Trump backs states' rights on abortion and protects his electoral prospects and the unborn

Democrats hope abortion becomes a determinative policy issue in 2024 federal elections. They have zeroed in on the American electorate’s views on abortion, and they’re perfectly willing to use Republicans’ principles against them.

Donald Trump blunted those efforts by publicly accepting the current legal landscape and leaving abortion policy to the states. The former president made the correct decision even if pro-life Republicans feel temporarily abandoned.

“The states will determine by vote or legislation or perhaps both, and whatever they decide must be the law of the land,” Trump said as he staked his campaign’s abortion stance. “Many states will be different. Many will have a different number of weeks, or some will [be] 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.”

For years, I’ve followed Gallup’s polling on a simple question: Do you think abortions should be legal under any circumstances, legal only under certain circumstances or illegal in all circumstances?

The trends have been fairly consistent since 1975. A majority believes abortion should be legal in some circumstances. A minority believes that abortion should be legal under any circumstances, and an even smaller minority believes it should always be illegal.

Gallup’s data on abortion perspectives has been both available and relatively consistent for decades. The clear outliers are abortion absolutists in either direction. Presently, only about 13% of America wants abortion banned without exception.

Another column by Cameron Smith: Tennessee can protect children who get in trouble by giving parents quick access to them

Principled stances without a strategy are just opinions

When Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey effectively prohibited states from regulating abortion prior to fetal viability, Republicans across the nation had the luxury of attacking abortion without prescribing legally enforceable policy of their own.

With the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization ruling on June 24, 2022, the Supreme Court dismantled a decades-old legal construct that removed critical decisions about abortion from the states. Those of us who wanted stronger restrictions on abortion applauded the decision.

With Trump’s latest announcement, many Republicans feel betrayed by the same president who delivered the judicial majority which changed the legal landscape for abortion.

"President Trump’s retreat on the Right to Life is a slap in the face to the millions of pro-life Americans who voted for him in 2016 and 2020," former Vice President Mike Pence shared on X.

“We are deeply disappointed in President Trump’s position,” stated Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of SBA Pro-Life America. “Unborn children and their mothers deserve national protections and national advocacy from the brutality of the abortion industry. The Dobbs decision clearly allows both states and Congress to act.”

We live in an immediate gratification culture, and the pro-life movement is no exception. When many pro-life Republicans saw Trump’s electoral strategy seemingly outweigh their short-term policy preferences, they were outraged.

Policy principles without winning political strategy are merely personal opinions. They don’t actually protect the unborn.

At the moment, Republicans have neither consensus nor momentum on federal abortion legislation. Had Trump endorsed a federal abortion restriction, he would have forced competitive Republican candidates to defend his plan instead of deferring to the states.

Instead of explaining immigration chaos and inflated prices for families, Democrats could easily put Republicans on defense. That’s a high electoral price to pay when Congress may not even have the constitutional authority to act on abortion at all.

Court ruling took power to regulate abortion from Congress to states

Dannenfelser is incorrect about the Dobbs decision “clearly” allowing Congress to restrict abortion. In fact, Dobbs erodes Congress’s ability to act in the space by explicitly rejecting any constitutional right to abortion under either the Due Process Clause or the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Our protection of the unborn must run in concert with our fidelity to the Constitution.

I will stand shoulder to shoulder with those who believe life is worth protecting from its earliest stages, but I also live in an area of the country where political majorities share that perspective. For the first time in my life, the state where I live has protected human life at an earlier stage than fetal viability.

I understand the draw of a one-size-fits-all federal abortion mandate.

Federal edicts are a politically expedient tool to enforce my views on people who disagree with me. It’s also specifically why the United States Constitution limits the powers of the federal government. When we force policies nationwide, we disenfranchise voters who form majorities in their respective states.

Republicans should force Democrats to be the ones who want to shove their views down American throats. It’s not a winning strategy.

Spend less time shouting and more time making the pro-life case

We can’t try to backdoor the same result by prosecuting women for out-of-state abortions. Again, the Constitution raises real barriers to such conduct by the states.

In his Dobbs concurrence, Justice Brett Kavanaugh noted that the question of whether a state may “bar a resident of that State from traveling to another State to obtain an abortion” is “not especially difficult”— “the answer is no based on the constitutional right to interstate travel.”

Neither Trump’s policy position on abortion nor the limitations of the Constitution should lessen our desire to protect life and care for pregnant mothers in less-than-ideal circumstances. In fact, we should focus those efforts in states where those voices are lacking.

As Trump points out, we must respect the will of the people even when they disagree with us. We should spend less time being outraged and more time convincing our fellow Americans to choose life.

USA TODAY Network Tennessee Columnist Cameron Smith is a Memphis-born, Brentwood-raised recovering political attorney who worked for conservative Republicans. He and his wife Justine are raising three boys in Nolensville, Tennessee. Direct outrage or agreement to smith.david.cameron@gmail.com or @DCameronSmith on X, formerly known as Twitter. Agree or disagree? Send a letter to the editor to letters@tennessean.com.

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Abortion rights: Trump makes the politically right move