Marking a year since President Donald Trump’s election, many of his fiercest advocates are rallying around the president and letting the media know: This pro-life, anti-establishment maverick is exactly who we voted for.
Penny Nance, CEO and President of Concerned Women for America, told Breitbart News, “President Trump has been the most pro-life president in modern history, slashing the Mexico City Policy shortly after taking office, which sent millions of taxpayer dollars overseas to pay for abortions.”
Other allies also celebrated his win. Appearing in key states Trump carried a year ago, former White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer and Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel called on Republicans to come together, while former White House strategist Steve Bannon maintained an aggressive tone toward any in the GOP who would stand in the president’s way.
Trump’s actions in defense of the unborn is long and extensive, Nance said.
His nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the United States Supreme Court is a pro-life appointment that will have ramifications long after President Trump leaves office. He has also stacked the Department of Health & Human Services with pro-life warriors who are already making positive differences for the protection of the unborn. He has picked individuals to advise him who have solid pro-life credentials, such as Vice President Mike Pence and Counselor to the President Kellyanne Conway. He has kept – and I will believe will continue to keep – the promises he made to pro-lifers during the campaign of signing into law a ban on 20-week abortions and ultimately defunding Planned Parenthood, with the help of supposedly pro-life Congressmen and women.
Bannon, meanwhile, took aim at veteran Republican lawmakers and entrenched party insiders, whom he has pledged to root out of the Senate next year. He grouped Gillespie — a lobbyist, former RNC chairman and adviser to former President George W. Bush — with the GOP forces of old.
Trump needs more outsiders at his side, Bannon said.
“He’s had some victories. He’s had some defeats,” Bannon said of Trump. “Most of the defeats are because the Republican establishment cannot execute on the plan.”
Bannon spoke at a Republican dinner in Macomb County, Michigan, a working-class Detroit suburb which former President Barack Obama carried twice but where Trump handily beat Democrat Hillary Clinton last year.
Despite Trump’s low approval ratings, McDaniel painted an optimistic picture of the economy, touted record party fundraising and said, “I feel very confident in the candidates I see running across the country.”
“I hope we expand our majority in the Senate so we can get more things done,” she said.
However, Bannon has pledged to find primary opponents for virtually every Republican senator standing for re-election next year, arguing they have not adequately defended Trump against attacks from within his own party, chiefly by Tennessee Sen. Bob Corker and Arizona Sen. Jeff Flake.
With Corker and Flake having announced plans to not seek re-election, Bannon is gunning for GOP Sen. Dean Heller in Nevada and has even mentioned challenging reliable conservatives such as John Barrasso of Wyoming and Deb Fischer of Nebraska.
One of Bannon’s chief goals is ousting Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, whom he blames for not following through on long-promised legislation to undo Obama’s 2010 health care law.
“They only understand one thing. You cannot be nice to these guys,” Bannon said, referring to McConnell.
“You have to drop the hammer. That’s what he understands.”
The Associated Press contributed to this article