(Oct. 22)  Liz Cheney this week made a reasonable point on abortion that is consistent with her principles, but in the wrong forum and with the wrong emphasis.

Conservatives all over the internet and in my inbox are blasting the Republican former congresswoman from Wyoming today because she purportedly backtracked on her long-standing pro-life position. In truth, though, Cheney did not say what some social media posts alleged. What she did say, apart from saying it while campaigning for a radically pro-choice candidate, is largely defensible from a pro-life standpoint.

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Additionally, Cheney deserves a defense more broadly for her decisions about how to oppose the candidacy of former President Donald Trump. One can disagree with her choices, but it is entirely unfair to question her motives or her sincerity or to accuse her of abandoning her principles.

Let’s start with the abortion comments in question. They came on Oct. 21 at a Malvern, Pennsylvania, town hall campaign appearance with Vice President Kamala Harris. …

Only after all [considerable] prologue [involving several other issues] came an audience question about the purportedly “terrible” rates of “maternal mortality.” Harris answered by talking about prenatal care, postpartum care, the need for more rural hospitals, better public information for women, and “a whole array of care” that was affected by the Supreme Court’s essentially pro-life Dobbs decision in 2022. Of course, she offered the usual pro-choice lines about “real harm” to women in the wake of Dobbs.

That’s when Cheney piped in. Despite social media posts claiming she said the Dobbs decision itself “went too far,” which would have unambiguously contradicted her long-standing principles, she said nothing of the kind. Instead, she expressed concern about what individual states have done in reaction to Dobbs.

“I think there are many of us around the country who have been pro-life but who have watched what’s going on in our states since the Dobbs decision and have watched state legislatures put in place laws that are resulting in women not getting the care they need,” Cheney said.

And: “In places like Texas, for example, the attorney general is talking about suing, is suing to get access to women’s medical records, that’s not sustainable for us.”… [The full column is at this link.]