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Wednesday, April 02, 2025

Democrats for Life

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So if pro-life Democrats huddle with top DNC boss, will it anger all those young Nones?

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So if pro-life Democrats huddle with top DNC boss, will it anger all those young Nones?

Does everyone remember that special U.S. House of Representatives election down in suburban Atlanta, the one that Democrats and Republicans poured millions of dollars into as a kind of referendum on President Donald Trump?

The winner, a Catholic conservative named Karen Handel, defeated a young aggressively secular outsider named Jon Ossoff.

That was a pretty big news story, right? And speaking of rather important national news stories, does anyone remember the provocative statement that Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez made a few weeks before that, when he proclaimed:

"Every Democrat, like every American ... should support a woman's right to make her own choices about her body and her health. This is not negotiable and should not change city by city or state by state." In fact, he added, "every candidate who runs as a Democrat" should affirm abortion rights.

So this week's Crossroads podcast (click here to tune that in) started with those two stories and attempted to connect the dots, building off my recent post that ran with this headline: "Who is Karen Handel, winner of that big Georgia race? Surprise! Press ignored a key angle."

The basic question: Would Handel, in a House district that Trump barely won, have been able to win if Democrats had been willing to run a candidate who was an old-fashioned, pro-life, culturally conservative, "Blue Dog" Democrat?

Ah, but would such a candidate be acceptable to the current DNC leadership in the age of Sen. Bernie Sanders and millions and millions of edgy, young, idealistic Democrats – many of whom, according to researchers, would surely fall under the "Nones" umbrella? You remember the "Nones," as in the rising tide of religiously unaffiliated Americans? That's a big story, too.

So we have a big story linked to another big story linked to yet another big story. So one would assume that a Washington, D.C. meeting between the leaders of the group Democrats for Life with the aforementioned Perez, primarily to discuss the party's willingness to run pro-life candidates in House districts in places like Georgia, would attract quite a bit of news attention.


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Who is Karen Handel, winner of that big Georgia race? Surprise! Press ignored a key angle

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When you consider the oceans of ink poured out in coverage of a certain U.S. House of Representatives race down in Georgia, it's interesting how little attention was devoted to a powerful component in the life of winner Karen Handel.

Want to guess what was missing in the mainstream coverage? Hang on, because we will get to that (sssssshhhhhh, she's a Roman Catholic) shortly.

But first, I want to flashback a few weeks to a related controversy. You might recall that Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez made news when he proclaimed that:

"Every Democrat, like every American," he said, "should support a woman's right to make her own choices about her body and her health. This is not negotiable and should not change city by city or state by state." In fact, he added, "every candidate who runs as a Democrat" should affirm abortion rights.

As you would imagine, Kristen Day was not amused. She serves as executive director for the Democrats for Life of America network. Neither were Catholics from all over the political and theological spectrum – from Cardinal Timothy Dolan to Father James "Colbert Report chaplain" Martin. Day noted:

"Tom Perez needs to know that what he is saying isn't what lots of Democrats are thinking. It's not what Democrats are thinking in places like Nebraska – places between the coasts where Democrats are trying to find candidates who are the right fit for their congressional districts or people to run for governor who fit their states."

Wait, she had more to say:

"The Democratic Party is pretty weak in large parts of America," said Day. "Can we really afford to push people away right now? I'm not sure that New York City and West Coast values are going to work with lots of voters in the heartland and down South."

Maybe this issue is relevant to the Georgia race? To be blunt, would Handel have had a tougher time winning if her opponent was a married, pro-life Democrat (or one interested in centrist compromises on that issue) from her district who could answer a question or two about his religious convictions in non-Nones language?

So, how much attention did mainstream news outlets devote to Handel's faith and moral convictions? The answer, of course, is zero, zip, nada, nul, niches, niente.


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Why is The Atlantic surprised that early pro-lifers were, uh, liberals?

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It always amuses me when a large magazine discovers something about the religious world or culture wars issues that many of us have known about for decades.

Recently, the Atlantic made the surprise discovery that the pro-life movement had some liberal founders. The piece, by Emma Green, is actually a book review of “Defenders of the Unborn,” by University of West Georgia professor Daniel Williams. You may remember Williams from his 2012 book “God’s Own Party: The Making of the Christian Right.” This time around, he’s come out with a tome reminding people that it was the left that first opposed abortion.

The Atlantic's treatment has considerable less snark than a similar New York Times review last month that assumed readers were liberals who can't imagine how someone reasonable could oppose abortion. But it does have some gaps. It starts thus:

Ronald Reagan. Barry Goldwater. George Wallace. These men probably won’t be featured on pro-choice pamphlets any time soon, but during at least some point in their political careers, the Moral Majority-era president, conservative stalwart, and infamous segregationist all favored the legalization of abortion. In the four decades since the Supreme Court decided Roe vs. Wade, the political debate over abortion in America has become stale and polarized, with two sides utterly divided and little change in public opinion. But in the years leading up to Roe, many people’s views on abortion didn’t fit neatly into either liberal or conservative ideology. In fact, early anti-abortion activists viewed their cause as a struggle for civil and human rights, of a piece with social programs like the New Deal and the Great Society.
In a new book, "Defenders of the Unborn," the historian Daniel K. Williams looks at the first years of the self-described pro-life movement in the United States, focusing on the long-overlooked era before Roe. It’s somewhat surprising that the academy hasn’t produced such a history before now, although Williams says that’s partially because certain archives have only recently opened. But the gap in scholarship is also partly due to the difficulty of putting abortion into a single intellectual framework.


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News? Handful of Democrats float a pro-woman plan to defund Planned Parenthood

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News? Handful of Democrats float a pro-woman plan to defund Planned Parenthood

So, in terms of politics (as opposed to undercover videos), was there anything really new in the U.S. Senate debates over funding for Planned Parenthood and the mainstream media coverage thereof? What else can bored journalists (meaning those that have elected to ignore dozens of issues linked to quotations in those undercover videos) look forward to covering in other Hill debates on this topic?

Well, there was one small – critics would say "tiny" – wrinkle that might prove interesting, in the event of a close vote in the future.

As always, Republicans who are willing to take this dangerous political step will need to find a few allies on the other side of the aisle. Yes, honest. They need to talk to at least a few Democrats.

Thus, I found it interesting that Baptist Press – yes, a conservative wire service – ended up paying attention to some proposals by Democrats for Life. (Confession: Yes, I am a pro-life Democrat and have a donor's bumper sticker in my office.)

We live in a day and age in which the number of pro-life Democrats is so small that the mainstream press considers the actions of this group "conservative," even when its proposals are in some way economically progressive. Thus, Democrats for Life draws little or no mainstream ink, but is covered by the alternative conservative press (surf this Google file, if you wish).

So what did Baptist Press report as the key element of this proposal?


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