Pat, thanks for your honest feedback, I have been meaning to respond to your comment, here’s my honest feedback:
Basically, the idea of focusing on trying to get Trump/current GOP to pass a federal heartbeat bill with no exceptions is not only futile, totally futile, but it would sabotage the pro-life movement.
Firstly, pro-life leaders, such as Lila Rose, have already put immense time and effort trying to convince Trump to support even basic restrictions. They already tried your suggestion. He not only said no, but he even called DeSantis’ heartbeat bill “horrible.” Not because he hates unborn babies or values women’s “choice.” But because he knew that support for six week restrictions was political suicide. (I disagree with the fact that Trump opposed signing even a reasonable 15 week restriction, he probably lost a few pro-life votes as a result and this gave me hesitancy to offer my vote as well.)
In fact, DeSantis killed his chances at beating Trump for the GOP nomination for president when he signed the six week abortion restriction and refused to answer questions on whether he would do so on a federal level as president. And in fact, in the last election, in Florida, a Trump-voting state, the majority of Floridians (56%) voted to overturn that six abortion ban, in exchange for an abortion-until-birth ballot measure. (The only reason why it didn’t pass was because Florida requires a 60% vote rate to pass, unlike other states.) Abortion-until-birth ballot measures have passed almost every time that they were placed on the ballot, including red states like Ohio and Missouri. They ALMOST passed one in Nebraska.
Post-edit addition: We Must Continue Changing Hearts and Minds Against Abortion - LifeNews.com
In another state, voters had a choice between a restriction at the second trimester and an abortion-until-birth, and luckily they chose the moderate option.
The current Democrat governor of red-state Kentucky won because he said he supported rape exceptions and because the GOP nominee supported the strict ban. In blue leaning, Harris voting Virginia, with republican Governor Youngkin, who insisted he only supported moderate restrictions, and not a full ban, they maintained their same number of state legislative seats they had before in the last election. They didn’t gain enough seats to pass any new pro-life laws, but at least they maintained the same number of seats they had before, to protect their state legislature from a blue wave in a previous midterm election.
If GOP nominees, legislators and/or the president gave serious consideration to passing a federal six week ban, they would lose control of congress, and then the presidency and would not be able to advance any Republican laws, or any basic pro-life protections such as the ones I suggested. It would be a disaster.
Again, I am saying that even just talking seriously about support for a six week ban would be disastrous for Republicans and pro-lifers, even if they never pass a six week ban.
Even if you do manage to convince the majority of Congress to pass a federal six week abortion ban, you are tragically so wrong to think that this would encourage the Democrats to respond with bipartisan legislation. I have paid close attention to things that Democrats and abortion activists say, to the polls, various news articles, OB-GYN’s, pro-life articles, and I can tell you FOR A FACT what would happen if Congress passed (or merely promoted the idea of) a six week abortion ban…
Oh, the Democrats would LOVE that! Love, love, love! They’d relish it! It would revive their political campaigns like never before. Regardless of how beautiful pro-lifers think of themselves to legally protect babies from abortion violence, the majority of Americans do NOT see it that way. No matter how many awesome, amazing, intelligent, well-researched videos, articles and speeches that pro-life leaders give, the pro-choice movement is winning in terms of public perception. It sucks, but it’s just true. The American public perception views strict abortion bans as too extreme, unfair, and ignorant, and that a lack of commonly supported exceptions is cruel.
In our current state of things, at least women in states that don’t offer them exceptions can at least get an abortion out of state. But with a federal six week ban, with no exceptions, the lack of such an option will only intensify the opposition towards pro-life laws. You will see anti-life headlines multiply like a plague… women with babies with fatal abnormalities, raped women, 12 year old girls. That’s in addition to the stories of women dying or being injured because the hospital delayed lifesaving treatment. Democrats and the pro-abortion movement are making martyrs, sacrificial lambs out of these women. I recently read a story about a young pro-life woman, who died in Texas because the doctors violated medical standards and blamed pro-life laws for their medical malpractice. The woman’s mother is also pro-life and knew it was the doctor’s fault. She tried to find a lawyer to sue for medical malpractice, but supposedly couldn’t find one to take the case. This is a situation in which this law would help to prosecute for medical malpractice. We have to take back the narrative.
The result of federal legislators supporting, or even seriously mentioning the idea of six week bans, would feed a Blue wave for midterms and the next election, and in four years, a Democrat president will pass the pro-abortion-until-birth law “Women’s Health Protection Act,” they will forever control the narrative about past abortion bans supposedly killing women, and the actual harms caused by the lack of exceptions, and that’s where the pro-life movement will die, or perhaps hibernate for another few decades… meaning after that, we will not be able to pass any meaningful abortion restrictions and the truth about elective abortion will be buried once again.
Bottom line: The majority of Americans are pro-choice. The majority support exceptions, including the majority of pro-lifers. The majority opposes late term abortion. The majority support basic pro-life protections. HOWEVER, if you give Americans a choice between six week abortion bans versus abortion until birth, they choose the latter. If you fight for all-or-nothing, nothing is what you will get.
There is absolutely NO evidence of Democrats and the abortion movement backing down on their desire for full abortion-until-birth laws. NONE! All evidence points to the very opposite! Again, they think that 24 week restrictions, with exceptions for mental health until birth, is their “compromise.” Listen to what EVERY elected Democrat has said—they will not “compromise” on the Women’s Health Protection Act and won’t even offer conscience protections for healthcare workers.
I suspect that your hesitance in supporting anything other than a strict abortion ban, has more to do with your opinion of yourself than anything else. You would feel lesser of yourself to admit that support for more moderately appealing abortion regulations would be more effective to the pro-life cause than six week bans. I really feel that’s what’s holding you back.
**Please read this recent pro-life article that supports what I’m trying to tell you: **
You claim that my policy “includes provisions that harm the taxpayer.” Here’s my quick responses to that:
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paying taxes does not equal “harm.” That’s your opinion.
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Women and parents, in total, make up more than half of taxpayers. And former fetuses make up 100% of all tax-payers. So actually, all of these provisions help taxpayers.
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The meat of my proposal (abortion exceptions and the small pro-life concessions) does NOT involve any significant tax payer funding.
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Regarding the portions that do involve more funding, is something that federal legislators are perfectly capable of deciding which priorities are worth it and which ones aren’t. I bet pro-lifer leaders would welcome any aid that the government could authorize to help keep dangerous doctors accountable for killing and endangering women. In exchange, the government could recover revenues from fines imposed against those violating this law, committing medical malpractice or fraud. Pro-lifers would welcome the idea of legislation to ensure that vulnerable populations, such as children with Down Syndrome, and Trisomy 18, get the care they are often denied. And my idea for a right to “education and coaching on management of pregnancy and parenting” is really an extension of the very mission of pregnancy crisis centers. The pro-life movement is weakened by being out-funded by the pro-abortion movement. So more funding to educational and awareness would only help the pro-life movement as well as families.
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Again, voting on this policy does NOT mean you agree with every little thing, nor does it compel GOP legislators to authorize all this funding, because they are perfectly capable of figuring out how much spending or priorities they can get away with.