A recent commentary in the Washington Post suggested that it’s possible for pro-lifers to vote for a Democrat rather than support the incumbent Republican president because he is, in the columnist’s words “an immoral lout,” and a “dictator” about to “suspend the Constitution.”

The author proffered several baseless arguments to bolster his view that that no president – of either party – would be powerful enough to have much impact on abortion policy.

Putting aside for a moment the obvious question of how a dictator cannot have much impact on public policy, the author is simply wrong when it comes to President Trump and abortion.

The President has already had a profound impact on abortion policy, not only in law but in the judges who will weigh these laws for decades to come. The federal judiciary has been so transformed by President Trump’s more than 200 appointments that even in the notoriously liberal Ninth Circuit, constitutional laws now stand a chance of escaping judicial review unscathed.

President Trump has already appointed two Supreme Court justices and it seems more than likely that with four more years, he will have a chance to seat two more. Given the fact that the two oldest Justices are of the liberal wing, that could conceivably give the Court a 7-2 pro-life  majority. The end of Roe v. Wade? Very possibly. And for the author to suggest that reversing Roe may not reduce abortions shows he has been paying insufficient attention to what’s been going on in the states.

I’m not talking about New York, Illinois, Vermont or Rhode Island, states where all limits on abortion have been abolished. What I mean is Iowa, Utah, Wisconsin, Oklahoma, Alabama, Georgia, and many more states that are working to eliminate or at least radically curtail abortion within their boundaries.

In fact, each time, in its decades of abortion jurisprudence, the Supreme Court has stepped away from Roe to give more authority to the states to regulate or even proscribe abortion, the states have pretty immediately shown their legislative eagerness to do so.

Every point the author makes is easily refutable, but what I’d especially like to respond to is his assertion that a vote for Trump would “undermine the reputation of the Gospel.”

I know for a fact that the man in the Oval Office is different from the Donald Trump of decades ago. He works to live out his faith, his conversion to the pro-life cause is sincere and deep, he is a generous man, a father of a beautiful family, and a keeper of promises. I know pastors who minister to him personally and assert that they have rarely seen anyone more responsive to God’s grace.

But of course it’s not up to me, or any man (or columnist), to judge. The Lord was quite clear: “Judge not lest ye be judged” (Mt. 7:1).

But even if President Trump was the “immoral lout” of the author’s imagination, I would rather vote for someone who doesn’t live out his faith to my liking rather than one who is determined to stop me from living out mine.

Make no mistake: The Democrats are enemies of religious freedom.

Hillary Clinton, whose name still can’t quite entirely disappear from the Campaign 2020 landscape, infamously said during a speech in 2015 that “deep-seated cultural codes, religious beliefs and structural biases have to be changed.”

Is changing the religious beliefs of citizens in the job description of an American lawmaker? Of course not. But it is on the wish-list of today’s Democrat party.

Some examples:

Before he suspended his long-shot presidential bid, Robert ”Beto” O’Rourke wanted to strip tax exemptions from churches and other organizations that oppose same-sex marriage.

California Attorney General Xavier Bacerra has instituted a ban that prohibits state-funded travel to states he feels do not sufficiently protect LBGTQ rights. Texas, included on the list because it does protect freedom of religion, has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review the ban.

And let’s not forget the Obama-era mandate that tried to force organizations like Priests for Life and the Little Sisters of the Poor to provide abortion-causing drugs and devices to employees. We had to fight all the way to the Supreme Court for our right to live out our faith and not be punished by crippling fines, and it was only the election of President Trump that ended up resolving the matter.

Simply put, the Democrats do not want people of faith – particularly Christians – to be able to practice our faith in the public square. This is not new – the Democrats removed the single reference to God in their 2012 platform – but it has certainly grown more disturbing. Last October, the Democratic National Committee passed a resolution that was openly hostile to religion, declaring:

“Those most loudly claiming that morals, values, and patriotism must be defined by their particular religious views have used those religious views, with misplaced claims of “religious liberty,” to justify public policy that has threatened the civil rights and liberties of many Americans, including but not limited to the LGBT community, women, and ethnic and religious/nonreligious minorities …”

The Washington Post columnist posits that pro-life Americans should consider voting for a Democrat for president to avoid causing “immediate harm” to our nation. But the fact is just the opposite. Voting for a Democrat would be the surest way to cause immediate harm.

Without religious liberty, both the Church and America herself are betrayed at their foundations.