie Dannenfelser, the president of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, said in a July 2 statement, days before the Republican platform was released.
As reported by OSV, Ms. Dannenfelser said a presidential candidate must at least support a 15-week federal abortion ban to receive her organization’s support. Yet, when the revised platform was officially approved on July 8, Ms. Dannenfelser appeared to back down from her previous position, stating, “The Republican Party remains strongly pro-life at the national level.”
Others were less certain.
Patrick Brown, a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, detailed his disapproval of the current Republican Party platform in The New York Times.
“The new platform makes sure to include positive mentions of birth control and in vitro fertilization yet neglects any reference to pregnancy resource centers or child care,” Mr. Brown said.
“Mr. Trump has repeatedly congratulated himself for having returned abortion decisions to the states,” he wrote. “Yet I have found no high-profile statements from the nominee supporting state laws that restrict abortion. On the contrary, he criticized abortion ‘hardliners.’ In 2023 he called the six-week abortion ban in his home state, Florida, a ‘terrible thing.’”
Further, as Mr. Brown noted, JD Vance of Ohio described himself as “100 percent pro-life” during his successful 2022 run for the U.S. Senate. Two years later, the Republican vice presidential candidate declared his support of access to the abortion pill.
“The Republican nominee seems all too content to sell out those of us who got into politics to advance policies that protect what we see as human life from its earliest stages,” Mr. Brown said of Mr. Trump. “Pro-life groups should not be too quick to offer Mr. Trump rhetorical cover or accommodate Mr. Trump’s redefinition of common sense on the issue.”
Robert P. George, in an article published in the Deseret News, pleaded with Republicans to both defend traditional marriage and hold fast to their previous pro-life position.
“Some Republican convention delegates openly promise that this year’s party platform will be ‘more socially moderate’—a thinly veiled euphemism for the abandonment of the truth about the sanctity of human life and the nature of marriage, and willful capitulation to the progressive social dogmas which currently find favor among our society’s elite,” wrote Mr. George, a law professor and director of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University.
“This must not be permitted to happen,” he said, citing the abolition of slavery as an example of Republican conviction. “Just as their forefathers did in 1856, Republicans today must have the courage to speak moral truth—even when the political headwinds appear at first glance to be daunting. Republicans knew then, as they surely know now, that arguments about political expediency or electoral palatability fare no better as defenses of whitewashing the killing of unborn children and lying about the nature of marriage than they did of slavery.”
Further, according to JD Flynn of the Pillar, the new Republican Party platform may make it more challenging for the U.S. bishops to update “Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship,” their teaching document on Catholic political responsibility.
“If it does happen, the project of revising ‘Faithful Citizenship’ will be a long one—with almost all of it taking place behind closed doors,” he wrote. “But for at least some bishops, a serious commitment to the ‘utterly vulnerable [and] utterly voiceless’ unborn might soon mean a divorce from tacit support for the Republican Party, which has now committed its platform to protecting the destruction of unborn life by in vitro fertilization.”
Yet some pro-life advocates had a more optimistic view of the G.O.P.’s stance. Steven H. Aden, the chief legal counsel for Americans United For Life, attended the meeting of the Republican Party’s national platform committee in Milwaukee. His organization, which he described as nonpartisan, is against both surgical and chemical abortions because “it’s the destruction of human life.” Mr. Aden told America last month that he was generally “pretty pleased” with the Republican platform and hoped the Democratic National Committee would follow suit.
“Nobody knows the human heart. Obviously, President Trump is a calculating political figure. He’s doing what he can to regain the White House. I will say that I think, in his heart and in his mind, he is pro-life. I saw conviction from him that I have rarely seen from politicians on any issue in his first administration,” Mr. Aden said, applauding Mr. Trump’s nominees to the Supreme Court and the overturning of Roe.
Mr. Trump was also the first sitting president to attend the National March for Life in Washington, D.C.
“He’s done more for innocent human life and for the pro-life movement than any other president in history—and I’m sorry, that includes Ronald Reagan,” Mr. Aden said. “And so, even if he does half of what he did in his first term, he will prove to be a game changer, a pro-life president that is changing the culture and the laws in this country to save human life.”
Americans United for Life has reached out to the D.N.C., he said, offering help “crafting pro-family, pro-women policy. We’ll have to wait to see what they have to say.”
If pro-life voters withhold votes from the Republican Party, it is unclear where they will cast them. Vice President Kamala Harris has yet to list specific policy positions on her campaign website, but her steadfast support for abortion rights is well known.
Earlier this year, Ms. Harris became what the White House claimed was the first sitting vice president to visit an abortion facility. Her running mate, Governor Tim Walz of Minnesota, is also considered a strong supporter of abortion rights, and he signed a bill to that end last year. While unlikely, Democrats would need a significant pivot at the Democratic National Convention next week if they hope to siphon pro-life support away from Republicans.
[Read next: A Catholic Minnesota mom’s view of Tim Walz]
Material from OSV News was used in this story. Connor Hartigan contributed to the reporting.
