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Conservative firebrand Tomi Lahren's nightly show pulled for a week after her abortion comments

Tomi Lahren, the 24-year-old conservative host of the show Tomi on The Blaze, has fiercely criticised the feminist movement. In her trademark fast-talking rants, the commentator has called modern-day feminists selfish, man-hating "snowflakes" and said that "real women don't wake up and skip work to march for abortions."

Lahren, an avid Donald Trump supporter, has been called incendiary. It is not unusual for her appearances to incite outrage from the left. But over the weekend, her words provoked fury from an unlikely segment of Americans: the right.

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Online show pulled after pro-choice comments

Conservative host Tomi Lahren has had her online video show suspended after admitting that she supports abortion rights.

Appearing on The View on Friday, Lahren admitted that she supports abortion rights, saying it would be hypocritical of her to believe the government should decide what women should do with their bodies.

"You know what? I'm for limited government, so stay out of my guns, and you can stay out of my body as well," Lahren said.

Even the show's hosts appeared shocked to hear her. Across social media, anti-abortion advocates said it was impossible for Lahren to be both conservative and in favour of abortion rights. They criticised her interpretation of the Constitution and called her out for seemingly contradicting previous remarks about abortion. Some claimed, as they have before, that by rising to prominence so young she lacked an understanding of political philosophy and ideology.

Lahren's viral monologues on her nightly show for the Blaze, created by conservative media personality Glenn Beck, have landed her appearances with Bill Maher and Trevor Noah, lured nearly 4.3 million followers to her Facebook page and invited praise from President Donald Trump himself. Mr Trump was so taken by one of her recent appearances that he called her to thank her for her "fair coverage" of him.

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But now, following her pro-choice comments, the prominent conservative commentator has had her show pulled off air for the week. On Monday, Leon Wolf, managing editor of the Blaze, told CNN that "Tomi's show will not be in production this week."

On Monday evening, Lahren tweeted that she had some "me" time that night, apparently a reference to time off from her nightly show. "Anything good on TV?"

She also retweeted a link to a Daily Caller article that reported, citing anonymous sources, that her show would be suspended, starting Monday, for at least one week.

"No one hunts small deer," she tweeted, "this too shall pass."

Beck addressed Lahren's abortion comments on his radio show Monday morning, criticising her explanation that her position was supported by the US Constitution.

The preamble to the Constitution, Beck explained, speaks of securing "'the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.' ... Well, who are our posterity, if not our unborn children and grandchildren and great grandchildren?" he said.

He said that it did not matter to him whether Lahren supported abortion rights. When the Blaze first launched, a show called Real News was hosted by Amy Holmes, who supported abortion rights. "So if you're pro-choice, you can have a job at the Blaze," Beck said. "I try to hire people who have a different opinion because I believe in being intellectually rigorous."

He did not comment on her future at the outlet, saying it would be inappropriate to discuss the topic on the radio. But, he said, "the ideas are what are important. And if you cannot defend the idea, no matter which side you're on, if you can't defend the idea, that leads to the second part of the discussion. Which is the people calling for Tomi to be fired."

Dana Loesch, a host on the Blaze and national spokeswoman for the National Rifle Association, also criticised Lahren's comments in an interview with Beck. "Conserving the individual is the basis of conservatism. It is classical de Tocqueville liberalism. And if anybody knows anything about politics 101, if they know this, this should not be a surprise to them."

Meanwhile, some of the hosts of The View defended her on Monday. Whoopi Goldberg, who was absent when Lahren was on the show, said "Do you have to be on the same side of every single issue of your political party? Aren't you allowed to evolve and grow?"

"Maybe what we need to do is stay away from all these labels." Sunny Hostin said. "They've been so terrible to her, and I think that's one of the problems with conservatism. There's so many faces to it."

New York Times, The Washington Post