Trump dodges on abortion as SCOTUS cases highlighting anti-abortion extremism approach

The floated 16-week federal abortion ban would be extreme. It also wouldn't be the end. Two upcoming SCOTUS cases prove anti-abortion groups won't stop.

Donald Trump doesn’t want to talk about the current abortion battles that he indirectly has caused and doesn’t want to answer the question of what now.

Unfortunately for him, the next months — including at the Supreme Court — are going to make that continually difficult. Fortunate for him, the media, thus far, is largely letting him get away with it.

Trump wants credit for overturning Roe v. Wade — but doesn’t want to be blamed for the pain it has caused for women and other pregnant people or for the electoral difficulties it continues to cause the Republican Party. And now, of course, he also wants to be president again.

All of that led to The New York Times Feb. 16 story reporting that Trump privately has “expressed support” for a 16-week national abortion ban, with exceptions for rape, incest, or the life of the mother (exceptions that have proven amorphous if not illusory) … in part because the number is pretty:

That story then led to this sort of write-around when the campaign was unable to answer one of the key questions voters have continually posed since June 2022:

This is an incredible state of affairs — and shows that the Republican Party still hasn’t figured out what to do. They remain the dog that caught the car.

The man who put in place the justices who ended the right to an abortion and wants the presidency again refuses to tell the country what should happen now.

The reason why is, in its way, obvious. The Republican Party is either directly supportive of dangerous extremism on abortion policy — or held hostage by those who are. Voters, time and time again, have expressed how wrong they think the Supreme Court was in June 2022 — let alone how wrong they think additional restrictions are passed in some Republican-led states.

First, let’s be clear: A national 16-week national ban would be extreme — further restricting abortion rights beyond what is currently allowed in approximately 30 states, according to a review of the Guttmacher Institute’s data, in addition to nationalizing a ceiling for potential efforts to lessen current restrictions in the other 20 states.

And yet, many stories responding to the 16-week proposal frame this in a way that ignores where this is coming from — and ignores how voters have described the stakes or their views.

Using phrases, as Politico does, like “less draconian” to describe the 16-week national abortion ban, these stories are doing exactly what anti-abortion groups like the Susan B. Anthony List want: to create an imaginary — and false — middle-ground position that does not exist and just will it into existence by mere repetition. Here’s NBC News:

Of course extremists would not be happy with a 16-week ban, regardless of the lines they’re spouting now. Look for just one minute at the SBA List’s mission and history before printing their press statements (which multiple outlets did). This isn’t some deep-dive Law Dork investigation; it’s right there:

Voters — in progressive, moderate, and even some conservative states — have made clear their standards: Roe or more protective of the right to an abortion. Obviously, that’s a nonstarter for SBA List other similarly aligned groups. But, as anti-abortion groups have proven, they are in this for the long haul. They need to find a way back into winning. So, for now, some are willing to back a 15-week or, because Trump likes even numbers, 16-week ban to get back into the “what’s possible” argument.

And they want to use reporters to do it.

But that is not their goal.

Responsible reporting on this addresses how extreme the “16-week” national ban proposal is, how far it diverges from public opinion, and how disingenuous anti-abortion backers are being when they claim to support it.

This is an important check-in right now because abortion is going to stay front and center in the news in the coming months — and not just because it remains a pivotal issue. The Supreme Court has oral arguments set in abortion cases in both March and April that highlight anti-abortion extremists’ goals.

Oral arguments over the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s efforts in recent years to ease access to mifepristone, one of the two drugs used in medication abortions, are set for March 26. Both the Biden administration and Danco Laboratories, the maker of Mifeprex, appealed a ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit that would reject that eased access in a challenge brought by the anti-abortion Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine. Notably, the Supreme Court did not accept the request from that group — represented by the far-right Christian legal advocacy group Alliance Defending Freedom — to hear their arguments over the initial 2000 approval of the drug. (Even the Fifth Circuit rejected that argument as untimely.)

Then, the next month, the Supreme Court will hear arguments on April 24 in the dispute between Idaho and the Biden administration over the state’s near-total abortion ban and the federal government’s argument that a federal law protecting emergency room care (the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act, or EMTALA) includes protections for abortion-related care in limited instances. The fact that Idaho is fighting even this minimal set of abortion protections — and, as Law Dork has reported, is getting help “without charge” from ADF — is yet another example of how far right anti-abortion groups and officeholders want the law to go. (Texas, unsurprisingly, is also fighting the Biden administration’s efforts on this front in a case not before the justices.)

I’ve been covering both of those cases in depth here at Law Dork, and will continue to do so in the coming months. For now, though, they are important context for this moment and for others’ coverage of the political landscape in the coming months.

Abortion, restrictions, and the fallout from the June 2022 end of Roe v. Wade are going to continue to be in the news. Efforts by those who would end abortion altogether to pretend that a 16-week national ban is moderate or that they would stop there are not telling the truth on either front. These cases — and the groups’ own statements — show that. Coverage of these issues must properly detail the full story.