Flashback: Media, Fact-Checkers Wrongly Attacked Donald Trump Over Late-Term Abortion

New York Legalizing 9-Month Abortions Proved Fact-Checkers Wrong on Exchange During Final Debate

New York passing the Reproductive Health Act, which legalizes abortion by non-doctors up until the point of birth, has once again brought the decades-old divisive issue into the national discourse.

On October 19, 2016, during the final debate in Las Vegas, then-Republican nominee Donald Trump and Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton sparred over the issue of abortion, specifically the latter’s support for late-term and partial-birth abortions.

Here is how Corporate Big Media reacted.

‘Rip the baby out of the womb’: What Donald Trump got wrong about abortion in America, the headline declared in the “Economic Policy” Wonk section of The Washington Post.

NPR’s “fact check” of the exchange during the debate linked to another NPR story dating back to 2006, which stated partial-birth abortion was performed “only” about 2,200 times a year before it was banned.

What that has anything to do with what Mr. Trump said would be the end result of the position Mrs. Clinton and other Democrats hold, or the cringe-worthy reality of it in practice, is not made clear.

At least Vogue was somewhat honest, at least about their position. They ran the cheerleading headline, Hillary Clinton Awesomely Defended Abortion Rights at the Debate.

Under the headline Fact check: Trump accuses Clinton of supporting abortion at 9 months, USAToday took a cute dig at Mr. Trump “for proposing to defund Planned Parenthood” before declaring “PolitiFact’s analysis of Clinton’s remarks on the topic don’t support that claim.”

Let’s focus in on the validity of that fact-check.

Mr. Trump, as you can hear from the video clip above, was merely bringing up the possibility of killing “the baby on the ninth month on the final day.” That has always been the logic behind the abortion-on-demand position, and that logic has always been the focus of conservative and pro-life critics.

Rather than address that logic, the fact-checkers simply claimed it doesn’t happen and, naturally, Mr. Trump was lying.

But what did Mr. Trump actually say? He said the following:

“If you go with what Hillary is saying in the ninth month you can take the baby and rip the baby out of the womb of the mother just prior to the birth of the baby.”

In 2016, Corporate Big Media rushed to cover for Mrs. Clinton and the Democratic Party holding a very unpopular position on abortion. But as with so many other issues, it was just a deceitful act.

Now, what was portrayed as conspiratorial is not only a reality in the state of New York, but met with standing ovations and cheers.

A similar bill in Virginia was supported by Democratic Governor Ralph Northam, though it was defeated in the Republican-controlled state legislature.