While reporting on the ongoing Republican National Convention in Milwaukee this week, several media outlets are falling for the GOP’s confusing messaging in its abortion platform, suggesting that the party is shifting away from previous longstanding abortion positions. In reality, while the Republican Party has changed the language used in the platform, the goals of the GOP and its right-wing media allies to target reproductive healthcare and enact a national abortion ban remain the same. 

Recently, the RNC adopted a platform that changed language regarding abortion, removing calls for various forms of national abortion bans and adding in opposition to “Late Term Abortion” and a statement about the 14th Amendment: “We proudly stand for families and Life. We believe that the 14th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States guarantees that no person can be denied Life or Liberty without Due Process.” 

While cutting the call for a national ban serves to obscure the party's actual goals, incorporating the 14th Amendment language nods to anti-abortion activists' push for “fetal personhood” by interpreting the word “person” in the amendment as applying to fetuses. As Slate's Mary Ziegler explained, anti-abortion leaders “read the platform as a commitment to pursue the recognition of personhood—through executive action, federal or state legislation, or the nomination of judges who would embrace personhood.”

The language switch provided the GOP with cover to appear as though it is moderating on abortion, while continuing to pursue unpopular abortion positions. As Ziegler explained:

Still, mainstream media outlets have continued to take the bait in their coverage of the RNC and the party’s platform on abortion. 

Politico posted a piece titled “A new kind of Republican Party is forming at the RNC” claiming that the party is “shifting its decades-long position on abortion” and has adopted a “slimmed down abortion platform.” 

The article noted that anti-abortion activists are mostly on board because of the inclusion of the 14th Amendment language, but it added that “the document reflects Trump’s leave-abortion-to-the-states approach in the post-Roe era, a position that leaves abortion broadly accessible in many states.” 

Axios similarly wrote — in a piece headlined “RNC delegates embrace Trump's abortion platform shakeup” — that the change is “a significant shift for the party that worked for decades to overturn Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court ruling on abortion rights.”

The Washington Post called the change a “revised abortion position” in a headline, saying the new party platform “embraces presumptive nominee Donald Trump’s political positions, including a leave-it-to-states approach to abortion law that abandons the party’s long-standing explicit support for national restrictions on the procedure.”

On the other hand, the 19th published an article clearly showing what the new platform is designed to do, titled “RNC approves platform that would give rights to fetuses, endangering abortion, IVF.” 

Amanda Becker and Shefali Luthra wrote, “Republicans have adopted a slate of policy positions that does not call for a federal legislative abortion ban, but opens the door to establishing fetal personhood.”

The mixed messaging appears intentional to muddy the waters on the platform’s position, as Ziegler noted that “personhood, as the modern anti-abortion movement views it, doesn’t allow states to do anything; it requires them to ban abortion. It’s no accident that the platform sends mixed messages.”

Jessica Valenti also wrote about the Republican Party’s bait-and-switch messaging:

Trump and right-wing media have used this strategy before on abortion, obfuscating and downplaying their position and policy goals on the issue as they reckon with the unpopularity of their agenda. It’s imperative that mainstream media outlets don’t lend them a hand.