Life Advocacy Briefing

Bringing Aborters Back to the Trough?

THE G.O.P. HOUSE MAJORITY HAVE ELECTED TO DODGE CONTROVERSY in the budget reconciliation proposal being advanced to fund the government. The controversy being avoided? Extension of last year’s explicit exclusion of Planned Parenthood from eligibility for Medicaid spending.

“‘That’s a terrible decision on the part of House leadership,’ Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) told The Hill,” report The Hill Healthcare newsletter writers Joseph Choi  and Nathaniel Weixel. “‘I can’t wait to hear the explanation for that. But it’s absolutely terrible.’”

One explanation could be the reluctance of certain GOP Senators – certainly not Sen. Hawley – to take any action which could jeopardize their support by Planned Parenthood’s political arm. (Sen. Collins, perhaps? Or Sen. Murkowski? Both are facing re-election this year and have mixed voting records at best when asked to stand up to the abortion lobby.)

Another explanation could be that House Republicans themselves are untested on the abortion question after a 2024 election season in which their strategists counseled them to avoid the issue at all costs. Could it be that House GOP Leadership have found that some of their more abortion-bashful Members are not actually pro-life? In the 18 months since their election – and in their campaigns in 2024 – their commitment has not been tested.

House Budget Chairman Jodey Arrington (R-TX) had this explanation in the Choi/Weixel report: “‘The clock was our greatest threat to the broader opportunities. … Introduce that, then you’re going to have a whole set of moving parts.’”

Pro-life voters need to weigh in now with their Congressional nominees of either party: Where do you stand on the right to Life for Americans yet unborn?

The Fight Is Worth It

SOMETIMES PRO-LIFE CITIZENS HAVE CAUSE TO WONDER: What is the point of passing pro-life laws under which prosecutors take no action. (Example: Has anyone ever heard of a prosecution – anywhere – under the federal Partial-birth Abortion Ban Act?) A story out of Florida caught our eye as an example where a hard-won federal statute has saved a life.

“Thanks to the efforts of Liberty Counsel [LC],” writes LifeSiteNews reporter Calvin Freiburger, “a teenage mother in Florida was not forced to go through with an unwanted abortion orchestrated by a family member.” Thanks also to the Members of Congress – House and Senate – who enacted in 2004 the Unborn Victims of Violence Act a/k/a “Laci & Conner’s Law.”

“LC reported July 17,” writes Mr. Freiburger, “that the [pregnant teenage] girl and her boyfriend, who remain anonymous, planned to choose Life for their baby girl, but a relative had other ideas. Because most abortions are illegal under Florida’s Heartbeat Law, the relative attempted to coerce the teen mother into traveling to radically pro-abortion Illinois,” notes Mr. Freiburger, “going so far as to secure travel and hotel arrangements with financial assistance from the Chicago Abortion Fund (CAF), which allegedly continued cooperating even after being told that the abortion would be against the mother’s will.”

The child’s father, notes LifeSiteNews, “reached out to LC for help in November, and LC quickly coordinated with the Florida Attorney General’s Office to present the mother’s family with a demand letter warning them that it was a federal crime under the Unborn Victims of Violence Act to kill a preborn baby against the wishes of her mother. The family backed down,” writes Mr. Freiburger, “and the baby girl has since been born healthy and safe.”

Kudos to then-Rep. Melissa Hart (R-PA), who sponsored the legislation, and to all who voted for it. Y’all have saved the life of a precious baby in Florida. Prevention is even better than prosecution.

Kudos, too, to the state lawmakers who over the years have taken the time and effort to establish Life as a principle in every one of the 50 states, even if the federal government shies away from the right to Life established in the Declaration of Independence. “‘Forcing a woman to have an abortion – including a minor – is illegal in all 50 states of the United States of America,’ according to the Justice Foundation’s Center Against Forced Abortions,” notes Mr. Freiburger. And that non-profit center, he writes, “offers a variety of information resources to help those who are being pressured into killing their babies.”

One Way to Respond to a Mandate

WHEN ILLINOIS IN 2025 ENACTED A LAW requiring state colleges and universities, notes Calvin Freiburger for LifeSiteNews, “to make abortion pills available on college campuses,” the politicians likely did not anticipate the response from one of the leading state universities.

“Public records indicate,” writes Mr. Freiburger, “Illinois State University (ISU) has purchased a single abortion pill, in an apparent effort to do the bare minimum to satisfy” the new law.

The LSN report cites as its source a website called The College Fix, which is characterized on the web as a “right-wing news website focused on issues of degree-oriented tertiary education.”

“The College Fix reports,” Mr. Freiburger writes, “that it has reviewed an ISU invoice indicating that, just one month after the law was signed, it purchased a single dose of mifepristone. It also found its mandatory informational notice is similarly sparse, with a brief statement that ‘referral to a tertiary care facility for students seeking medication abortion is available’ and ‘on-campus pharmacy fills contraception prescriptions and medication abortion prescriptions for enrolled students’ on the Student Health Services website’s Pharmacy page.

“The Fix adds that ISU did not respond to comments about the invoice, how many abortion pills it currently possesses, what other arrangements (if any) it has for facilitating abortions or what life-affirming alternative services it offers to pregnant students. The Fix previously found,” Mr. Freiburger writes, “that no public universities in Illinois offer prenatal care.”

Still, the seeming ISU response to the legislature and governor forcing the institution to abet the killing of unborn children could represent an encouraging refusal to be implicated in the deaths of innocent future students. And it ought to bring smiles to frustrated Illinois taxpaying citizens.

A Victory in Michigan

A FEDERAL DISTRICT JUDGE IN MICHIGAN HAS GRANTED a preliminary injunction to two Michigan pro-life groups, reports Katherine Dailey for MichiganAdvance.com, “in their challenge to a state employment law that would require them to recruit and hire candidates with beliefs on abortion that do not align with the groups, as well as requiring them to cover abortion care [sic] in employee pregnancy benefits plans.”

The plaintiffs: Right to Life of Michigan and the Pregnancy Resource Center in Grand Rapids. The defendants: Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, the state’s Department of Civil Rights and members of the state’s Civil Rights Commission.

Federal District Judge Robert J. Jonker, who was appointed by President George W. Bush, wrote in responding to the suit, writes Ms. Dailey, “‘Plaintiffs are likely to receive the relief they sought from this litigation.’”

The state’s radical attorney general apparently plans to pursue the matter “‘in future proceedings,’” writes Ms. Dailey, quoting Ms. Nessel’s spokesman.

Standing Up

SEN. JOSH HAWLEY (R-MO) IS NOT THE ONLY D.C. LAWMAKER to be calling on the Administration to defend the unborn. His colleague, Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) and House Pro-Life Caucus Chairman Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) have spearheaded a letter signed by more than 50 Members of Congress and Senate, reports Calvin Freiburger for LifeSiteNews (LSN), “urging Acting US Atty. Gen. Todd Blanche to investigate the remains of unborn babies discarded years ago by an abortion facility in the nation’s capital for possible cases of infanticide that so far have evaded justice.

“In 2022, the group Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising (PAAU) discovered the remains,” notes Mr. Freiburger, “of five aborted babies in a crate outside the Washington Surgi-Clinic in DC, operated by notorious late-term abortionist Cesare Santangelo. While the authorities refused to investigate, an initial medical examination indicated that some of them died by infanticide and partial-birth abortion, both of which are illegal. But instead of investigating, the federal government [under then-President Joe Biden] took action against the pro-lifers who exposed them.”

“‘For four years, Members of Congress have remained alarmed at this clear violation of life and law, but the Biden Administration Dept. of Justice refused to act,’ the letter reads,” as presented in the LSN report. “‘We cannot undo the grievous, barbaric acts that killed these children in their most vulnerable stage, but we equally cannot allow such lawlessness and inhumanity to evade our justice system any longer. Under Pres. Trump’s and your leadership, we are hopeful that these children will finally receive the justice they deserve.’” Amen.

Sen. Hawley Persists

ATTORNEY GENERAL-NOMINEE TODD BLANCHE’s NOMINATION HEARING before the Senate Judiciary Committee has generated a perhaps-unexpected focus on the illegal – but ignored – use of the US mail to ship abortion drugs, thanks to Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO), who followed up the hearing with a letter to the nominee. With appreciation to the dog-with-a-bone Senator, we publish his letter here:

Dear Acting Attorney General Blanche:

             I write to refer to the Dept. of Justice new information my office has received concerning an organized international effort to profit from the violation of state and federal law. I believe these activities warrant criminal investigation.

             At the center of the effort is an entity called Plan C, a left-wing dark-money operation that styles itself a “public health information campaign” but functions, in practice, as the referral and logistics hub for shipping abortion drugs into states whose laws prohibit it.

             Plan C does not operate alone. Danco Laboratories, a large and wildly profitable manufacturer of mifepristone, lists Plan C among the patient resources on its own website, steering prospective customers to an organization that instructs Americans on how to break the law. On information and belief, GenBioPro, the generic manufacturer, maintains a similar referral relationship with Plan C. The Department is well positioned to determine the full extent of these relationships, including any financial ties.

             Consider what Plan C does, much of it in its own words:

• Florida, Oklahoma and Texas each specifically prohibit providers from mailing abortion drugs to patients. Plan C nonetheless directs residents in all three states to obtain pills by mail, including from two foreign clinics that ship mifepristone to US addresses from abroad. Plan C warns that using these clinics carries “possible legal risk.”

• Plan C likewise directs residents of those states to e-commerce websites that sell and ship dangerous pills with no prescription, no identification and no medical consultation of any kind. By Plan C’s own description, these websites “sell generic abortion pills that are not regulated or inspected by the US government,” and “Plan C tests these websites by buying pills from them.”

• Plan C coaches its users in how to evade the law. Its website instructs users to protect their “digital footprint” against investigations, recommending privacy-enabled browsers, virtual private networks and encrypted email. Its own FAQ acknowledges that people face legal jeopardy for obtaining pills through the services it lists and tells readers it is “up to every individual to decide what level of legal risk they are willing to take.”

• Plan C steers women to providers willing to mail pills as late as 14 weeks into pregnancy. That is a month beyond the 10-week limit in FDA’s own approved labeling and risk-mitigation program, and far beyond the limits enacted by states such as Florida and Iowa.

             This conduct squarely implicates federal criminal law. The Federal Food, Drug & Cosmetic Act prohibits introducing unapproved and misbranded drugs into interstate commerce and dispensing prescription drugs without a valid prescription. Criminal anti-smuggling statutes likewise cover the importation of these unregulated foreign pills. And an organization implicates federal conspiracy statutes and aiding-and-abetting provisions when it openly announces its intent to deliver drugs into states whose laws forbid it, coordinating the suppliers, vendors and carriers needed to accomplish that end.

             I therefore respectfully refer this matter to the Department to open a criminal investigation into Plan C, its relationship with potential co-conspirator manufacturers and the network of suppliers it promotes. That includes the foreign clinics and no-prescription vendors shipping drugs into the United States.

             I appreciated your recent comments before the Senate Judiciary Committee regarding the right of the states to enforce their duly enacted laws, as well as your promise that the Department will protect vulnerable women from criminals who would prey upon them. In that vein, this coordinated effort between Plan C and the abortion drug manufacturers to violate state law at the expense of women’s health deserves the closest scrutiny. I thank you for your prompt attention to this referral.

             Sincerely, Josh Hawley, United States Senator

There He Goes Again

DURING THE CONFIRMATION HEARING for Dr. Erica Schwartz, nominee for director of the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC), Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) “raised the matter of abortion data collection and analysis, which the CDC paused in November without explanation,” writes Calvin Freiburger for LifeSiteNews (LSN), “and asked if she would ‘commit to trying to get as much information – again, to collect the data on the number and circumstances of abortions – as is provided for in this system.’

“‘Senator, you have my commitment,’ [Dr.] Schwartz answered,” reported by LSN. “‘Abortion surveillance is an absolutely critical component of what the CDC is currently doing. To your point, it may be moved to another agency in Health & Human Services. But I also want to also make sure that certain states are not conflating emergency services and hiding abortions in that “emergency services” case definition,’ she added. ‘We need to make sure we’re pulling out true abortions and making sure that we’re really having clear case definitions regarding abortions, so the data is actually accurate.’” (We find that answer to be about as clear as mud, but hopefully Sen. Hawley will persist.)

That might be harder to do than it appears. Just 44 states and the District of Columbia, according to the Guttmacher Institute, cited as source by LSN, “have ‘some form’ of abortion reporting requirements, but there is no uniform nationwide standard. The CDC has acknowledged that it only collects abortion data voluntarily submitted by states, whose reporting rules vary significantly. California, Maryland and New Hampshire – three states that are significantly pro-abortion – have historically submitted no data whatsoever, further limiting the public’s understanding of the frequency of things such as late-term abortion and abortion complications.”

This lack of reported data – or even the reporting of unreliable data – has immense implications for the public’s grasp of legalized abortion as a significant cost to society. One of the approaches advocated for pro-life communicators by Life Advocacy Resource Project is the exposure of the fact – yes, fact – that abortion is the leading cause of death in America and in each state where it is legal. The abortion death toll, acknowledging that every abortion costs our society a living human being, is shocking as compared to such publicly recognized “leading causes of death” as heart disease and cancer. Abortion outranks them all, but the CDC’s recent shutting off of the data from public view is truly unhelpful to the informing of public opinion.

Welcome, Sen. Graham

DARLINE NORDONE, NEE GRAHAM (R), TOOK THE OATH OF OFFICE on Wednesday, July 14, to succeed her late brother, Sen. Lindsey Graham. As Senator, she is using her maiden name and is now known as Sen. Darline Graham. She has reportedly “inherited” her brother’s staff and has announced that she will be seeking the GOP nomination in a special primary election to be held on Aug. 11 for election in November to a full six-year Senate term. Her brother had secured that nomination in a regularly called primary earlier this year. She is widely expected to carry on her brother’s policy commitments, including his devotion to the cause of Life.

Mr. Hyde Lifts the Hearts of Hearers

We are nearing the close of our paragraph-by-paragraph reprinting of the Sept. 19, 1996, speech by Rep. Henry J. Hyde to the House of Representatives, in which he called for the House to override Pres. Clinton’s veto of the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act, HR-1833. Rep. Hyde has long been seen as one of America’s all-time leading orators and a model communicator in the cause of Life.

             … Now, we’ve talked so much about the grotesque, permit me a word about beauty. We all have our own images of the beautiful: the face of a loved one, a dawn, a sunset, the evening star. I believe nothing in this world of wonders is more beautiful than the innocence of a child. Do you know what a child is? She’s an opportunity for love, and a handicapped child is an even greater opportunity for love.