The dissenting delegates specifically protested the failure of the new platform to support a “human life amendment” to the U.S. Constitution that would provide legal protections for fetuses and embryos, a provision that had been in previous party platforms. They also protested the failure of the platform to explicitly “call for the application of the Fourteenth Amendment to children before birth.”
The 2024 platform drastically shortens the discussion on abortion from the 2016 document, even dropping an earlier call for a nationwide ban on abortion after the 20th week of pregnancy. “We believe that the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution guarantees that no person shall be deprived of life or liberty without due process of law, and that the states are therefore free to enact laws protecting these rights,” the document reads.
Some anti-abortion activists applauded the mention of the 14th Amendment because it echoed earlier platform language that said embryos and fetuses were entitled to due process protections from the moment of conception, an argument the party has long sought to explicitly enshrine in the Constitution. Others have pointed out that the language suggests that states could also legally choose to allow abortions, a position Trump himself has embraced.
“This is the only way that the delegates can show their support for the platform’s longstanding position of defending the unborn,” Perkins said. “There’s a reason the media wasn’t allowed in the room. The trial was more befitting of a Third World dictatorship than the Republican National Committee.”
The platform was adopted Monday in a fast-track process, closed to the press, that allowed no room for amendments after Trump addressed the Milwaukee gathering remotely. The platform committee vote was 84-18, with opponents falling short of the 25 percent needed under party rules to issue a formal “minority report” to the full convention.
The 2024 document ditches decades of party tradition for a much shorter and sometimes vaguer policy statement. Instead of opposing gay marriage, as previous documents had, the new platform says only that “Republicans will promote a culture that values the sanctity of marriage.”
The 2024 platform continues to express support for abortion restrictions. “We proudly stand for families and life,” the document reads. “We will oppose late-term abortion while supporting mothers and policies that advance prenatal care, access to birth control, and IVF.”
The intraparty conflict is unlikely to abate, prompting Trump’s allies to push for changes to the 2028 convention process. In separate meetings this week, the convention’s rules committee raised the threshold for submitting a formal “minority report” at the 2028 convention from 25 percent to 35 percent of delegates, according to a person familiar with the change.