The abortion debate was big in 2019 and will become even larger in 2020.  In 2019, eleven state legislatures approved measures to limit abortion, including many who signed "heartbeat" laws, which prohibit abortion after a heartbeat is detected. 

While this was happening in more conservative states, liberal-leaning states were moving the other way. New York passed a law to decriminalize abortion.  Vermont passed legislation making abortion a fundamental right.  Massachusetts, Illinois, Rhode Island, Wisconsin, Maine, Nevada, and Hawaii are all in different stages of working on bills that would protect abortion.

Many of the restrictive laws have been challenged, and the courts have blocked them thus far.

The politics of abortion is heating up.  The clash between the pro-life worldview and the pro-abortion one is going to be a factor in the 2020 election.  The battlefield is taking shape.

First, there's a sharp contrast between President Trump and his Democrat challengers.

President Trump is pro-life and has not been shy about saying so.  In his 2019 State of the Union address, he railed against the New York law, asserting, "Lawmakers in New York cheered with delight upon the passage of legislation that would allow a baby to be ripped from the mother's womb moments from birth."  He called on Congress to "to prohibit the late-term abortion of children who can feel pain in the mother's womb."

Trump has been called "the most prolife president in American history."  Not a single Democrat running for president is pro-life.

Joe Biden, in a move that indicates the firmness of his convictions, changed his position on the Hyde Amendment and no longer supports a ban on government funding for abortion.  This puts Biden in the mainstream of Democrat political thinking.  Democrats are much more likely than Republicans to support legal abortion in all or most cases.

Pete Buttigieg, Elizabeth Warren, and Bernie Sanders are also firmly in the pro-choice camp.  Sanders pledges to "oppose all efforts to undermine or overturn Roe v. Wade, and appoint federal judges who will uphold women's most fundamental rights."  Warren has promised to wear a Planned Parenthood scarf to show support for that organization at her inauguration if she becomes president.  In New Hampshire, at the end of 2019, Buttigieg affirmed a woman's right to an abortion to a seven-year old child who asked him about it. 

The difference between the two sides couldn't be any clearer.  Is abortion a fundamental right, or is it the taking of a life?  How that question is answered is huge and will shape the character of our nation.  If those who hold to the sanctity of life don't vote for Trump in 2020, the left will appoint judges who will codify abortion as the law of the land for a long time.

Second, the Supreme Court is poised to address abortion.

On January 2, 2020, more than 200 members of Congress signed an amicus brief supporting a contended Louisiana abortion law and urged the Supreme Court to reconsider the landmark abortion case Roe v. Wade.

The Court will take up the Louisiana law in early 2020.  There's likely to be a decision announced at the end of June, and both sides recognize what's at stake.

 "What's on the line is the continued protection by the Supreme Court of access to abortion services," says Nancy Northup, president and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights, which is representing the Hope clinic in the Louisiana case.

Benjamin Clapper, director of Louisiana's Right to Life chapter, said, "We look forward to the Supreme Court reviewing Louisiana's 2014 Unsafe Abortion Protection Act.  Abortion facilities should not be provided loopholes when it comes to health and safety standards that apply across the board to outpatient surgical facilities."

If the Court sides with Louisiana, states will have the ability to regulate and moderate abortion practices within them.  It may be the beginning of the end of the abortion industry as we know it.  The Supreme Court is possibly more conservative than it has been in years.  No one, though, knows how it will rule.  Regardless of the decision, abortion will be in the headlines just before the general election begins, stirring passions on both sides.

The 2020 election will determine who gets to appoint future justices.  Several are older and in declining health.  The winner of the presidential election in 2020 could appoint two or three more justices. The Democrat candidates have indicated that their choices will be pro-abortion.  Trump's have been pro-life.  Those who hold a pro-life view cannot afford to sit out 2020.

There are a lot of issues that dominate the political discussion today.  While no one knows what will be in the headlines in the middle of 2020, it seems all but certain that abortion will be a big issue.  Depending on the outcome of the election, it might be that the silent cry from the womb will, at last, be heard.