Obama in 2003: 'I Am Pro-Choice' in All Situations, Including Late-Term Abortions

In the video above, the year was 2003 and President Barack Obama, then a seasoned state congressman, was running for the U.S. Senate in Illinois. A reporter can be heard asking him about his stance on abortion during a press conference in Springfield, Ill., and the future president of the United States provides an honest answer..

"I am pro-choice," a noticeably younger Barack Obama replies.

"In all situations, including the late-term thing?" a reporter asks.

"I am pro-choice. I believe that women make responsible choices and they know better than anybody the tragedy of a difficult pregnancy and I don’t think that it’s the government’s role to meddle in that choice."

If only there were more areas that he felt the government shouldn't "meddle" in.

The nearly decade-old video, uncovered by the folks over at The Weekly Standard, displays what many people believe to be President Obama's official position on abortion: staunchly pro-choice.

In another interview, Obama explained: "I voted no on the late-term abortion ban, not because I don't recognize that these are painful issues but because I trust women to make these decisions."

The issue may seem clear-cut from these videos, however, Obama has proven to be a bit of a flip-flopper when it comes to the controversial topic.

The Weekly Standard explains:

But over the years, Obama has been shifty on the issue of late-term abortion. As an Illinois state senator, Obama opposed the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act. The problem, in Obama's own words, was that in some cases the "fetus, or child -- however you want to describe it" was "not just coming out limp and dead." Supporters of the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act wanted to require doctors to provide medical care to these infants, while Obama wanted to leave it up to the discretion of the abortionist to determine whether these infants had a reasonable chance of sustained life.

But when Obama ran for president in 2008, he said that he supported states' banning late-term abortions so long as the bans contained a "strict" exception for the physical health of the mother. Days later, Obama modified his position, saying he also supported an exception for "serious clinical mental health diseases." Supreme Court reporter Jan Crawford noted at the time that Obama's position was still "startling" because the exceptions Obama claimed to support were narrower than the Supreme Court's 1973 edict in Doe v. Bolton that there must be “emotional, psychological, familial, and ... age" exceptions to late-term abortion bans.

The Chicago Tribune reported in October 2004: "Obama said that had he been in the U.S. Senate two years ago, he would have voted for the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act, even though he voted against a state version of the proposal."

And when he ran for president 2008, Obama repeated those claims.

(H/T:: Life News)