Abort Last Week: Gov. Newsom Actually Promoting Abortion

People can believe that abortion is morally wrong and should be banned.

People can believe abortion should be readily available and offered at no cost by the government.

People can believe abortion should be safe, legal, and rare.

People can believe it should only be allowed under specific circumstances, such as in a case of rape, incest, or when the live of the mother is in danger.

People can believe a whole number of different things, take a whole number of different positions on the abortion issue.

But the government actually promoting abortion? Like elective third-trimester abortions, very very few people believe that should occur.

But it seems those who believe it should occur – that the government should promote abortion – all work for the state of California.

In the past week, Gov. Gavin Newsom has – for puerile political reasons – super-charged his quest to be the American politician most in favor of abortion and he wants the world – and Democratic voters – to know.

Last week, Newsom went on Jen Psaki’s MSNBC show and stated categorically that, if president, Donald Trump will sign a national abortion ban.

He even added one of his more irritating verbal tics:  “Period. Full stop.” when he made the claim.

Of course, Psaki did not challenge Newsom on the issue.  

But the claim that Trump would ban abortion nationally is a lie. Period. Full stop.

Trump is one of many politicians that has hemmed and hawed on the issue. In other words, he is not morally outraged by the procedure and, therefore, would never do something so politically unpopular.  Right now, Trump says essentially to follow the Supreme Court and let states decide on their own, a position that many in the pro-life movement took prior to the Dobbs ruling overturning Roe v. Wade.

Newsom even tried to blame an Arizona law passed in 1864 banning abortion on Trump.  Maybe Joe Biden was alive in 1864, but Donald Trump was not and watching Newsom and the media twist that law by bending time and space into an “evil Trump” trope is truly fascinating to watch.

Also last week, Newsom introduced an emergency bill that would allow Arizona doctors to come to California with their patients to perform abortions legally.

“Arizona Republicans continue to put women in danger—embracing a draconian law passed when Arizona was a territory, not even a state,” said Newsom at a press event Wednesday. “California will not sit idly by. We’re urgently moving legislation to allow Arizona doctors to provide safe and reliable reproductive care to Arizonans here in California.”  

It is true that an initial attempt to overturn the ban – it had been upheld by the state supreme court – failed in the Arizona legislature. However, it is also true that the issue will be back and passing a bill that would modify the ban stands a better chance of passage now than previously.

Newsom and his allies have left that part out of their constant drumbeat against Trump and Republicans in general – that’s because this is one of the very very few issues on which Democrats out-poll Republicans.

Of course, they do that in large part because they utterly lie about the typical national Republican’s position – far more support some kind of access than support a ban – on the issue, but that is par for the Newsom course.

Also par for the Newsom course is absurd grandstanding. In 2022 – the last year figures were available for about 30 Arizonans each day got an abortion, with about 200 others giving birth.

But Newsom knows that making sweeping claims and gestures about a “problem” that would impact very very few people will keep him in the news as a defender of “reproductive rights” and top of mind for Democrat voters and officials if and when Biden is either dropped from or merely wanders away from the presidential ticket.

Hence this utterly stunning ad he is pushing out:

Abortion, for Newsom, does not appear to be an ethical or moral issue, a nearly intractable discussion about rights, the beginning of life, the meaning of life, and what role – if any – the state should play in the matter.

It is a purely political stance meant to woo single-issue voters, create – even if subconsciously – a fear of all Republicans, and to secure him his spot in the progressive pantheon.

And no matter your position on the issue, pursuing it for inherently base political ends is despicable.