President Donald Trump promised Wednesday to sign an executive order that would require health care providers to provide medical care to all babies born alive as he makes an election-year push to appeal to voters who oppose abortion.

The White House did not release further details about the order, but Trump�s announcement follows numerous attempts by GOP lawmakers in Washington and in state capitals around the country to pass legislation that threatens prison for doctors who don�t try to save the life of infants born alive during abortions.

Organizations representing obstetricians and gynecologists say the law already provides protections to newborns, whether born during a failed abortion or under other circumstances. But when anomalies are so severe that a newborn would die soon after birth, a family may choose what�s known as palliative care or comfort care. This might involve allowing the baby to die naturally without medical intervention.

It is not necessarily a crime to forgo sophisticated medical intervention in cases where severe fetal abnormalities leave a newborn with no chance of survival. This has happened on rare occasions in the course of a late-term abortion. The U.S. government recorded 143 deaths between 2003 and 2014 involving infants born alive during attempted abortions.

In a video message Wednesday to the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast, Trump said his �born alive executive order� would ensure that babies born alive no matter the circumstances �receive the medical care that they deserve.�

�This is our sacrosanct moral duty,� Trump said.

Trump�s comments come as his campaign and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden work to win over Roman Catholic voters in the Nov. 3 presidential election. For decades, that group has been a pivotal swing vote in U.S. presidential elections, with a majority backing the winner � whether Republican or Democrat � nearly every time.

Advocates for Trump say faithful Catholics should not vote for Biden, who is a practicing Catholic, because of his support for abortion rights. Critics of Trump say he is too divisive and callous to merit their vote.

A Pew Research Center poll over the summer found 50% of Catholics saying they support Trump in the presidential election, compared with 49% backing Biden. A Pew Research Center analysis of voters in 2016 showed 52% of Catholics voted for Trump.

Among Catholic voters in the midterms, 56% said abortion should be legal in all or most cases, while 42% say it should be illegal in all or most cases, according to AP VoteCast.

AP VoteCast also found abortion low on the list of priorities for midterm voters: Just 2% nationwide in 2018 considered abortion the top issue facing the country. About a quarter named health care and immigration; roughly 2 in 10 named the economy and jobs.

(AP)