Comedian Kenan Thompson took the stage at the Democratic National Convention (DNC) on Wednesday, Aug. 21, to add some humor to a subject Democrats say makes them concerned: Project 2025. Thompson told voters if they vote for former President Donald Trump, they vote for the conservative policy agenda.
“You ever seen a document that could kill a small animal and democracy at the same time?” Kenan joked as he held up an oversized book.
Trump said he has nothing to do with Project 2025 and has criticized its authors. It was sponsored by the Heritage Foundation which stated, “Project 2025 does not speak for any candidate or campaign, in any capacity.”
However, Democrats are trying to convince voters that Project 2025 is a blueprint for a second Trump term.
“You know how when you download an app and there are hundreds of pages there that you don’t read, it’s just the terms and conditions, and you just click, agree, right?” Thompson asked the audience. “Well, these are the terms and conditions of a second Trump presidency.”
Thompson singled out one subject in particular — abortion.
“On page 459, Project 2025 resurrects a law from the 1800s called the Comstock Act to ban abortion nationwide and throw health care providers in jail,” Thompson said.
And that statement is true. On page 459, Project 2025 calls on the FDA to “stop promoting or approving mail-order abortions in violation of long-standing federal laws that prohibit the mailing and interstate carriage of abortion drugs.”
The law is still in effect as 18 USC 1461: Mailing obscene or crime-inciting matter.
“Every article or thing designed, adapted or intended for producing abortion, or for any indecent or immoral use…is declared to be non-mailable matter,” it states in part. “Anyone who knowingly mails such material shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both, for the first such offense, and shall be fined…or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both, for each such offense thereafter.”
Trump was asked about the Comstock Act during a CBS News interview on Monday, Aug. 19.
“You would not enforce the Comstock Act?” Trump was asked.
“I would not do that, no,” Trump answered.
Trump said abortion law should be decided at the state level.
“The federal government should have nothing to do with this issue,” Trump said.
Despite Trump continuously stating his opposition to abortion measures at the federal level, his opponents are trying to convince voters he would try to pass a nationwide abortion ban into law.
The ACLU wrote specifically about the Comstock Act, “Trump’s anti-abortion allies are trying to revive this zombie law, claiming that the Comstock Act is a dormant national abortion ban already on the books, just waiting to be enforced by a Trump Department of Justice.”
In 2023, the Justice Department issued guidance on enforcing the Comstock Act. It said the law only applies when the sender intends for the drugs they are shipping to be used illegally. The guidance added that because there are many ways in which the drugs can be used legally throughout the country.
“The mere mailing of such drugs to a particular jurisdiction is an insufficient basis for concluding that the sender intends them to be used unlawfully,” the DOJ said.
If Trump wins, his attorney general could issue new guidance. But Republicans have already lost races due to the abortion issue and voters have approved every pro-choice ballot measure since the Dobbs decision. So Republicans are aware that policies like that lose elections.
