Anti-abortion activists are optimistic about how Donald Trump’s second presidency will impact abortion policy in the U.S.
“Our country faces the return of the most pro-family, most pro-life American president of our lifetimes,” said Vice President J.D. Vance during his Jan. 24 address to the national March for Life in Washington D.C. “Now, this is the man who delivered on his promise of ending Roe, giving us a monumental, earth-shattering decision in Dobbs, the man who appointed hundreds of pro-life judges dedicated to defending the constitutional liberties of all Americans and the man who supported pro-family policies like doubling the child tax credit — which happened during his first Administration, and which we’re going to do so much more on in the second Administration — now he’s back and we’re going to do it again.”
During the 2024 campaign, Vance told NBC News’ “Meet the Press” that Trump would veto a federal abortion ban. In 2018, during his first term, Trump supported a 20-week abortion ban. During a March 2024 radio interview, Trump seemed to support a 15-week abortion ban.
“The number of weeks now, people are agreeing on 15, and I’m thinking in terms of that, and it’ll come out to something that’s very reasonable,” Trump said in a radio interview with Sid Rosenberg on WABC. “But people are really — even hard-liners are agreeing — seems to be 15 weeks, seems to be a number that people are agreeing at.”
The 2024 Republican platform, the first since 2016, noticeably softened its language on abortion, explicitly opposing abortion later in pregnancy, but supporting access to birth control, and IVF, leaving legislation of abortion up to individual states.
Despite the mixed signals during the campaign, anti-abortion activists are optimistic about the next four years.
“I’m really confident that they’re going to continue to be consistent in that pro-life ethic,” said Nicole Hunt, an analyst and spokesperson for conservative Christian powerhouse Focus on the Family, during an appearance last week on KNUS 710’s Jeff and Bill Show. “I’m excited to see what else they might do to promote life.”
The night before the March for Life, Trump pardoned 23 anti-abortion activists who were sentenced for violating the FACE [Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances] Act. Enacted in 1994, the FACE Act prohibits intentional property damage and the use of “force or threat of force or…physical obstruction” to “injure, intimidate or interfere with” someone entering a health care facility. In 1993, Colorado passed a prohibition on engaging in “oral protest, education or counseling” within 100 feet of the entrance of a health care facility, but a lawsuit filed in June is challenging that law as well.
In 2022, 11 of those pardoned were charged with violating the FACE act for blockading the Carafem Health Center Clinic, in Mount Juliet, Tennessee on March 5, 2021. According to a Justice Department news release, “all 11 defendants violated the FACE Act by using physical obstruction to intimidate and interfere with the clinic’s employees and a patient, because the clinic was providing, and the patient sought reproductive health services. All defendants will have appearances scheduled in U.S. District Court in Nashville at a later date. If convicted of the offenses, the seven conspiracy defendants each face up to a maximum of 11 years in prison, three years of supervised release and fines of up to $350,000. The remaining five defendants face a year in prison, one year of supervised release and a fine of up to $10,000.”
While the majority of FACE Act prosecutions involve anti-abortion protesters, the law has also been used to target activists who have vandalized anti-abortion pregnancy centers following the Dobbs decision. In January, two Florida residents were indicted by a federal grand jury for spray-painting threats on anti-abortion pregnancy centers in the state. According to the indictment, “Caleb Freestone, 27, and Amber Smith-Stewart, 23, engaged in a conspiracy to prevent employees of reproductive health services facilities from providing those services. … As part of the conspiracy, the defendants targeted pregnancy resource facilities and vandalized those facilities with spray-painted threats. … Freestone and Smith-Stewart, and other co-conspirators, are alleged to have spray painted threats, including ‘If abortions aren’t safe than niether [sic] are you,’ ‘YOUR TIME IS UP!!,’ ‘WE’RE COMING for U,’ and ‘We are everywhere,’ on a reproductive health services facility in Winter Haven, Florida.”
In 2023, former U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn joined Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) in introducing legislation to repeal the law. Since taking office, Trump’s Justice Department has issued directives to limit enforcement of the FACE Act to “extraordinary circumstances” or instances when death, extreme bodily harm, or significant property damage result.
Colorado Christian University (CCU), a longtime supporter of the March for Life, sent 42 students to attend last week’s event. While in D.C. they attended a policy briefing about feminism at The Heritage Foundation, visited an open house at the Advancing American Freedom headquarters at the invitation of former Vice President and Mrs. Pence, and attended the National Pro-Life Summit.
CCU freshman Eve Bequillard said in a news release, “The March for Life was an unforgettable once-in-a-lifetime experience. I learned so much more about the pro-life movement, and I am so thankful I can attend a university that supports this cause.”
Vance was direct about his goals for the movement. “I want more babies in the United States of America,” he said. “I want more happy children in our country and I want beautiful young men and women who are eager to welcome them in into the world and eager to raise them and it is the task of our government to make it easier for young moms and dads to afford to have kids to bring them into the world and to welcome them as blessings.”
According to recent reporting from the Houston Chronicle, “At least 100 Texas children aged 17 and younger got abortions in other states during the first year after Texas banned the procedure, including six aged 11 and under, according to the latest state data available. The total is a nearly ninefold jump in the number of children getting out-of-state abortions from five years earlier and comes as virtually all abortions have ground to a halt in Texas under a ban that makes no exception for fetal abnormality, rape, or incest.”
