Within hours of the Democratic National Convention’s conclusion, former President Trump resumed rambling incoherently on Truth Social—this time putting forth the frankly head-spinning lie that, if elected for a second term, he'll be “great for women and their reproductive rights." As you’ll recall, after he appointed three anti-abortion extremists to the Supreme Court, his first term culminated in the reversal of Roe v. Wade.
Then, over the weekend, Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance told NBC that Trump would veto a national abortion ban that came to his desk: “I think he would. He’s said that explicitly that he would,” Vance said. “To be clear, Donald Trump I think has staked his position and made it very explicit. He wants this to be a state decision. States are going to make this determination themselves.” None of this is true, and all of it is because Trump and Vance know the abortion bans they support—and would enforce if elected—are deeply unpopular.
So it’s important to call complete and utter bullshit on lies like this, which is exactly what Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) did on Sunday. “American women are not stupid, and we are not going to trust the futures of our daughters and granddaughters to two men who have openly bragged about blocking access to abortion for women all across this country,” Warren said on NBC’s Meet the Press. The Massachusetts senator and renowned policy wizard then raised how Trump and Vance wouldn’t need legislation from Congress to effectively ban abortion nationally, thanks to a little something called the Comstock Act.
American women are not stupid—and we are not going to trust the futures of our daughters and granddaughters to Donald Trump and JD Vance, who have openly bragged about blocking access to abortion. pic.twitter.com/rFYAC9iukk
— Elizabeth Warren (@ewarren) August 25, 2024
Citing Project 2025, Warren said, “Just read it. JD Vance actually sent a letter last year to the Department of Justice saying, ‘Enforce the Comstock Act.’ And remember he did that, and then Donald Trump picked him to be his vice president.” Project 2025, written by Vance and Trump’s close advisors and friends at the Heritage Foundation, details a number of ways a Republican president could fully wield the executive branch to ban abortion—including through the Comstock Act. The zombie law from 1873 prohibits the dissemination of “obscene” materials, including any drug or medical supplies that could be used for abortion.
Warren then called on voters to elect Kamala Harris and a Democratic Congress to “restore a right to half the population in this country, and no longer will a woman have to go into an emergency room and be told she’s not near enough to death to get the medical treatment that she needs.” Of course, terrifying as Project 2025 may be, it’s also pretty frustrating that Democrats lack their own version of a Project 2025 to outline how a Democratic president could fully wield the executive branch to make abortion as accessible as possible with or without Congress.
Here’s the reality:
-Trump already backed a national abortion ban the last time he was in office
-He’s privately floated a ban behind closed doors
-His Project 2025 agenda would let him and JD Vance ban abortion WITHOUT Congress https://t.co/qibVszgrd1 pic.twitter.com/GQK2yQgtef
— Alex Floyd (@alexjfloyd) August 24, 2024
We don’t have to wonder how Trump and Vance would govern our reproductive rights because we’ve already seen it. Trump boasts about reversing Roe, and his un-reassuring reassurances that he’d leave abortion to the states are bullshit, too, considering every abortion ban-induced horror story we’ve heard for the last two years is a direct consequence of that position. To Warren’s point, Vance has not only advocated for a total abortion ban to stop people from traveling across state lines for care, and advocated against rape exceptions to bans—he’s signed a letter calling for law enforcement to have unilateral access to traveling abortion patients’ medical records.
Despite the clarity of Trump and Vance’s anti-abortion extremism, their recent insistence that A) they would be “great” for women and our reproductive rights, and B) they would veto an abortion ban, has managed to miff conservatives. Over the weekend, the conservative outlet the National Review accused Trump of “abandoning pro-lifers,” and honestly, LOL. Oh, to be so naive. We’re still months away from Election Day, but at least right now, it seems Trump and Vance may be alienating themselves from the right-wingers they rely on while winning over approximately zero pro-abortion rights voters to their cause. Interesting strategy!
