{"id":2685456,"date":"2026-10-16T07:51:01","date_gmt":"2026-10-16T11:51:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaignjames-talarico-says-he-wants-to-see-fewer-abortions-but-why\/"},"modified":"2026-10-16T07:52:59","modified_gmt":"2026-10-16T11:52:59","slug":"utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaignjames-talarico-says-he-wants-to-see-fewer-abortions-but-why","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaignjames-talarico-says-he-wants-to-see-fewer-abortions-but-why\/","title":{"rendered":"James Talarico Says He Wants To See Fewer Abortions. But Why?"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">22<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Futm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaignjames-talarico-says-he-wants-to-see-fewer-abortions-but-why%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2685456&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico expressed support for abortion rights during a CNN town hall, affirming that abortion should be legal, not considered murder, and that the Bible does not address abortion directly.When challenged by a Catholic voter who argued that the Bible condemns killing, Talarico emphasized his desire to reduce unplanned pregnancies and abortions, framing abortion as a public health issue rather than a moral or theological one. He claimed common ground with pro-life advocates in wanting fewer abortions and supported measures like sex education and contraception to achieve this goal, despite holding views that openly conflict with conventional Catholic teachings and the belief that abortion is morally equivalent to murder. Critics argue that Talarico&#8217;s position is motivated by political strategy rather than genuine belief, as his philosophical stance dismisses the moral meaning of the unborn, suggesting he is selectively presenting his views to appeal to swing voters while avoiding arduous moral debates.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>What does Democratic Senate hopeful James Talarico really think about abortion? At a CNN town hall this week in Texas, he confirmed his long-held views that abortion should be legal, that it\u2019s not murder, and that \u201cthe Bible is silent on the issue of abortion.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s what he said during <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/BonillaJL\/status\/2110537992188084403?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">an exchange with a Catholic voter<\/a> who challenged him on the abortion issue. The voter, a woman named Jodi Hunt who also happens to be a Catholic theologian, responded by saying, \u201cI just want to add that the Bible is not silent on abortion. There is the 10 Commandments: \u2018Thou shall not kill.\u2019 And as Catholics, we take great insult, I guess sometimes, when it\u2019s described that way.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That was the viral moment. But before that exchange Talarico said something most voters had not heard before: that he wants to see fewer abortions and unwanted pregnancies.<\/p>\n<p>The obvious question is, why? If, in Talarico\u2019s view, abortion isn\u2019t murder, and the Bible says nothing about it, then why should he care about how many abortions there are in Texas? Why would fewer abortions be better, if abortion is just \u201chealth care,\u201d as he claims? In the past, Talarico said he thinks <em>Roe v. Wade<\/em> should be codified in federal law, meaning abortion would be legal up until the moment of birth. Such a law would surely mean <em>more<\/em> abortions nationwide. So what is he saying?<\/p>\n<p>Hunt had asked him why Catholics should support Democrats, given the party\u2019s support for abortion, since Catholics believe abortion is the murder of an innocent human being. How can Catholics trust Democrats to safeguard the public good, she asks, when they refuse to protect the most vulnerable among us?<\/p>\n<p>It was a good question, and well-put. Talarico responded with a bit of legerdemain that strongly called to mind Obama in the 2010s, back when the Democratic establishment behaved as if all the major cultural and moral debates in American public life had been settled in Democrats\u2019 favor, and all that remained was to decide which specific policy solutions to implement.<\/p>\n<p>In his reply to Hunt, Talarico smiled and said that although they might come to different moral and ethical conclusions about whether abortion should be legal, or about what the scriptures say about abortion, there\u2019s some common ground they share when it comes to being pro-life.<\/p>\n<p>The common ground, Talarico says, is \u201creducing the number of unplanned pregnancies and the number of abortions.\u201d He goes on to say that if we treat abortion as a public health problem and not a culture war problem, \u201cthen we can actually make progress together.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Talarico insisted that abortion isn\u2019t a philosophical or theological debate, but a public policy problem. \u201cI want to see fewer unplanned or unwanted pregnancies. I want to see fewer abortions,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd so you and I actually have the same goal.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He went on to say that things like sex education, contraception, and \u201chealth care\u201d all reduce the number of abortions, and that he\u2019d be \u201cwilling to work with\u201d voters like Hunt on those things. (Never mind that most Catholics like Hunt are also going to be opposed to sex education and contraception on similar moral grounds.)<\/p>\n<p>But in fact Hunt and Talarico do not ultimately share the same goal because they have totally different <em>reasons<\/em> for wanting fewer abortions. Hunt believes, along with 2,000 years of Christian tradition and teaching, that abortion takes an innocent human life and is therefore a violation of the sixth commandment against murder. Her reason for wanting fewer abortions is clear: she believes unborn children are human beings who have the same right to live as anyone else, and killing them is a crime.<\/p>\n<p>Talarico\u2019s reason for wanting fewer abortions is totally unclear. He holds the bizarre and blasphemous belief, which he articulated in an appearance on Joe Rogan\u2019s podcast last year, that abortion is sanctioned by the Bible because Mary gave her consent to the Incarnation. He does not think it\u2019s murder, and he does not think the unborn have any rights whatsoever. So why should it matter how many women choose to get an abortion?<\/p>\n<p>The most obvious answer is that Talarico is being dishonest. He doesn\u2019t really want to see fewer abortions but he needs to appear as reasonable and sympathetic as possible to swing voters because he has said so many radical and frankly insane and off-putting things \u2014 about abortion and scripture, about God being nonbinary, about trans kids, about race, and so on.<\/p>\n<p>His comments to Hunt on the CNN town hall, in other words, were carefully calibrated to table the real and intractable disagreement he has with pro-life voters. Public policy disputes are almost always first and foremost disputes over philosophical and theological commitments \u2014 and none more so than abortion, which concerns matters of life and death.<\/p>\n<p>That Talarico wants to pretend otherwise is an indication he\u2019s not being honest about what he really thinks, and despite his winsome persona, like Obama he doesn\u2019t really think there\u2019s anything left to debate. The only question is which Democratic policy to adopt.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>      John Daniel Davidson is a senior editor at The Federalist. His writing has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the Claremont Review of Books, The New York Post, and elsewhere. He is the author of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Pagan-America-Decline-Christianity-Dark\/dp\/1684514444\/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=Pagan+America&#038;qid=1695306441&#038;sr=8-1\"><i>Pagan America: the Decline of Christianity and the Dark Age to Come<\/i><\/a>. Follow him on Twitter, @johnddavidson.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Talarico&#8217;s true stance on abortion revealed at CNN town hall<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":518,"featured_media":2685457,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Talarico-town-hall.png","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[33651],"tags":[4310,4606,59577,4762,5894],"class_list":["post-2685456","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-western-journal","tag-abortion","tag-healthcare","tag-james-talarico","tag-legislation","tag-politics"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Talarico-town-hall.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2685456","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/518"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2685456"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2685456\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2685459,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2685456\/revisions\/2685459"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2685457"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2685456"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2685456"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2685456"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}