The Most Supportive Pro-Life President Ever . . .

Crooked Sticks, Straight Blows, and Abortion

The word coming out of the United States--from people who ought to know--is that Donald Trump is the most pro-life US President in a long, long time--perhaps ever since the fight against abortion began. 

One of the reasons we find it difficult to give credence to this assessment is that Trump has not always been a pro-life warrior.  In fact, he had been decidedly unreliable.  Prior to the campaign, he seemed to run with the hares and hunt with the hounds.  But he has turned out much better than many Presidents who have gone before. 

“I don’t think you could find an issue where he has been better,” Dannenfelser [longtime president of the Susan B. Anthony List (SBA List), a highly influential anti-abortion group] says of the pro-life progress under this administration. “We went from the conviction that he sounded unpresidential to the conviction that he’s the best president on the life issue that we’ve had, and when I say that, the test is actions, in terms of following through on promises made.”  [Alexandra Desantris, National Review Online]

Trump began to win over anti-abortion voters during the campaign when he signed off on a list of names of potential US Supreme Court nominee to replace Antonin Scalia.
  The list of potential nominees was drawn up by conservative stalwarts and has been roundly praised.  The significance of this move can be seen subsequently in Trump's nomination and the eventual appointment of Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court.  Trump--ever erratic, ever mercurial--was showing some steel on the matter of abortion. 

But there was also a "X" moment on the campaign when Trump showed some gut convictions on the matter of abortion that resonated with the public.

At the October 19 debate in Las Vegas, Fox News host Chris Wallace asked Clinton to explain her vote as a U.S. senator against a ban on partial-birth abortions, to which Clinton replied that such late-term procedures must remain legal to protect the life and health of mothers. Asked for his view, Trump threw down the gauntlet: “Well, I think it’s terrible,” he said, cutting off the end of Wallace’s follow-up question in his haste. “If you go with what Hillary is saying, in the ninth month, you can take the baby and rip the baby out of the womb of the mother just prior to the birth of the baby.” He enunciated each word with his signature tone of disgust. “Now, you can say that that’s okay, and Hillary can say that that’s okay. But it’s not okay with me, because based on what she’s saying, and based on where she’s going, and where she’s been, you can take the baby and rip the baby out of the womb in the ninth month, on the final day. And that is not acceptable.”

In one electric moment, nearly 72 million viewers heard straight from the Republican nominee’s mouth the reality of late-term abortion procedures and watched the Democratic nominee twice defend it. As polls consistently illustrate, it was Trump and not Clinton who sided with the majority of Americans in his view of that gruesome reality.

Trump's electoral integrity towards the pro-life movement, both on the campaign trail, and in office is also a testament to the growing strength and influence of the pro-life movement in the United States. 

It pleases God to strike straight blows with very crooked sticks from time to time.  Always in such occasions we are reminded that it is God who is the absolute sovereign over all creation.  We are thankful for His mercies, despite our unworthiness.  Such times make us lift our eyes heavenward, in praise and gratitude.