Betsy DeVos Compares Ending Abortion With Ending Slavery

Education Secretary Betsy DeVos told an audience of conservative Christians that their fight to restrict abortion was like President Abraham Lincoln’s quest to abolish slavery, and compared defenders of slavery with modern abortion rights activists.

Lincoln, “too, contended with the pro-choice arguments of his day. They suggested that a state’s choice to be slave or to be free had no moral question in it,” DeVos said Wednesday at a dinner for Colorado Christian University , held at the Museum of the Bible in Washington. “Well, President Lincoln reminded those pro-choicers that is a vast portion of the American people that do not look upon that matter as being this very little thing. They look upon it as a vast moral evil.”

She continued:

Lincoln was right about the slavery choice then, and he would be right about the life choice today. Because as it’s been said: Freedom is not about doing what we want. Freedom is about having the right to do what we ought.

The event was closed to the press, but attended by the Colorado Times Recorder , which first reported on DeVos’ comments Thursday.

DeVos told the audience she hopes to make abortion “unconstitutional” and “unthinkable.”

She also praised President Donald Trump for installing conservative judges on the nation’s courts — including the Supreme Court, where conservatives hope dismantling Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 decision ensuring a woman’s right to an abortion, will be on the table.

Trump on Friday is slated to become the first sitting president to in person address the March for Life , an annual gathering of anti-abortion proponents on the National Mall. Trump has relied heavily on support from conservatives and evangelical Christians , and has used social issues like abortion to rally his base, even though some of his views and actions have not been consistent with those of conservatives.