Donald Trump appeared in Illinois on Saturday evening, holding a rally for Rep. Mary Miller, one of his endorsees for the House of Representatives. As you’d expect, though, the Dobbs decision from the Supreme Court, which overturned the non-existent constitutional “right” to an abortion, took center stage.
The former president took to the podium to take a much-deserved victory lap, addressing the monumental moment the country is currently passing through. Chants of “thank you, Trump” rang out, overtaking the speech at one point.
You absolutely love to see it, and Trump, despite his direct role in getting us here, remained humble, not taking all the credit and praising those who have prayed and fought for this outcome for decades. “Congratulations,” he told the crowd, noting the hard work and countless judicial appointments it took to reach this result.
Trump went on to commend the Supreme Court Justices who joined the majority in Dobbs, noting that they endured a relentless campaign of harassment and violent threats, including the attempted assassination of Justice Brett Kavanaugh. The former president also nailed the Democrat Party and the “two-tiered system of justice” that allowed those threats to build without much, if any, pushback. He then compared the hysteria over January 6th with the shoulder shrugs directed at the attacks on the Supreme Court.
But while Trump chose to not singularly focus on his personal role in seeing Roe overturned, I do think he deserves immense credit. I’ve seen some on the right (the usual suspects) attempting to downplay the former president’s part in nominating the three justices who ultimately provided the votes necessary to end abortion as a federally-protected “right.” Often, their arguments boil down to “well, any Republican would have made those picks.” But that’s absolute nonsense, and history is our guide on the matter.
For 50 years, various Republican presidents had the chance to put justices on the court who would overturn Roe and its equally asinine sister opinion, Casey. For 50 years, they muffed a sizable portion of their picks. To put it in perspective, Republicans had the chance to save millions of lives decades earlier, but Anthony Kennedy (who authored Casey), Sandra Day O’Connor, David Souter, and John Roberts ended up put on the court instead.
To make matters even worse, former President George W. Bush only selected Justice Samuel Alito, who authored the Dobbs decision, after he attempted to put a pro-abortion squish named Harriet Myers on the Supreme Court.
In short, I don’t want to hear the stupid assertions that what Trump did was no big deal, and that any other Republican would have done the same thing. Other Republicans had the same chance to do the same thing and they didn’t. Instead, they let their voters down time and again. Yes, Mitch McConnell deserves credit for stopping the confirmation of now-AG Merrick Garland, paving the way for Justice Neil Gorsuch, but it was Trump who was the primary catalyst. Without his defeat of Hillary Clinton and his willingness to listen to the conservative judicial movement, none of this would be happening. No one can take that away from him.