It's time for the pro-life movement to scare the GOP straight
It might be the only way to get the party to stop bowing to its moderate professional class


It's a grand tradition. Every year, on the anniversary of Roe v. Wade, enormous numbers of people march on Washington, D.C., to protect the dignity of every human life. Every year, the media fails to cover it appropriately.
This year, there was supposed to be an additional symbolic event: Since the Republican Party controls both houses of Congress, it was as good a time as any to pass a bill banning abortion after 20 weeks — when babies can feel every single moment of being torn apart limb from limb in their mother's womb. The bill also included a rape-reporting requirement, which isn't surprising given that Planned Parenthood has been implicated in failing to report sexual assault in the past.
This isn't an extreme right-wing position. It's a political no-brainer. After all, banning late-term abortion is enormously popular.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
And yet, proving its talent for incompetent improvisation once again, the House GOP fumbled this incredibly easy ball. The bill died.
This is a wake-up call for the pro-life movement — if the GOP cannot support our cause when it is a political no-brainer, what will it do when the going gets tough?
The left tends to view the pro-life movement as a force so scary and powerful that it essentially controls the Republican Party. But the fact of the matter is that, in this tense relationship, it's not clear who controls who. As Eric Erickson writes, for many pro-lifers — and I am very much among them — being part of the pro-life movement feels like being the GOP's "whores." It's simple political logic: If a group votes overwhelmingly for one party, then that group gets ignored; the group that the party cares most about is swing voters, not groups that have no choice but to vote for it.
While the GOP's rank and file and many of its elected officials are committed pro-lifers, the party's very important professional operative class, and a disproportionate number of its big-money donors, are in favor of legal abortions. Against all political logic, the GOP's professional operatives constantly seek to marginalize the pro-life movement and this plank of the Republican Party.
But, as Erickson points out, there is one way for pro-life activists to reassert our influence within the GOP: primaries. At the end of the day, most politicians understand only the stick and the carrot. If the carrot will not do, there must be a stick. Pro-lifers cannot become bipartisan — the Democratic Party is too unremittingly hostile to the cause.
That leaves the next-best option. Within the GOP, the pro-life movement is respected, but it is not feared. It brings in money and votes and moral gravitas. But, as the Tea Party has shown, only when it collects a few scalps will it start to be feared.
The time has come for fear. And that means the pro-life movement using the primary process to remove from office any Republican who fails to support our cause.
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry is a writer and fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. His writing has appeared at Forbes, The Atlantic, First Things, Commentary Magazine, The Daily Beast, The Federalist, Quartz, and other places. He lives in Paris with his beloved wife and daughter.
-
Law firms: Caving to White House pressure
Feature Trump targets major law firms tied to his past investigations
By The Week US Published
-
Venezuelan deportees: Locked up for tattoos?
Feature A former pro soccer player was deported after U.S. authorities claimed his tattoo proved he belonged to a Venezuelan gang
By The Week US Published
-
Saving the post office
Feature The U.S. Postal Service is facing mounting losses and growing calls for privatization. Can it survive?
By The Week US Published
-
The JFK files: the truth at last?
In The Spotlight More than 64,000 previously classified documents relating the 1963 assassination of John F. Kennedy have been released by the Trump administration
By The Week Staff Published
-
'Seriously, not literally': how should the world take Donald Trump?
Today's big question White House rhetoric and reality look likely to become increasingly blurred
By Sorcha Bradley, The Week UK Published
-
Will Trump's 'madman' strategy pay off?
Today's Big Question Incoming US president likes to seem unpredictable but, this time round, world leaders could be wise to his playbook
By Sorcha Bradley, The Week UK Published
-
Democrats vs. Republicans: who are the billionaires backing?
The Explainer Younger tech titans join 'boys' club throwing money and support' behind President Trump, while older plutocrats quietly rebuke new administration
By Harriet Marsden, The Week UK Published
-
US election: where things stand with one week to go
The Explainer Harris' lead in the polls has been narrowing in Trump's favour, but her campaign remains 'cautiously optimistic'
By Harriet Marsden, The Week UK Published
-
Is Trump okay?
Today's Big Question Former president's mental fitness and alleged cognitive decline firmly back in the spotlight after 'bizarre' town hall event
By Harriet Marsden, The Week UK Published
-
The life and times of Kamala Harris
The Explainer The vice-president is narrowly leading the race to become the next US president. How did she get to where she is now?
By The Week UK Published
-
Will 'weirdly civil' VP debate move dial in US election?
Today's Big Question 'Diametrically opposed' candidates showed 'a lot of commonality' on some issues, but offered competing visions for America's future and democracy
By Harriet Marsden, The Week UK Published