Life Advocacy Briefing

What to Say

WATCHING THE VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES last week speaking during her “visit” to an abortuary in Minnesota, we became increasingly convinced that this nation’s advocates of abortion will not say the word. Have you noticed? It’s “reproductive health,” typically – never “abortion.”

This tells us something: It appears the pro-abortion politicians and their handlers have emerged from polling or focus groups or other public-opinion-gathering devices with the certainty that using the term “abortion” reflects negatively on them. Why? Certainly because the average American is repelled by the thought.

So, they dress it up in ruffles and feathers. But our pro-life speakers – politicians and others – can help the public grasp what is at stake in this 50-some-year-old debate by overtly questioning the abortion advocates’ use of their favorite terminology. Here is a suggestion:

“Let’s face it. There is no ‘reproduction’ in what [so-and-so] calls ‘reproductive health.’ The entire idea of abortion is to end the life of an unborn child. What is ‘reproductive’ about that? And while we’re at it, how about the term ‘health’? There is no disease involved, so no cure involved. What we are really talking about here is taking overt action to end the life of a developing human child who is not capable of fending for him- or herself.”

Our candidates or public officials or other public speakers can also point out, it seems to us, the cruelty of the abortion pill, which has become the most common method of ending a little one’s life. In a chemical abortion (which is the terminology which should be used, not to confuse it with the mere taking of a pill), the mother herself ends the life of her child. Usually alone. And, unlike in the aftermath of a surgical abortion, the aborting mother sees for herself the tiny body – yes, body – of her now-dead unborn baby.

Taking a moment to inform with these facts both denies the abortion advocate the euphemisms of “choice” and “reproductive health care” and demonstrates the compassion of the pro-life advocate for both mother and child.

Why are our communicators letting “the other side” get away with their euphemisms? Yes, it takes a moment to flesh out our position, but only a moment. And bumpersticker slogans don’t do it.

If you, as a reader of Life Advocacy Briefing, have a pro-life candidate or public official you are working with or even simply supporting, please share this with him or her. The battle is joined, and until now, it seems to us, only one side is armed and ready for the victory. We cannot allow them to continue to win. Millions of lives are at stake, both born and unborn.

Biden Wants to Tax You for Abortion

THE BIDEN BUDGET PROPOSAL FOR FY-2025, reports Cassy Fiano-Chesser for Live Action, “not only removes the Hyde Amendment, which prevents the federal funding of abortion, but would include the taxpayer funding of abortion through all three trimesters of abortion.”

This should not be surprising, but that does not make it any less outrageous.

“In a press release,” writes Mrs. Chesser, “the Biden Administration … boasted that the new budget would support ‘Family Planning Services, Maternal Health & Health Equity,’” whatever that is.

“Funding for the Title X [Ten] program would be increased by 36%,” notes Mrs. Chesser, “to $390 million.” This after the Biden Regime has yanked the Trump-era rule “requiring Title X recipients to completely separate abortion programs from family planning programs, meaning abortion businesses are again receiving Title X dollars. …

“The proposed budget,” reports Mrs. Chesser, “calls not only for the elimination of the Hyde Amendment but of the Dornan Amendment as well. The Hyde Amendment is a rider barring federal taxpayer dollars from funding most abortions, which has been added to every appropriations bill since 1976. The Hyde Amendment has saved millions of lives, and though it enjoyed bipartisan support for decades, pro-abortion lawmakers have been demanding its repeal since 2016.

“The Dornan Amendment, meanwhile, prevents taxpayer dollars from being used to fund abortions in Washington, DC,” reports Live Action, “though investigations have found that abortions have been funded anyway. Because the budget would remove the restrictions in both Hyde and Dornan, this means taxpayers would be funding abortions federally as well as in DC, where there are no gestational limits on abortion.”

Planned Parenthood Wins a Judicial Confirmation

THE U.S. SENATE VOTED 50-47 last Tuesday to confirm Nicole Berner to sit on the 4^th Circuit Court of Appeals based in Richmond, Virginia. Judicial confirmations require a simple majority. Had all Republican Senators been present and voting, the motion would have tied (thanks to Democrat Senator Joe Manchin), which would have required the presence and vote of the Vice President to achieve the victory. We publish the Senate voting record at the close of this Life Advocacy Briefing.

Readers may recall from last week’s Life Advocacy Briefing that the controversy attending the Berner nomination has chiefly been her employment by Planned Parenthood and her involvement in the notorious Schiavo case as part of the team which represented Michael Schiavo in his lawsuit to withdraw nutrition and hydration from his disabled wife Terri. She has spent several years on the legal team for organized labor. And she is “married” to a female lawyer who represented Christine Blasey Ford in her effort to derail confirmation of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Now she is a federal appellate judge, for the rest of her life.

Raising a Noteworthy Alarm

THE ATTORNEYS GENERAL OF 16 STATES HAVE BECOME SO CONCERNED about legislation pending in Maine that they have co-signed a letter, developed by Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti (R), to Maine’s attorney general, writes Matt Lamb for LifeSiteNews, “warning their counterpart … about pending legislation that would reportedly turn the state into a sanctuary for abortion and the surgical and chemical mutilation of gender-confused individuals.”

The problem is, the legislation is clearly intended to lure the residents of pro-life states to Maine in a promotion of abortion tourism, among the results of the Supreme Court’s tossing abortion policy to the states rather than noticing that the right to life is guaranteed by the 5^th and 14^th amendments to the US Constitution. Legislation such as Maine’s is prompted also by the failure of Congress – and the pro-life movement – to tackle the issue of cross-border abortion facilitation. (Please read our next item, outlining the current status of the long-sought Child Interstate Abortion Notification Act, repeatedly filed in Congress but not given priority in the past several years.)

According to the AGs’ letter, as quoted by Mr. Lamb, Maine’s “‘LD-227 not only purports to shield from liability those offering or aiding the provision of unlawful services to citizens located in our states – a provision Planned Parenthood asserts would “safeguard” Maine providers and patients from “out-of-state laws that ban or restrict care that is legal in Maine.” The law also,’” notes the letter, reports Mr. Lamb, “‘creates a private right of action for damages against law enforcement, prosecutors and other officials in our states who are enforcing our own valid state laws, even laws whose constitutionality has been confirmed by federal appellate courts. On top of that,’” the attorneys general continue, “‘LD-227 purports to block valid orders and judgments from our state courts enforcing laws upheld by federal appellate courts.’ … The pending bill ‘flouts the federalist structure that allows each of our states to engage in self-government responsive to the will of our citizens,’ the letter says,” reports Mr. Lamb.

More Urgent than Ever

THE CHILD INTERSTATE ABORTION NOTIFICATION ACT has been filed in Congress repeatedly since 2005. It is pending again now in both houses, but in both House and Senate, it is resting quietly in committee. As important as it has always been, it seems to us to be even more urgent since the Dobbs ruling of the Supreme Court has stimulated a state-by-state patchwork of abortion policy. “CIANA” is an initiative of the National Right to Life Committee and would create a federal crime of transporting a minor across state lines for an abortion without the knowledge of the girl’s parents. Its current iteration was filed in February, 2023, by now House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) as HR-792 and in January of last year by Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) as S-78. Both bills are resting quietly in the Judiciary committees of their respective houses.

Rep. Mary Miller (R-IL) last June introduced a variation, reports K.D. Hastings for The Washington Stand. “H.R.4123 … would secure parental rights, which both the government and special interest groups seem intent on eroding, when an underage girl seeks an abortion. The bill, the Parental Notification and Intervention Act, would require abortion industry organizations that accept federal funding to inform the parents when a minor seeks an abortion.” Her bill has eight co-sponsors and is resting in the House Judiciary Committee. The Senate companion was filed in March, 2023, by Sen. Mike Braun and four co-sponsors as S-1103, apparently stuck in the Senate Judiciary Committee.

We offer below the names of the co-sponsors of these four bills, hoping our readers will either thank or encourage their own representatives and senators to sign on and urge action on these bills. They will not fix the whole problem being pointed out by the states’ attorneys general in the Maine proposal (see above), but they would address a problem which the Dobbs ruling has not solved.

Speaker Johnson’s co-sponsors on HR-792: GOP Representatives Robert Aderholt (AL); Doug LaMalfa (CA); Doug Lamborn (CO); Matt Gaetz & Greg Steube (FL); Rick Allen & Andrew Clyde (GA); Russ Fulcher (ID); Mary Miller (IL); Ron Estes & Tracey Mann (KS); Trent Kelly (MS); Chris Smith (NJ); Dan Bishop & David Rouzer (NC); Jeff Duncan (SC); Jodey Arrington, Brian Babin, Jake Ellzey, Ronny Jackson and Randy Weber (TX); and Bob Good (VA).

Sen. Rubio’s co-sponsors on S-78: GOP Senators Mike Crapo & James Risch (ID), Mike Braun (IN), Roger Marshall (KS), Bill Cassidy & John Kennedy (LA), Cindy Hyde-Smith & Roger Wicker (MS), Josh Hawley (MO), Steve Daines (MT), Deb Fischer & Pete Ricketts (NE), Kevin Cramer (ND), James Lankford (OK), Tim Scott (SC), John Thune (SD) and Ted Cruz (TX).

Rep. Miller’s co-sponsors on HR-4123: GOP Representatives Eli Crane, Paul Gosar & Debbie Lesko (AZ); Doug LaMalfa (CA); Lauren Boebert (CO); Jim Banks (IN); Diana Harshbarger (TN) and Alex Mooney (WV).

Sen. Braun’s co-sponsors on S-1103: GOP Senators Katie Britt (AL), Marco Rubio & Rick Scott (FL) and Roger Wicker (MS).

Opening Eyes to Reality in Human Development

TENNESSEE STATE LAWMAKERS ARE WORKING ON A BILL to require public schools to expose their students, reports Calvin Freiburger for LifeSiteNews, “to fetal development information complete with video illustration, as part of a multi-state trend,” he writes, “that could dramatically shift the culture’s understanding of abortion.” What a concept! Public schools offering truth!

The bill is titled the “Baby Olivia Act,” after the name of an educational film (Meet Baby Olivia) which, notes Mr. Freiburger, citing the film’s developer Live Action as source “is an animated video which ‘provides a medically accurate animated glimpse of human life from the moment of fertilization’ and ‘details her growth as she progresses from one developmental stage to the next, in preparation for her continued life outside the womb.’”

The video may be viewed by the public at the website https://babyolivia.liveaction.org.

The Tennessee proposal has emerged from committee in a legislature where, notes Mr. Freiburger, “Republicans have strong majorities in both chambers …, and Republican Gov. Bill Lee has established a consistent pro-life record, so the bill’s prospects for becoming law are strong. … Similar legislation is also being advanced,” writes Mr. Freiburger, “in Iowa and West Virginia.” And he goes on to report, “Live Action notes it has also been introduced in Kentucky, Missouri and Virginia and enacted in North Dakota.”

Readers are encouraged to bring the proposal and the underlying video to the attention of pro-life state lawmakers of their acquaintance. “Making it standard practice to give public school students a clear understanding that the preborn are living human children early in their development has significant potential,” writes Mr. Freiburger, “to provoke the next generation of Americans to better recognize exactly who it is that abortion destroys.” It can be especially effective when shown to those who are still young enough to approach the question of human development with both an open mind and an open heart.

Death Merchants

THOUGH FORECAST SEVERAL MONTHS AGO, the time has come, reports John Stonestreet in BreakPoint, for the abortion drug RU-486 (mifepristone) to be marketed by Walgreens and CVS.

“Walgreens plans to sell the pill at locations in New York, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, California and Illinois,” writes Mr. Stonestreet, “with hopes to expand to other locations and states soon. CVS will offer the pill in Massachusetts and Rhode Island and then expand to other states.”

According to a Guttmacher Institute study reported by National Review, “Chemical abortions accounted for 63% of all abortions last year, up from 53% in 2020 and 39% in 2017.”

By selling this drug, these firms are abetting the poisoning of unborn would-have-been future customers. Let us pray their executives and/or shareholders reconsider this tragic decision.

Misplaced Priority

A RESOLUTION HAS BEEN FILED in both the US House and the Senate to recognize a specific date in March each year as “Abortion Provider Appreciation Day.” Chief sponsor of HRConRes-95 is Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), joined by 18 co-sponsors. In the Senate, SConRes-30 was filed by Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-HI); she has secured 15 co-sponsors. Both resolutions have been referred to committee and appear to be buried there. We have no doubt they were filed for political and fundraising purposes with no true intention of adoption; the day has already passed in 2024 to commemorate such merchants of death.

Of course, the resolutions’ authors incorporated more rhetoric into the resolution than a mere huzzah to baby aborters. Included was a charge, reports Ben Johnson for The Washington Stand, that “‘the effects of the Dobbs decision were immediate and disastrous.’ … Dobbs has been ‘unleashing devastation’ on the abortion industry by making it ‘increasingly difficult’ for ‘individuals [note the lack of the term women] who can become pregnant’ to receive ‘essential and time-sensitive care.’

“The legislation complains,” notes Mr. Johnson, “that, thanks to the issue of abortion being returned to the democratic control of the people, pro-life laws have been enacted in states populated by ‘1 in 3 women of reproductive age, plus more trans and nonbinary people.’ …

“The resolution would take Supreme Court justices to task,” reports Mr. Johnson, “as Pres. Biden did during his most recent State of the Union address, by establishing the sense of Congress that ‘the Supreme Court of the United States erroneously overturned Roe v. Wade.’”

Thinking it might be useful for our readers to know which of their elected officials have endorsed such a resolution, we list them here: Cosponsoring with Sen. Hirono are Democratic Senators Laphonza Butler & Alex Padilla (CA), Richard Blumenthal & Christopher Murphy (CT), Tammy Duckworth (IL), Edward Markey & Elizabeth Warren (MA), Gary Peters (MI), Tina Smith (MN), Cory Booker (NJ), Martin Heinrich (NM), Ron Wyden (OR), John Fetterman (PA), Peter Welch (VT) and Patty Murray (WA).

House sponsor Pressley was joined by Democratic Representatives Raul Grijalva (AZ); Sydney Kamlager-Dove, Adam Schiff & Eric Swalwell (CA); Diana DeGette (CO); Nikema Williams (GA); Raja Krishnamoorthi & Delia Ramirez (IL); Cori Bush (MO); Daniel Goldman, Grace Meng, Joseph Morelle, Jerrold Nadler & Nydia Velazquez (NY); Kathy Manning & Deborah Ross (NC); and Lloyd Doggett & Veronica Escobar (TX).

Senate Voting Record

On Confirmation of Nicole Berner as Judge of the 4^th Circuit Court of Appeals – March 19, 2024 – Confirmed 50 to 47 (Democrats in italics)

Voting “no” – pro-Life: Britt & Tuberville (AL), Murkowski & Sullivan (AK), Boozman & Cotton (AR), Rubio & Scott (FL), Crapo (ID), Braun & Young (IN), Ernst & Grassley (IA), Marshall & Moran (KS), McConnell & Paul (KY), Cassidy & Kennedy (LA), Collins (ME), Hyde-Smith & Wicker (MS), Hawley & Schmitt (MO), Daines (MT), Fischer & Ricketts (NE), Budd & Tillis (NC), Cramer & Hoeven (ND), Vance (OH), Lankford (OK), Scott (SC), Rounds & Thune (SD), Blackburn & Hagerty (TN), Cornyn & Cruz (TX), Lee & Romney (UT), Capito & Manchin (WV), Johnson (WI), Barrasso & Lummis (WY).

Voting “yes” – anti-Life: Kelly & Sinema (AZ), Butler & Padilla (CA), Bennet & Hickenlooper (CO), Blumenthal & Murphy (CT), Carper & Coons (DE), Ossoff & Warnock (GA), Hirono & Schatz (HI), Duckworth & Durbin (IL), King (ME), Cardin & VanHollen (MD), Markey & Warren (MA), Peters & Stabenow (MI), Klobuchar & Smith (MN), Tester (MT), Cortez-Masto & Rosen (NV), Hassan & Shaheen (NH), Booker & Menendez (NJ), Heinrich & Lujan (NM), Gillibrand & Schumer (NY), Brown (OH), Merkley & Wyden (OR), Casey & Fetterman (PA), Reed & Whitehouse (RI), Sanders & Welch (VT), Kaine & Warner (VA), Cantwell & Murray (WA), Baldwin (WI).

Not voting: Risch (ID), Mullin (OK) & Graham (SC).