Is Voting for Kamala Worth Babies’ Lives?

Written by Ecce Verum

A Newsweek article from August chronicles the many Republicans who have openly pledged their support for Kamala Harris.

Their list includes former Vice President Dick Cheney, former U.S. Representatives Liz Cheney (Wyoming), Adam Kinzinger (Illinois), former Trump White House official Stephanie Grisham, and a group of over 200 staffers for previous presidential Republican candidates.

Enough Republicans are feeling likewise that Newsweek reports a program started by the Harris campaign—”Republicans for Harris”—which is intentionally catering to Republicans who are rejecting Trump.

When Harris herself was asked about the endorsement by the Cheneys, Harris struck a theme that probably many of these people sympathize with:

“A lot of what I think is happening . . is that people are exhausted about the division and the attempts to kind of divide us as Americans.”

I can see where these people are coming from.

This criticism against Trump is deeper than a “typical” attack over policy differences. It’s one thing when you think a candidate has a bad plan for the environment, it’s another thing altogether when you think a candidate will undermine the political fabric that even allows us to debate the environment and all other political issues as well. 

If you believe that a candidate poses an actual threat to democracy, it’s going to be very hard to vote for that candidate, no matter how much you disagree with his opponent on everything else. The Democrats are playing into this theme quite well: As Bernie Sanders put it,

“Cheney and I agree on nothing, no issues. But what we do believe in is that the United States should retain its democratic foundations.”

The question of whether Donald Trump will indeed undermine democracy is a question for another time.

In this article, however, I hope to discuss a question that enters my mind when I hear these prominent Republicans switching their support to Harris. How can all these Republicans swallow the issue of preborn life?

If there’s any issue that rivals “threatening our democracy,” wouldn’t it be the issue of “killing innocent people?”

On this front, the candidates’ respective position statements quickly reveal a stark contrast. On her campaign website, Harris announces that she

“will never allow a national abortion ban to become law. And when Congress passes a bill to restore reproductive freedom nationwide, she will sign it.”

What does “restore reproductive freedom” mean if not “take us back to where we were before Dobbs?” Harris has already announced (back in July) that

“We need to put into law the protections of Roe v. Wade.”

Recall that under Roe, there was no substantial obstacle to obtaining an abortion at any point in pregnancy (as long as a mother could claim it affected a very broad definition of “health”).

Now, let’s turn to Trump.

Just to be clear, I don’t believe Trump is pro-life—not after he announced he would not block the abortion pill (which comprised two-thirds of last year’s abortions). But Trump is at least not pro-abortion in the sense that Harris is. Look at the Republican party platform (which is what Trump appears to be using on his website for a position statement):

“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).”

Instead of pledging to sign a bill to restore abortion access nationally, Trump is pledging to let states regulate it.

As much as I’m troubled by this weak stance against abortion, it’s obvious that more preborn life will be protected under Trump than under Harris.

If I can’t save both the California and the Idaho babies, at least I’ll save the Idaho babies. The only thing worse than permitting some abortions is permitting all abortions.

So how do so many Republicans swallow the life issue in their choice for Kamala, when it’s obvious that more babies will die under Kamala (if she gets her way) than under Trump?

While I can’t speak for people’s personal motives, I think it may be that life is just not as important to the Republican party as it used to be. I sigh longingly when I read the Republican party platform from just eight years ago, when Trump ran the first time:

“Accordingly, we assert the sanctity of human life and affirm that the unborn child has a fundamental right to life which cannot be infringed. We support a human life amendment to the Constitution and legislation to make clear that the Fourteenth Amendment’s protections apply to children before birth.”

Just eight years ago, the party explicitly supported a human life amendment to the Constitution. Now, they merely claim that states are “free to pass laws” if they choose.

Tragically, at this point, the Republican party is also pro-choice. It’s just pro-states’-choice instead of pro-mothers’-choice. If the party really believed that the unborn were full human persons, they would advocate for a binding law that wouldn’t relegate it to anyone’s choice!

This leads me to the conclusion that the party doesn’t really believe that the preborn are full human persons.

The party’s attempt to be pro-life-but-not-really-pro-life cannot even stand on its own two feet. In the very next sentence in the 2024 platform, after boasting that they gave power back to a “vote of the people,” they make sure to “oppose late term abortion.”

If abortion is so discretionary, then why does the party still have opinions about it? If abortion is such a discretionary issue that the states are merely “free to pass laws” about it, then why do you still actively oppose late term abortion? (Are late term babies more valuable for some reason?)

And the party’s support of birth control (which often has an abortifacient dimension), and IVF (in which a huge number of embryos never reach fullness of life) demonstrate that the party doesn’t really believe that life and human worth begin at conception.

The party has pulled one of the most confusing moves ever. We won a huge battle against abortion, and then suddenly became pro-choice.

Trump’s rallying cry is the awfully pathetic “Look at me, I made it a state issue.” You see, the party explicitly stated that the unborn child has a “fundamental right to life” when the U.S. Supreme Court said we couldn’t do anything about it. And then, finally, when the U.S. Supreme Court said we could do something about it, the party says the states are “free” to protect babies (if they want).

We won a battle, and now we’re sitting back watching the enemy dig in deeper. What’s worse, some Republicans are now supporting those who have an explicit agenda to reverse that battle.

And I wonder if it’s at least partly because we forgot how important that battle really was. 

Ultimately, my point is this—abortion cannot fall out of circulation as a core rallying cry for the Republican party. If Republicans really, truly believed that abortion is a non-negotiable, then it would be a lot harder to swallow the issue and go support Harris.

So, if you’re thinking about supporting Harris this election, please ask yourself whether more babies would die under Harris or Trump. And if that’s the first time you’ve asked yourself that question, please ask yourself a deeper one:

Is your stance on abortion going the way of the Republican party platform?