Ohio Senator J.D. Vance, Donald Trump’s nominee for vice president, announced this week at the 2024 Republican National Convention, has described himself as “100% pro-life… There is something sociopathic about a [pro-abortion] political movement that tells young women (and men) that it is liberating to murder their own children.”
Vance, 39, is an author, Republican senator and former U.S. Marine who served in Iraq before attending Yale Law School. He came to prominence in 2016 with his bestselling memoir Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis.
He is also a Catholic convert, being received into the Church in 2019.
Following Vance’s nomination to be Trump’s vice president, mainstream media highlighted his pro-life positions.
“I want to save as many babies as possible,” he told CBS News in May. “And sure, I think it’s totally reasonable to say that late-term abortions should not happen, with reasonable exceptions.”
Vance has previously signalled that he agrees with Trump’s view that abortion laws should be left to individual U.S. states to decide following the reversal of Roe v. Wade, though he’s not against a nationwide law limiting abortion in principle.
“You can have some minimum national standards, which is my view, while also allowing the states to make up their minds”, he said. “This is not about moral legitimacy but political reality… We have to accept that people do not want blanket abortion bans.”
The Susan B. Anthony List National Pro-Life Scorecard, which rates senators’ voting record on abortion, gives Vance a rating of A+.
SPUC Comment
A SPUC spokesperson said: “J.D. Vance represents a party that wants to save as many unborn babies as possible while recognising the political reality in America, where post-Roe state referendums on abortion have resulted in pro-life defeats. The culture has yet to be won in that regard.
“Vance’s anti-abortion voting record speaks for itself, which stands in stark contrast to the pro-abortion Biden administration.
“In the upcoming 2024 U.S. Election, much will be at stake for unborn babies again. The attacks on Vance by mainstream media show how much of a pro-life champion they precieve him to be.”
“If elected, SPUC’s hope is that this potential administration enacts a nationwide abortion ban.”
