The Republican Party platform committee on Monday adopted a plank drafted by aides to Donald Trump, whose new language softens the GOP’s past positions on marriage and abortion while trotting out a series of utopian economic promises.
Among them are vows to “end inflation”, turn the US into a “manufacturing superpower” and deliver “big tax cuts for workers”.
At the same time, the document echoes Trump’s promise not to cut “a dime” from Social Security and Medicare, the expensive but popular government benefits and health care programs.
The 16-page platform was approved by the Republican National Committee panel by an 84-18 vote, a source familiar with the matter told CNBC.
It’s a fraction of the size of the platform the RNC used during the 2016 and 2020 election cycles. The new platform further cements an ongoing push to remake the GOP in Trump’s populist, nationalist image while playing down some issues that the party once had at its core.
The Trump campaign in a press release Monday afternoon touted the new document as the “Republican Party Platform of President Donald J. Trump for 2024”.
The platform now launches with language mirroring a Trump campaign press release, including the presumptive nominee’s “Make America Great Again” and “America First” slogans.
The preamble, which envisions a Republican-controlled Congress and White House in 2025, lists 20 “promises that we will deliver very quickly.”
The first two: Seal the US southern border and “carry out the largest deportation operation in American history.”
The platform also promises to “prevent World War III,” cut regulations designed to encourage the adoption of electric vehicles, end “weaponizing the government” and “keep men out of women’s sports.”
The newly compressed party platform offers far fewer policy details than its predecessor and sometimes reads more like a list of preferred outcomes than a statement of beliefs or legislative goals.
“Republicans will end world chaos and restore Peace through Strength, reducing geopolitical risks and lowering commodity prices,” the platform claims at one point.
In abortion, the changes are stark. The old platform took a tough stance against abortion, calling for a “human life amendment to the Constitution” in a lengthy passage that used the word “abortion” dozens of times.
The Trump-backed platform uses the word only once, in a short paragraph expressing support for allowing states to pass their own abortion laws while pledging to oppose “Late Term Abortion.”
The shift in focus comes as Democratic President Joe Biden’s re-election campaign focuses on abortion as a key issue for the November election.
The 2022 Supreme Court decision that overturned Roe v. Wade β a vote supported by all three Trump-appointed justices β was followed by strong election showings for Democrats.
The Republican presidential candidate publicly took credit for bringing the issue to state legislatures, some of which have worked quickly to restrict access to abortion.
In recent months, however, Trump falsely claimed that legal scholars unanimously supported overturning Roe, which had been the law of the land for nearly 50 years.
The newly adopted platform also rejects the party’s previous claim that “Traditional marriage and the family, based on marriage between a man and a woman, is the foundation for a free society.”
The new platform instead states, “Republicans will advance a Culture that values ββthe sanctity of marriage,” adding, “We will end policies that punish families.”
The GOP is also departing from its old platform on Social Security and Medicare.
The 2016 and 2020 platforms noted: “Medicare’s long-term debt is in the trillions and is being financed by a workforce that is shrinking relative to the size of future beneficiaries… When a vital program is so clearly headed for a train wreck, it has come time to put it on a safer track.”
He proposed a handful of reforms, including setting “a more realistic age of eligibility in light of today’s longer life spans.”
The new platform erases any discussion about the challenges of keeping programs solvent.
“Republicans will tackle inflation, unleash American energy, restore economic growth, and secure our borders to keep Social Security and Medicare funded for the next generation and beyond,” he says.
“We will ensure that these programs remain solvent long into the future, reversing the Democrats’ damaging policies and unleashing a new economic boom.”
That stance echoes Trump, who has opposed entitlement reform and attacked political opponents who have considered changes to the two programs.
The platform was approved a week before the GOP officially chose Trump as its presidential nominee.