Politics

Huckabee woos pro-life crowd: ‘I can be the full spectrum of conservative’

Font Size:

WASHINGTON — Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee brought a staunchly pro-life crowd to their feet Wednesday evening with a passionate argument for pro-life values as a moral and political issue.

“There are voices who have told us, ‘Please don’t bring those issues up. Because we want to win elections.’ So do I, but I want to win them for a cause that’s worth fighting for,” Huckabee said in his keynote address to the Susan B. Anthony List’s annual Campaign for Life Gala at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Washington, D.C.

According to Huckabee, who ran for president in 2008 and whose name has been floated as a possible 2016 contender, the life issue is more than a political issue.

“Whether it is politically expedient or not, is no consequence to me. I tell people all the time and this is the God’s truth, I did not become pro-life because I got into politics. I got into politics because as a pro-life person I believe if we get this issue wrong we will get all the other issues wrong,” he said to thunderous applause.

He stressed that he is the full package when it comes to conservatism: social to economic and culture to defense.

“I’m convinced that as a conservative I can be the full spectrum of conservative,” he said. “I don’t have to quit being pro-life and pro-family to also be a person who believes that the government should take less money from each family and should spend less,” he said, going on to assert his belief in limited government spending, strong national defense, and American exceptionalism.

The former pastor, author and Fox News host, further walked the audience through his concerns about not just the lives lost to abortion, but also for the mothers — recalling the women who would sob in his office as they recalled and worried about their past abortions.

Huckabee pointed to the downfall of societies that have devalued segments of the population.

“We live in a country that is always valued the notion that every person has worth and value,” he said going on to say that once a country devalues any group of people “anything is possible.”

He recalled his recent visit to Auschwitz.

“We look at the horrors of the Holocaust and say, ‘How could that happen? How could one of the most sophisticated, scientifically advanced countries on the entire planet do something of such magnitude,’ and I tell you, it didn’t happen over night. It happened slowly and methodically human beings were devalued,” he said.

According to Huckabee, his generation needs to be concerned that if younger generations are taught that some lives are expendable, his generation could be facing a rough situation, as they get too old and become a social and financial burden.

“Let’s ask ourselves if we teach the generation coming after us, the ones younger than us, that it is okay to terminate a human life because it represents a financial hardship or social disruption. … When they are our caretakers and we are approaching the end of life at the other end of the spectrum, when we become a financial hardship to them, and when we are a social disruption,” he said, going on to add “we’ve already given them the full capability to take us out.”

He concluded his speech by stressing his sincere commitment to protecting life.

Follow Caroline on Twitter