The pro-life movement, a coalition of religious groups, advocacy organizations, and citizens who believe that human life is inherently valuable and deserving of legal protection, once struck fear into the hearts of Republican politicians. Its capacity to raise significant funds quickly, identify and activate single-issue voters, and swing elections afforded the unborn a voice within the GOP coalition that could not be ignored.
Yet, the movement that later terrorized Republican consultants began more than half a century ago as little more than a sideshow. Before Roe v. Wade in 1973, neither party viewed abortion as a major problem. Republican and Democratic voters showed similar levels of support for abortion. The Catholic Church opposed it, but the Southern Baptist Convention, the largest evangelical denomination, largely supported it. Many Republicans, including first lady Betty Ford, applauded the Roe decision, while some Democrats, including newly elected Sen. Joe Biden, opposed it.
But conservatives soon mobilized around abortion. Evangelicals claimed it as a central issue, correctly framing it as part of a broader threat to the family. In 1980, the Southern Baptist Convention passed a resolution opposing abortion. The movement found a champion in President Ronald Reagan, who endorsed a constitutional amendment to ban abortion, and then in President George H.W. Bush, who vetoed legislation that would have allowed Medicaid funding for abortions and restored the Mexico City Policy, which prevents U.S. taxpayer funds from going to international organizations that perform or promote abortion.
By the turn of the century, the voice of the unborn wielded such authority within GOP politics that ignoring it became unthinkable for Republicans seeking office.
Its clout was on full display in the 2004 Pennsylvania Senate primary. Four-term Republican Sen. Arlen Specter, a staunch defender of Roe, nearly fell to upstart primary challenger Pat Toomey, whose campaign was turbo-charged by the mobilizing prowess of the pro-life movement. Though Specter survived by a razor-thin margin of 17,000 votes, pro-life pressure eventually forced him to switch parties, paving the way for Toomey to eventually win the seat in 2010.
In 2016, the voice of the unborn appeared to gain a powerful ally in presidential candidate Donald Trump. Though a longtime pro-abortion Democrat, the brash New Yorker and 2016 hopeful released a list of 11 possible Supreme Court nominees, curated with input from conservative groups, such as the Federalist Society and Heritage Foundation, all of which were perceived to align with pro-life principles. He clarified his intent to appoint pro-life justices during a primary debate, saying, “I am very, very proud to say that I am pro-life.” And upon securing the nomination, he gave a speech to evangelicals, promising that his justices would “protect the sanctity of life.”
True to his word, Trump appointed three Supreme Court justices, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett, who are widely regarded as favorable to the pro-life cause. And throughout his first term in office, Trump reiterated his desire to sign a 20-week national abortion ban into law if Roe were to fall.
And then, two years after being voted out of office, the Dobbs decision restored the ability of states to protect unborn life by enacting laws that restrict or ban abortion. The pro-life movement rejoiced, having achieved what was once considered a long shot and a dream. And it hailed Trump as a hero for hearing the voice of the unborn, and Trump reveled in the praise.
“This is the biggest WIN FOR LIFE in a generation,” he wrote in a statement following the decision. “These were only made possible because I delivered everything as promised.”
Trump reminded pro-lifers of his achievement at every turn, and key pro-life groups continued to heap praise on the former president, with many referring to him as “the most pro-life president in history.”
But as 2024 approached, and as one state after the next voted to enshrine abortion rights in their state constitutions, Trump’s commitment to the voice of the unborn wavered.
Behind-the-scenes infighting over abortion marked the run-up to the GOP convention that would nominate Trump for a third time. Pro-life lost out, as Trump oversaw the removal of key provisions from the Republican National Committee platform. These included references to the “sanctity of human life” as a fundamental right that “cannot be infringed,” the commitment to a national 20-week abortion ban, and a call for a constitutional amendment to grant personhood protections for the unborn. Worse, the new platform explicitly supported contraception and in vitro fertilization, a practice largely opposed by pro-life voters because it results in the destruction or indefinite freezing of embryos.
Yet, this open retreat provoked almost no public pushback from the movement’s leading organizations. Major groups, such as SBA Pro-Life America, National Right to Life, and the Family Research Council, continued to shower Trump with glowing endorsements and record fundraising appeals that still hailed him as “the most pro-life president in history.”
For these organizations, opposing Trump carried a significant risk. Trump had become more than a popular Republican figure. He had become a once-in-a-generation movement leader. Publicly criticizing Trump meant being frozen out of his orbit and losing what leverage they had to influence policy. And crossing MAGA was a risky proposition for the individuals in these organizations: Access to power provides career stability and advancement opportunities for anyone in the policy advocacy world.
But as 2024 unfolded, it became clear that Trump’s days crusading for the unborn were over. Early that year, he openly regarded the pro-life position as politically untenable, stressing on the stump and at town halls that “you have to win elections.”
But he didn’t stop at the political facts of life. By late summer, Trump had adopted several explicitly pro-abortion talking points and positions, vowing on social media that he would “be Great for Women and their Reproductive Rights” and promising to make IVF free, even boasting of being “the father of IVF.”
Trump’s running mate, then-Republican Ohio Sen. JD Vance, once considered a solidly pro-life Republican, adopted Trump’s anti-life stance. During an appearance on NBC’s Meet the Press months before the election, he promised that a future Trump-Vance administration would keep mail-order abortion pill mifepristone accessible, effectively nullifying Dobbs by allowing abortion drugs to be shipped from blue states.
Host Kristen Welker asked Vance, “Just to be clear, you support mifepristone being accessible?”
Vance responded, “Yes, Kristen, I do.”
In October, Trump dropped any pretense of standing up for the unborn, posting on X in all caps, “EVERYONE KNOWS I WOULD NOT SUPPORT A FEDERAL ABORTION BAN, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, AND WOULD, IN FACT, VETO IT.”
Despite all this, adulation from pro-life groups only intensified. Following his reelection, CatholicVote, a pro-life Catholic group that vigorously advocated the Trump campaign during the election, effectively lionized Trump and Vance as champions of pro-life priorities in the wake of their victory, posting on X things like “The Golden Age is upon us,” featuring pictures of Trump gazing heroically into the distance.
The group’s president, Brian Burch, was appointed U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See. The announcement featured a quote from Trump saying of Burch, “he represented me well during the last Election.”
National Right to Life, a pro-life advocacy organization, released a statement congratulating “pro-life President-elect Donald Trump and Vice President-elect J.D. Vance” on their victory, while Students for Life of America posted on X, “Donald Trump has been re-elected as President of the United States! LIFE WINS!”
During the first year of Trump’s second term, the cause of life has not won, to put it mildly. True to his and Vance’s word during the campaign, the administration has continued Biden-era efforts to defend mifepristone in ongoing court challenges, primarily through procedural arguments. The FDA also approved a generic version of mifepristone before completing its own safety review of the drug, despite possessing the tools to pause the process.
Clinicians in California, New York, and other abortion-rights states continue shipping abortion drugs across state lines — telehealth abortion provider Aid Access reports that 84% of its 118,000 prescriptions went to states with abortion bans. Despite Roe’s fall, overall abortions in America continue to rise because of access to this drug, which accounts for two-thirds of total abortions in America.
The Trump administration also kept its word on promoting access to IVF more than any prior administration. In October, Trump detailed his IVF policy by announcing initiatives to lower the price of IVF by lowering the cost of key drugs and creating a new optional employer fertility insurance benefit. Many in the pro-life movement, including Ryan Anderson of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, took solace in the fact that Trump’s IVF policy would not include government subsidies.
The key victory for the pro-life movement during Trump’s second term so far involved the defunding of abortion giant for one year through the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Pro-life activists had been pushing for a permanent defunding and hoping for at least a 10-year ban. Today, loopholes created through the Affordable Care Act continue to allow taxpayer money to go to Planned Parenthood.
Looking forward, the pro-life movement has a choice between two roads. The first is to recognize its severely diminished political clout within the GOP, without which it has no hope of affecting abortion policy on the state or federal levels, and abandon the political realm altogether. On this path, the movement would reallocate its resources away from lobbying and toward winning hearts and minds. This would involve elevating inspiring stories of young mothers choosing life, disseminating science on fetal development, and performing large-scale works of charity for poor pregnant women. Many in the pro-life movement already do this heroic work of making abortion morally unthinkable; focusing exclusively on these efforts could conceivably cut into abortion’s stubbornly high national approval ratings.
THREAT TO DONOR PRIVACY UNITES RIGHT AND LEFT AT SUPREME COURT
The second road would be to throw what remains of its political weight behind real champions of life in upcoming primaries at the state and national levels. Trump’s exit from the national stage will afford the movement a chance to reset and reassert its authority with a new crop of politicians. Pro-life leaders will have a tough call to make on Vance, who is adept at wooing the movement through passionate rhetoric and appearances at pro-life events such as the March for Life — he will be sure to use the trappings of his office toward this end. But he must be made to offer tangible commitments beyond the illusion of access to power in exchange for loyalty.
Indeed, the last thing the movement can afford to do is to continue pretending it has powerful friends when it doesn’t. The pro-life movement can’t expect to influence, let alone intimidate, a politician it has already declared king. Only the voice of the unborn has the moral authority to make leaders of conscience think twice. It’s the movement’s sole job to amplify that voice — always, no matter the cost. Until it does, the pro-life movement can expect to remain in the political wilderness.