The Effect of Trumpism on the Christian Church

[bigbird 60,564]

3 minutes ago, aubiefifty said:

my thoughts agree a hundred percent with your thought on this. and people are crazy if they think trump would not turn dictator if given the chance. and i think jan 6 has emboldened trump. i certainly hope i am very wrong.

I reworded my post as it may have been too ambiguous. 

[Grumps 3,704]

10 hours ago, 1716AU said:

Evangelicalism has always been Facist. It has no true concept of the Gospel of Jesus, and it values violence and power above Love. You just have to visit one church on July 4 Sunday and you see who their true god is.  And it isn't the Abba of Jesus.

It has always been this way and has not changed. It's what happens when you think God looks like Zeus or Moloch rather than Jesus.

I agree with you except that I think that your definition of Evangelicalism may be too broad.

[jj3jordan 2,055]

8 hours ago, aubiefifty said:

my thoughts agree a hundred percent with your thought on this. and people are crazy if they think trump would not turn dictator if given the chance. and i think jan 6 has emboldened trump. i certainly hope i am very wrong.

You are crazy if you think Trump would turn dictator.  BSC.  He would never mandate an experimental vaccine with emergency approval to all government workers and companies who have any government contracts or they will be fired. That is dictatorship. 

[jj3jordan 2,055]

13 hours ago, 1716AU said:

Evangelicalism has always been Facist. It has no true concept of the Gospel of Jesus, and it values violence and power above Love. You just have to visit one church on July 4 Sunday and you see who their true god is.  And it isn't the Abba of Jesus.

It has always been this way and has not changed. It's what happens when you think God looks like Zeus or Moloch rather than Jesus.

You clearly have no idea of the meaning of evangelicalism or fascism. 

[Farmer Brown 2,391]

On 10/29/2021 at 7:09 PM, SaltyTiger said:

Jesus was extremely critical of “the church”.

I hate to tell you, but there was no "church", in Jesus' time....

Matthew 16:18  And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
 

"I will build my church", is plainly a reference to a future work. Now if you had said, "religion", you would have been correct. 

 

[Farmer Brown 2,391]

On 11/1/2021 at 1:00 PM, aubiefifty said:

i know for a fact at least two of the churches in my area are either convincing people or just plain teaching folks that libs are evil. it is very troubling to me.

I would say from a biblical perspective, that if you believe in abortion, you are evil. 

[aubiefifty 16,805]

6 hours ago, Farmer Brown said:

I would say from a biblical perspective, that if you believe in abortion, you are evil. 

i would say

 

6 hours ago, Farmer Brown said:

I hate to tell you, but there was no "church", in Jesus' time....

Matthew 16:18  And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
 

"I will build my church", is plainly a reference to a future work. Now if you had said, "religion", you would have been correct. 

 

you mean when paul got tired of sitting on that pillar for seven years? i have already stated my feelings about abortion and yet here you are bringing it up.

 

6 hours ago, Farmer Brown said:

I would say from a biblical perspective, that if you believe in abortion, you are evil. 

i am pretty sure trump was named by his lawyer for paying for an abortion or two. that makes trump evil and i am betting the farm you voted for him. so tell me what does that make you? from a biblical perspective of course................

[SaltyTiger 7,816]

6 hours ago, Farmer Brown said:

I hate to tell you, but there was no "church", in Jesus' time....

The church quotation marks meaning what resembled the church of that time. Jesus was very critical of the hypocrisy and leadership

[jj3jordan 2,055]

2 hours ago, aubiefifty said:

i would say

 

you mean when paul got tired of sitting on that pillar for seven years? i have already stated my feelings about abortion and yet here you are bringing it up.

 

i am pretty sure trump was named by his lawyer for paying for an abortion or two. that makes trump evil and i am betting the farm you voted for him. so tell me what does that make you? from a biblical perspective of course................

And there it is, fiddy and his "pretty sure" followed by "trump evil".  Are you talking past or present?  If past sins are forgiven then paying for an abortion, or being pro choice, would be forgiven also. That makes you irrelevant.   Current liberal democrat philosophy actively promotes abortion on demand until birth and after if you are Ralph Northam, and my opinion of partial birth abortion is the same as being born alive and murdered.  Forcibly holding a kicking baby's head inside the mother an inch or so while you stab the baby's brain with scissors until he or she stops thrashing is inhumanly cruel and yet democrats consider this "health care". As usual fiddy you don't know what you are talking about, from a biblical perspective, or any perspective.

[aubiefifty 16,805]

1 hour ago, jj3jordan said:

And there it is, fiddy and his "pretty sure" followed by "trump evil".  Are you talking past or present?  If past sins are forgiven then paying for an abortion, or being pro choice, would be forgiven also. That makes you irrelevant.   Current liberal democrat philosophy actively promotes abortion on demand until birth and after if you are Ralph Northam, and my opinion of partial birth abortion is the same as being born alive and murdered.  Forcibly holding a kicking baby's head inside the mother an inch or so while you stab the baby's brain with scissors until he or she stops thrashing is inhumanly cruel and yet democrats consider this "health care". As usual fiddy you don't know what you are talking about, from a biblical perspective, or any perspective.

you are such a joke. i do not believe in abortion. and just because i am a dem does not mean i agree with everything they stand for. and you talk like trump would be forgiven but not a dem? and with all the nuts on the right why would you think anyone would give you a say so over their body? since abortion is not against the law i believe that should be between the person and god. certainly not you. as usual you forgot to mention the types of abortion you speak of were banned by congress in 2003. in fact the supreme court upheld this ban in 2007. so "current liberal democratic philosophy" you talk about does not even happen anymore. non disclosure of leaving the ban out in 2003 is the same as lying. but again i personally do not believe in abortion and if i had a child the child would be born and i would raise it. so why keep bringing it up with me?

[jj3jordan 2,055]

14 minutes ago, aubiefifty said:

you are such a joke. i do not believe in abortion. and just because i am a dem does not mean i agree with everything they stand for. and you talk like trump would be forgiven but not a dem? and with all the nuts on the right why would you think anyone would give you a say so over their body? since abortion is not against the law i believe that should be between the person and god. certainly not you. as usual you forgot to mention the types of abortion you speak of were banned by congress in 2003. in fact the supreme court upheld this ban in 2007. so "current liberal democratic philosophy" you talk about does not even happen anymore. non disclosure of leaving the ban out in 2003 is the same as lying. but again i personally do not believe in abortion and if i had a child the child would be born and i would raise it. so why keep bringing it up with me?

As usual solid comment from fiddy.  You need to read closer. Yes a democrat can be forgiven for supporting abortion in the past but this requires the said democrat to turn away from that support and become pro life. So your analogy as most all of your analogies is wrong. The “ban” has been challenged and overturned numerous places for lack of exception for health of the mother. It is still legal. And the us code specifies a “health of the mother” exception which makes it legal. So all you need is a “health of the mother” donation to the “doctor” providing “health care” and you can proceed apace.  Current democrat philosophy is no restriction to abortion anywhere any time. If you try to impose any restriction at all they will fight you tooth and nail.  
 

Stop the weed!  Is this you?

 am pretty sure trump was named by his lawyer for paying for an abortion or two. that makes trump evil and i am betting the farm you voted for him. so tell me what does that make you? from a biblical perspective of course 

[homersapien 11,386]

On 11/13/2021 at 1:12 AM, Farmer Brown said:

I would say from a biblical perspective, that if you believe in abortion, you are evil. 

 

The pro-choice president who's about to make abortion illegal

If Donald Trump believes in anything, it's sexual freedom.

It’s virtually certain that the third nominee Donald Trump chooses to put on the Supreme Court will be strongly opposed to abortion. If that nominee is confirmed, and if, as a consequence, the Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade, then Trump—in defiance of public sentiment—will have ended a half-century of legal abortion throughout the U.S.

But does Trump honestly oppose abortion? We know he pledged in 2016 to appoint justices who would overturn Roe. But there’s ample reason to doubt that he is—as he’s (mostly) said publicly since 2011—“pro-life.”

This fierce protector of the unborn is a thrice-married philanderer who’s bragged about grabbing women “by the *****” and been accused by 26 women of sexual assault. He’s hung out at Studio 54 and told Playboy magazine “I don’t have to answer that” when asked whether he was monogamous. Not long before entering his seventh decade he married a fashion model who during their whirlwind romance posed nude for British GQ. Guys like that seldom end up opposing abortion—and when they do it’s generally part of a program that includes regular attendance at some identifiable place of worship.

But don’t take my word for it. Take Trump’s.

As recently as 2000, Trump declared himself publicly to be pro-choice. In 2004 he suggested that when his then-girlfriend Marla Maples was pregnant with his daughter Tiffany, he raised the possibility of an abortion. In 2013 he said, “It’s never been my big issue.” 

In 2015 Trump declared himself to be pro-choice and then, after being prompted, corrected himself and said he was pro-life. Whoops!

In 2016 he said about abortion, “The laws are set, and I think we have to leave it that way.” Whoops!

Around the same time Trump said, “Such an interesting question” when asked whether he was “ever involved with anyone who ever had an abortion.”

Trump’s former private attorney says Trump is pro-choice. Both women whom they paid off to keep quiet about extremely plausible allegations of extramarital sexual relations with Trump said he didn’t use a condom. “I don’t like these things,” the future commander-in-chief said, according to one of the women.

I list below a chronological sequence of statements Trump has made about abortion. They are, it seems to me, the words of a man who never stopped being pro-choice, either consciously or through revealed preference. To borrow a phrase that Hendrik Hertzberg coined to describe the twice-married former Hollywood actor Ronald Reagan, Donald Trump has all the markings (at least on matters related to cultural mores) of a “closet tolerant.”

But don’t take my word for it. Read the statements below and decide for yourself. Then scratch your head at the idea that the person who said these things is about to make abortion illegal.

About 300 people gathered inside to honor Robin Chandler Duke, the president emeritus of the National Abortion Rights Action League, which sponsored last week's abortion rights march in Washington.

The guests paid $500 each for an evening of dinner and speeches by pro-choice advocates, including Morgan Fairchild, Joanne Woodward, Dr. Mathilde Krim, Arthur Schlesinger and Judy Collins, who sang.

The organizers of the dinner said they will use the proceeds to continue an intensive advertising campaign in print and television to strengthen the voice of the pro-choice movement. 

Donald J. Trump, a co-sponsor of the dinner and owner of the Plaza Hotel, at Fifth Avenue between 58th and 59th Streets, did not attend the event.

—New York Times, April 13, 1989

Well, look, I’m very pro-choice … I just believe in choice … I am strongly for choice … I am pro-choice in every respect.

—Donald Trump, telling Tim Russert on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that he wouldn’t ban “partial-birth abortion,” Oct. 24, 1999.

I support a woman’s right to choose … but I am uncomfortable with the procedures.

When Tim Russert asked me on ‘Meet the Press’ if I would ban partial-birth abortion if I were president, my pro-choice instincts led me to say no. After the show, I consulted two doctors I respect and, upon learning more about this procedure, I have concluded that I would indeed support a ban.

—Donald Trump, The America We Deserve, 2000.

I'm glad it happened. I have a great little daughter, Tiffany. But, you know, at the time it was like, 'Excuse me, what happened?' And then I said, 'Well, what are we going to do about this?' [Marla Maples] said, 'Are you serious? It's the most beautiful day of our lives.' I said, 'Oh, great.'

—Trump on “The Howard Stern Show,” January 7, 2004.

I am pro-life.

—Trump to the Conservative Political Action Conference, Feb. 10, 2011. At the time he was considering whether to enter the 2012 presidential primaries.

One thing about me, I'm a very honorable guy. I'm pro-life, but I changed my view a number of years ago. One of the reasons I changed -- one of the primary reasons -- a friend of mine's wife was pregnant, in this case married.

She was pregnant, and he didn't really want the baby. And he was telling me the story. He was crying as he was telling me the story. He ends up having the baby and the baby is the apple of his eye. It's the greatest thing that's ever happened to him.

And you know here's a baby that wasn't going to be let into life. And I heard this, and some other stories, and I am pro-life.

—Donald Trump, explaining to the Christian Broadcasting network why he changed his mind on abortion, April 8, 2011. At the time he was considering whether to enter the 2012 presidential primaries. One month later he announced that he would not.

Howard Stern: I know you, I know you. There is no way that you personally are against abortion. You know there’s too many mother****ers running around here out of their minds. They got people having babies, they can’t take care of them. You got women who … who wants a baby on the planet that nobody’s gonna take care of? We got a ton of them as it is, and thank God there’s abortion. I know you believe that.

Trump: Well, it’s never been my big issue, Howard, and you know somebody asked me and I say ‘pro-life,’ but it’s never been an issue that really has been discussed with me in great detail, to be honest with you.

—Trump on “The Howard Stern Show,” Feb. 6, 2013.

Jake Tapper: Let me ask you about a few social issues because they haven’t been issues you have been talking about for several years. I know you’re opposed to abortion.

Trump: Right. I’m Pro-Choice.

Tapper: You’re pro-choice or pro-life?

Trump: I’m pro-life. I’m sorry.

—Trump on CNN’s “State of the Union,” June 28, 2015

You look at different things having to do with Ben [Carson] and there's a lot of contradiction and a lot of questions … You know, like Ben was pro abortion not so long ago, as everybody has told me. I don't know it personally, but that's what I'm told -- I've been told and all of a sudden he's so hard on abortion under no circumstance, virtually, can there be exceptions. And you say, well, how does that happen where you were pro and not long ago, by the way, and then all of a sudden you can't even have exceptions?

--Trump on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Oct. 27, 2015

I am very, very proud to say that I am pro-life.

--Trump at Republican primary debate in Cleveland, Aug. 6, 2015. 

Chris Matthews: Do you believe in punishment for abortion, yes or no as a principle? 

Trump: The answer is that there has to be some form of punishment. 

Matthews: For the woman. 

Trump: Yeah, there has to be some form. 

--Town Hall meeting in Green Bay, Wisc., March 30, 2016.

The issue is unclear and should be put back into the states for determination.

-Trump campaign clarifying previous, one hour after the quote leaks.

If Congress were to pass legislation making abortion illegal and the federal courts upheld this legislation, or any state were permitted to ban abortion under state and federal law, the doctor or any other person performing this illegal act upon a woman would be held legally responsible, not the woman. The woman is a victim in this case as is the life in her womb. My position has not changed.

--Trump campaign press release retracting both the original statement and the initial clarification, two and a half hours after the quote leaks.

John Dickerson: You had said you wanted, you told Bloomberg in January, that you believed abortion should be banned at some point in pregnancy. Where would you do the ban?

Trump: Well, I, first of all would have liked to see this as a state’s rights issue. I would have preferred states’ rights. I think it would have been better if it were up to the states. But right now the laws are set and that’s the way the laws are.

Dickerson: But do you have a feeling how they should change. There are a lot of laws you want to change, you’ve talked about them on everything from libel to torture. Anything you would want to change on abortion?

Trump: At this moment the laws are set, and I think we have to leave it that way.

—Trump on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” aired April 3, 2016. CBS released an excerpt on April 1.

If this is his position, he has just disqualified himself as the GOP nominee. At some point, the candidate’s words must stand on their own. What do you believe, Mr. Trump? No one knows.

—Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the anti-abortion group the Susan B. Anthony List, April 1.

Mr. Trump gave an accurate account of the law as it is today and made clear it must stay that way now --until he is president. Then he will change the law through his judicial appointments and allow the states to protect the unborn. There is nothing new or different here.

—campaign statement, April 1, 2016.

“What I said was perfect. . . . What I said was so good, it was so perfect,” he said. “The only reason I tell you this is because I want you to watch it. Now if I did something wrong, I wouldn’t want you to watch it.

—Trump during campaign stop in Racine, Wisc., April 2, 2016.

Given his draconian comment, sending women back to back alleys, I had to ask: When he was a swinging bachelor in Manhattan, was he ever involved with anyone who had an abortion?

‘Such an interesting question,’ he said. ‘So what’s your next question?’

—Maureen Dowd column in the New York Times, April 2, 2016.

‘I thought she was sort of kidding,’ [Trump] said. ‘The answer is 'no.'

Then he added, ‘I respect Maureen Dowd. I think she is a great writer.’

--interview with Mary Jordan of the Washington Post, April 8, 2016.

As part of the division of labor in the campaign, I was assigned to lead the outreach to faith communities on behalf of Trump, mostly because having Roger Stone attempt to make those connections would be a farce. It was at this time that Paula White called me and said that she wanted to put together a group of evangelical leaders to meet with Trump and discuss his potential candidacy…. More than fifty religious leaders came to Trump Tower to meet the Boss in a conference room on the 25th floor…..

As an organizer, I went to watch the proceedings, and what I saw was amazing, to put it mildly….. As the evangelicals inhaled Trump’s Norman Peale horse s***, they solemnly asked to approach to ‘lay hands’ on him…. I could hardly believe the performance, or the fact that these folks were buying it.

Watching Trump, I could see that he knew exactly how to appeal to the evangelicals’ desires and vanities.—who they wanted him to be, not who he really was.  Everything he was telling them about himself was absolutely untrue. He was pro-abortion; he told me that Planned Parenthood was the way poor people paid for contraception. He didn’t care about religion…. He could lie directly to the faces of some of the most powerful religious leaders in the country and they believed him—or decided to believe him…. He knew what they really cared about—the core, core beliefs. Anti-abortion laws, Supreme Court justices, opposition to gay marriage and civil rights, and the cultural war-like rhetoric aimed at godless liberals…. I knew then that he would ride all the way to the White House.

—Disloyal, a 2020 memoir by Michael Cohen. Cohen is the private Trump attorney who in Aug. 2018 pleaded guilty violating campaign and other laws in connection with hush money payments he made to the porn actress Stormy Daniels and the Playboy model Karen McDougal. The two women were threatening to go public with stories of having sex with Trump in 2006, the same year Melania gave birth to his son Barron. 

Both women said Trump did not use a condom. “We talked about it, right beforehand,” McDougal told CNN’s Anderson Cooper. “Then he’s like, ‘I don’t like these things.’” McDougal also told Cooper that she voted for Trump in 2016.

 

https://timothynoah.substack.com/p/the-pro-choice-president-whos-about

 

 

[jj3jordan 2,055]

Thank God.  It's about time somebody did.

[AU9377 4,962]

On 11/1/2021 at 10:27 PM, jj3jordan said:

You are crazy if you think Trump would turn dictator.  BSC.  He would never mandate an experimental vaccine with emergency approval to all government workers and companies who have any government contracts or they will be fired. That is dictatorship. 

Experimental vaccine my ass.  You must be against taking all forms of medications if you believe that there isn't ample evidence of the vaccine's safety and effectiveness at this point. 

[AU9377 4,962]

On 11/13/2021 at 12:24 PM, jj3jordan said:

As usual solid comment from fiddy.  You need to read closer. Yes a democrat can be forgiven for supporting abortion in the past but this requires the said democrat to turn away from that support and become pro life. So your analogy as most all of your analogies is wrong. The “ban” has been challenged and overturned numerous places for lack of exception for health of the mother. It is still legal. And the us code specifies a “health of the mother” exception which makes it legal. So all you need is a “health of the mother” donation to the “doctor” providing “health care” and you can proceed apace.  Current democrat philosophy is no restriction to abortion anywhere any time. If you try to impose any restriction at all they will fight you tooth and nail.  
 

Stop the weed!  Is this you?

 

 am pretty sure trump was named by his lawyer for paying for an abortion or two. that makes trump evil and i am betting the farm you voted for him. so tell me what does that make you? from a biblical perspective of course 

Better idea... why don't you get the government out of a woman's vagina?  What is the difference between the morning after pill and having an abortion at 7 weeks?  None that I know of.  Should we start arresting women that have a miscarriage if we can prove they weren't taking good care of themselves?  When abortion was illegal in every state, the country wanted that to change. There were too many women injuring themselves out of desperation at the hands of untrained underground abortion providers. I'm certain that there were a number of them that were daughters of families where they were as afraid of showing up pregnant as they were of bleeding out from a botched procedure. 

[DKW 86 7,426]

On 11/15/2021 at 12:50 PM, homersapien said:

 

The pro-choice president who's about to make abortion illegal

If Donald Trump believes in anything, it's sexual freedom.

It’s virtually certain that the third nominee Donald Trump chooses to put on the Supreme Court will be strongly opposed to abortion. If that nominee is confirmed, and if, as a consequence, the Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade, then Trump—in defiance of public sentiment—will have ended a half-century of legal abortion throughout the U.S.

But does Trump honestly oppose abortion? We know he pledged in 2016 to appoint justices who would overturn Roe. But there’s ample reason to doubt that he is—as he’s (mostly) said publicly since 2011—“pro-life.”

This fierce protector of the unborn is a thrice-married philanderer who’s bragged about grabbing women “by the *****” and been accused by 26 women of sexual assault. He’s hung out at Studio 54 and told Playboy magazine “I don’t have to answer that” when asked whether he was monogamous. Not long before entering his seventh decade he married a fashion model who during their whirlwind romance posed nude for British GQ. Guys like that seldom end up opposing abortion—and when they do it’s generally part of a program that includes regular attendance at some identifiable place of worship.

But don’t take my word for it. Take Trump’s.

As recently as 2000, Trump declared himself publicly to be pro-choice. In 2004 he suggested that when his then-girlfriend Marla Maples was pregnant with his daughter Tiffany, he raised the possibility of an abortion. In 2013 he said, “It’s never been my big issue.” 

In 2015 Trump declared himself to be pro-choice and then, after being prompted, corrected himself and said he was pro-life. Whoops!

In 2016 he said about abortion, “The laws are set, and I think we have to leave it that way.” Whoops!

Around the same time Trump said, “Such an interesting question” when asked whether he was “ever involved with anyone who ever had an abortion.”

Trump’s former private attorney says Trump is pro-choice. Both women whom they paid off to keep quiet about extremely plausible allegations of extramarital sexual relations with Trump said he didn’t use a condom. “I don’t like these things,” the future commander-in-chief said, according to one of the women.

I list below a chronological sequence of statements Trump has made about abortion. They are, it seems to me, the words of a man who never stopped being pro-choice, either consciously or through revealed preference. To borrow a phrase that Hendrik Hertzberg coined to describe the twice-married former Hollywood actor Ronald Reagan, Donald Trump has all the markings (at least on matters related to cultural mores) of a “closet tolerant.”

But don’t take my word for it. Read the statements below and decide for yourself. Then scratch your head at the idea that the person who said these things is about to make abortion illegal.

About 300 people gathered inside to honor Robin Chandler Duke, the president emeritus of the National Abortion Rights Action League, which sponsored last week's abortion rights march in Washington.

The guests paid $500 each for an evening of dinner and speeches by pro-choice advocates, including Morgan Fairchild, Joanne Woodward, Dr. Mathilde Krim, Arthur Schlesinger and Judy Collins, who sang.

The organizers of the dinner said they will use the proceeds to continue an intensive advertising campaign in print and television to strengthen the voice of the pro-choice movement. 

Donald J. Trump, a co-sponsor of the dinner and owner of the Plaza Hotel, at Fifth Avenue between 58th and 59th Streets, did not attend the event.

—New York Times, April 13, 1989

Well, look, I’m very pro-choice … I just believe in choice … I am strongly for choice … I am pro-choice in every respect.

—Donald Trump, telling Tim Russert on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that he wouldn’t ban “partial-birth abortion,” Oct. 24, 1999.

I support a woman’s right to choose … but I am uncomfortable with the procedures.

When Tim Russert asked me on ‘Meet the Press’ if I would ban partial-birth abortion if I were president, my pro-choice instincts led me to say no. After the show, I consulted two doctors I respect and, upon learning more about this procedure, I have concluded that I would indeed support a ban.

—Donald Trump, The America We Deserve, 2000.

I'm glad it happened. I have a great little daughter, Tiffany. But, you know, at the time it was like, 'Excuse me, what happened?' And then I said, 'Well, what are we going to do about this?' [Marla Maples] said, 'Are you serious? It's the most beautiful day of our lives.' I said, 'Oh, great.'

—Trump on “The Howard Stern Show,” January 7, 2004.

I am pro-life.

—Trump to the Conservative Political Action Conference, Feb. 10, 2011. At the time he was considering whether to enter the 2012 presidential primaries.

One thing about me, I'm a very honorable guy. I'm pro-life, but I changed my view a number of years ago. One of the reasons I changed -- one of the primary reasons -- a friend of mine's wife was pregnant, in this case married.

She was pregnant, and he didn't really want the baby. And he was telling me the story. He was crying as he was telling me the story. He ends up having the baby and the baby is the apple of his eye. It's the greatest thing that's ever happened to him.

And you know here's a baby that wasn't going to be let into life. And I heard this, and some other stories, and I am pro-life.

—Donald Trump, explaining to the Christian Broadcasting network why he changed his mind on abortion, April 8, 2011. At the time he was considering whether to enter the 2012 presidential primaries. One month later he announced that he would not.

Howard Stern: I know you, I know you. There is no way that you personally are against abortion. You know there’s too many mother****ers running around here out of their minds. They got people having babies, they can’t take care of them. You got women who … who wants a baby on the planet that nobody’s gonna take care of? We got a ton of them as it is, and thank God there’s abortion. I know you believe that.

Trump: Well, it’s never been my big issue, Howard, and you know somebody asked me and I say ‘pro-life,’ but it’s never been an issue that really has been discussed with me in great detail, to be honest with you.

—Trump on “The Howard Stern Show,” Feb. 6, 2013.

Jake Tapper: Let me ask you about a few social issues because they haven’t been issues you have been talking about for several years. I know you’re opposed to abortion.

Trump: Right. I’m Pro-Choice.

Tapper: You’re pro-choice or pro-life?

Trump: I’m pro-life. I’m sorry.

—Trump on CNN’s “State of the Union,” June 28, 2015

You look at different things having to do with Ben [Carson] and there's a lot of contradiction and a lot of questions … You know, like Ben was pro abortion not so long ago, as everybody has told me. I don't know it personally, but that's what I'm told -- I've been told and all of a sudden he's so hard on abortion under no circumstance, virtually, can there be exceptions. And you say, well, how does that happen where you were pro and not long ago, by the way, and then all of a sudden you can't even have exceptions?

--Trump on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Oct. 27, 2015

I am very, very proud to say that I am pro-life.

--Trump at Republican primary debate in Cleveland, Aug. 6, 2015. 

Chris Matthews: Do you believe in punishment for abortion, yes or no as a principle? 

Trump: The answer is that there has to be some form of punishment. 

Matthews: For the woman. 

Trump: Yeah, there has to be some form. 

--Town Hall meeting in Green Bay, Wisc., March 30, 2016.

The issue is unclear and should be put back into the states for determination.

-Trump campaign clarifying previous, one hour after the quote leaks.

If Congress were to pass legislation making abortion illegal and the federal courts upheld this legislation, or any state were permitted to ban abortion under state and federal law, the doctor or any other person performing this illegal act upon a woman would be held legally responsible, not the woman. The woman is a victim in this case as is the life in her womb. My position has not changed.

--Trump campaign press release retracting both the original statement and the initial clarification, two and a half hours after the quote leaks.

John Dickerson: You had said you wanted, you told Bloomberg in January, that you believed abortion should be banned at some point in pregnancy. Where would you do the ban?

Trump: Well, I, first of all would have liked to see this as a state’s rights issue. I would have preferred states’ rights. I think it would have been better if it were up to the states. But right now the laws are set and that’s the way the laws are.

Dickerson: But do you have a feeling how they should change. There are a lot of laws you want to change, you’ve talked about them on everything from libel to torture. Anything you would want to change on abortion?

Trump: At this moment the laws are set, and I think we have to leave it that way.

—Trump on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” aired April 3, 2016. CBS released an excerpt on April 1.

If this is his position, he has just disqualified himself as the GOP nominee. At some point, the candidate’s words must stand on their own. What do you believe, Mr. Trump? No one knows.

—Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the anti-abortion group the Susan B. Anthony List, April 1.

Mr. Trump gave an accurate account of the law as it is today and made clear it must stay that way now --until he is president. Then he will change the law through his judicial appointments and allow the states to protect the unborn. There is nothing new or different here.

—campaign statement, April 1, 2016.

“What I said was perfect. . . . What I said was so good, it was so perfect,” he said. “The only reason I tell you this is because I want you to watch it. Now if I did something wrong, I wouldn’t want you to watch it.

—Trump during campaign stop in Racine, Wisc., April 2, 2016.

Given his draconian comment, sending women back to back alleys, I had to ask: When he was a swinging bachelor in Manhattan, was he ever involved with anyone who had an abortion?

‘Such an interesting question,’ he said. ‘So what’s your next question?’

—Maureen Dowd column in the New York Times, April 2, 2016.

‘I thought she was sort of kidding,’ [Trump] said. ‘The answer is 'no.'

Then he added, ‘I respect Maureen Dowd. I think she is a great writer.’

--interview with Mary Jordan of the Washington Post, April 8, 2016.

As part of the division of labor in the campaign, I was assigned to lead the outreach to faith communities on behalf of Trump, mostly because having Roger Stone attempt to make those connections would be a farce. It was at this time that Paula White called me and said that she wanted to put together a group of evangelical leaders to meet with Trump and discuss his potential candidacy…. More than fifty religious leaders came to Trump Tower to meet the Boss in a conference room on the 25th floor…..

As an organizer, I went to watch the proceedings, and what I saw was amazing, to put it mildly….. As the evangelicals inhaled Trump’s Norman Peale horse s***, they solemnly asked to approach to ‘lay hands’ on him…. I could hardly believe the performance, or the fact that these folks were buying it.

Watching Trump, I could see that he knew exactly how to appeal to the evangelicals’ desires and vanities.—who they wanted him to be, not who he really was.  Everything he was telling them about himself was absolutely untrue. He was pro-abortion; he told me that Planned Parenthood was the way poor people paid for contraception. He didn’t care about religion…. He could lie directly to the faces of some of the most powerful religious leaders in the country and they believed him—or decided to believe him…. He knew what they really cared about—the core, core beliefs. Anti-abortion laws, Supreme Court justices, opposition to gay marriage and civil rights, and the cultural war-like rhetoric aimed at godless liberals…. I knew then that he would ride all the way to the White House.

—Disloyal, a 2020 memoir by Michael Cohen. Cohen is the private Trump attorney who in Aug. 2018 pleaded guilty violating campaign and other laws in connection with hush money payments he made to the porn actress Stormy Daniels and the Playboy model Karen McDougal. The two women were threatening to go public with stories of having sex with Trump in 2006, the same year Melania gave birth to his son Barron. 

Both women said Trump did not use a condom. “We talked about it, right beforehand,” McDougal told CNN’s Anderson Cooper. “Then he’s like, ‘I don’t like these things.’” McDougal also told Cooper that she voted for Trump in 2016.

https://timothynoah.substack.com/p/the-pro-choice-president-whos-about

Never understood why the Right embraced trump like they did. his whole life has been mocking everything they believe.

[TitanTiger 20,499]

38 minutes ago, DKW 86 said:

Never understood why the Right embraced trump like they did. his whole life has been mocking everything they believe.

Because he hated all the same people they hated.

[homersapien 11,386]

35 minutes ago, TitanTiger said:

Because he hated all the same people they hated.

And he mirrored that hate and frustration on a daily basis.

You have to give Trump credit for his "con man" skills if nothing else.

[TitanTiger 20,499]

19 minutes ago, homersapien said:

And he mirrored that hate and frustration on a daily basis.

You have to give Trump credit for his "con man" skills if nothing else.

It's not that hard when people are so willing to be conned.  Fear tends to do that.

[jj3jordan 2,055]

8 hours ago, AU9377 said:

Better idea... why don't you get the government out of a woman's vagina?  What is the difference between the morning after pill and having an abortion at 7 weeks?  None that I know of.  Should we start arresting women that have a miscarriage if we can prove they weren't taking good care of themselves?  When abortion was illegal in every state, the country wanted that to change. There were too many women injuring themselves out of desperation at the hands of untrained underground abortion providers. I'm certain that there were a number of them that were daughters of families where they were as afraid of showing up pregnant as they were of bleeding out from a botched procedure. 

Even better idea. Let an innocent baby be born and not dismembered into a sink. Having “the country” wanting “that to change” does not redefine true evil into good. You are lucky having already been born.  If you can’t differentiate abortion from miscarriage then your power of discernment is questionable, as is your assertion that “the country” was behind the movement.

[jj3jordan 2,055]

1 hour ago, TitanTiger said:

Because he hated all the same people they hated.

Trump didn’t hate anybody, he loves this country and proclaimed that loudly and forcefully.

[TitanTiger 20,499]

Just now, jj3jordan said:

Trump didn’t hate anybody, he loves this country and proclaimed that loudly and forcefully.

Exhibit A for "easy to con."

[jj3jordan 2,055]

14 minutes ago, TitanTiger said:

It's not that hard when people are so willing to be conned.  Fear tends to do that.

You mean like democrats conning black populations into thinking they are helping them out of poverty?

[TitanTiger 20,499]

1 minute ago, jj3jordan said:

You mean like democrats conning black populations into thinking they are helping them out of poverty?

Newsflash:  The Democrats being terrible on something or multiple things doesn't wash away the bad things about Trump and the GOP.  Try not whatabouting.

[jj3jordan 2,055]

Just now, TitanTiger said:

Exhibit A for "easy to con."

I understand why you would be offended by a slogan such as “America First”. Deflecting that onto me is irrational. Deal with yourself first.