Democrats are struggling to unify this week, with battles raging over the party platform, superdelegates, Clinton’s selection of Tim Kaine as her running mate and leaked emails showing that the Democratic National Committee tried to undermine Bernie Sanders’ campaign.
But one thing Democrats aren’t fighting over is abortion: They’re making their national convention a celebration of the destruction of unborn life.
On Tuesday night, sitting next to Bill Clinton in the gallery was Cecile Richards, the president of Planned Parenthood, America’s largest abortion business. Planned Parenthood performs approximately 325,000 abortions a year, or approximately one every minute and a half.
Richards will speak Tuesday night. Wednesday evening, Stephanie Schriock, president of EMILY’s List, America’s largest political action committee to elect pro-choice Democratic women, and Ilyse Hogue, head of NARAL Pro-Choice America, will deliver prime-time speeches.
Needless to say, there won’t be any pro-life Democrats speaking. It’s been at least a generation since a pro-lifer was allowed to speak about their views at the DNC. Famously, in 1992, Pennsylvania Gov. Robert P. Casey was refused a speaking slot at the DNC because he was pro-life.
The prevalence of abortion rights leaders at the DNC stands in stark contrast to the paucity of pro-lifers, and pro-life talk, at the Republican convention. Republican nominee Donald Trump’s speech, which ran an hour and 15 minutes, didn’t mention the pro-life cause at all.
RNC Chairman Reince Preibus, vice presidential nominee Mike Pence and Liberty University President Jerry Falwell all made passing references to “pro-life justices to the Supreme Court,” or the “sanctity of life,” but otherwise, nothing.
There is a lot of room for the GOP to talk about abortion, as a new Marist poll finds that 78 percent of the public would like to limit abortions to the first trimester and nearly two thirds oppose taxpayer funding of abortion. Democrats, of course, support abortion through all nine months of pregnancy and just wrote into their platform a call for the repeal of the Hyde Amendment, which prohibits the use of taxpayer funds for most abortions.
Daniel Allott is deputy commentary editor for the Washington Examiner
