Steven Ertelt | Oct 8, 2024 | 10:31AM | Washington, DC
Vice-presidential candidate JD Vance says that, if he’s elected, Donald Trump will fight to defund the Planned Parenthood abortion business.
During his term as president, Trump took multiple steps to revoke taxpayer funding for the largest abortion company in America. Some were successful but the abortion giant fought others in court and prevented his executive orders from being implemented to revoke funding.
“We don’t think that taxpayers should fund late-term abortions,” Vance told RealClearPolitics. “That has been a consistent view of the Trump campaign the first time around, it will remain a consistent view.”
Planned Parenthood, the nation’s largest abortion chain, has been mired in scandal after scandal, from allegations that it sold aborted baby body parts and covered up sex trafficking to accusations of “systemic racism” and pregnancy discrimination by its own employees.
Yet, the billion-dollar abortion chain receives more than $500 million tax dollars annually.
President Donald Trump and his administration have been working to block that funding, beginning his first week in office. Some efforts have been successful, while others have been thwarted by the abortion industry and activist judges. But no one can accuse the Trump administrating of doing nothing to stop Americans’ hard-earned tax dollars from supporting the largest abortion chain in America.
Here are seven ways Trump and his administration has tried to defund Planned Parenthood:
#1 Defunding International Planned Parenthood
Trump signed the Mexico City policy in one of his first acts as president. The pro-life policy prohibits international aid funds from going to groups that promote or provide abortions. The move defunded two major abortion chains of hundreds of millions of American tax dollars. The International Planned Parenthood Federation estimated a $100 million loss. Additionally, the British abortion chain Marie Stopes International was defunded by about $73 million in U.S. tax dollars.
The Mexico City policy, which began with President Ronald Reagan, historically has been supported by pro-life presidents and rescinded by pro-abortion presidents. Trump went further, though. He not only reinstated the policy but also expanded it by increasing the number of global health assistance funds and government programs that are covered under the policy.
#2 Defunding Planned Parenthood Ally UNFPA
The Trump administration stopped funding a United Nations agency linked to forced and coerced abortions. The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) “partners on family planning activities with the Chinese government agency responsible for these coercive policies,” the administration said in defense of its decision. China’s oppressive one child policy, recently changed to a two-child limit, has led to forced and coerced abortions up through nine months of pregnancy, as well as forced and coerced sterilizations.
The UNFPA has worked hand-in-hand with Planned Parenthood to promote abortion worldwide, and Planned Parenthood was caught sharing offices in China with UNFPA to promote population control.
The decision stopped at least $32.5 million tax dollars from funding the pro-abortion agency in 2017, the Associated Press reported at the time. The Trump administration redirected the funds to the U.S. Agency for International Development, which provides medical care to families across the world.
#3 Cutting Planned Parenthood Funding $60 Million
In 2019, President Donald Trump enacted a new Title X rule to ensure that the program does not indirectly fund abortions. Title X provides family planning and other health services for low-income individuals. Planned Parenthood could have complied with the rule by stopping abortions or completely separating its abortion business from its actual health services, but it refused. Instead, it prioritized abortions over women’s health. Therefore, it was defunded of about $60 million.
The abortion chain challenged the rule in court, but, in May, a federal appeals court upheld the rule.
However, some pro-abortion Democrat governors defied Trump’s effort by giving their state taxpayers’ money to Planned Parenthood instead.
#4 Cutting Planned Parenthood Funding $200 Million
A fourth effort to cut sex education funding from the abortion chain was blocked in federal court.
In 2017, the Trump administration announced plans to cut millions of dollars in grants to Planned Parenthood through the failed Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program. HHS spokesman Mark Vafiades told the New York Times last year that there is very little evidence that the program was successful. The cuts amounted to about $200 million in grants to the abortion chain and other participants.
However, Planned Parenthood sued, and a federal judge ruled in favor of the abortion chain in 2018.
#5 Helping States Defund Planned Parenthood
In 2018, Trump signed an executive order so states have more control over taxpayer funds to Planned Parenthood and other abortion groups. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced that the administration was rescinding Obama-era Medicaid guideline that limited the way states could take action against Planned Parenthood.
After Planned Parenthood was exposed for allegedly selling the body parts of aborted babies, many states wanted to revoke taxpayer funding for the abortion company. However the Obama administration made it difficult for states to do that by claiming federal control over Medicaid dollars even though states participate with their own taxpayer funds and the federal program. Trump changed that, and a number of states have since taken action to defund Planned Parenthood.
#6 Stopping Planned Parenthood Funding in Coronavirus Relief Bill
This spring, the Trump administration tried to stop Planned Parenthood from getting coronavirus relief funds meant to help struggling small businesses.
A Trump administration official told the Daily Caller that the Paycheck Protection Program included language making it “clear that the abortion industry shouldn’t be able to qualify for those funds, which are desperately needed by small businesses.”
“The interim final rule made crystal clear that an organization with Planned Parenthood’s corporate structure doesn’t qualify,” the official said.
However, the abortion chain found a loophole in the aid program, and many of its affiliates applied for and received funding. In total, Planned Parenthood received approximately $80 million.
Now, the Trump administration is demanding Planned Parenthood return the funds, and it may file criminal charges against employees of the abortion giant if they lied on the applications. Some affiliates have returned the funds, while others have refused.
#7 Helping Texas Defund Planned Parenthood
In January, the Trump administration granted Texas a waiver in its long-fought battle to defund Planned Parenthood and use tax dollars to support real women’s health care.
The waiver allowed Texas to defund Planned Parenthood and other abortion groups from its Healthy Texas Women Program. State lawmakers defunded abortion groups from the program in 2011, but the pro-abortion Obama administration retaliated by revoking federal funding. For years, Texas gave up federal funding for the program and used only state tax dollars to support Healthy Texas Women.
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) waiver reversed the Obama-era decision and restored $350 million in federal funding to the program, which provides medical care for low-income women.
Planned Parenthood’s abortion numbers are above 345,000 a year, and its annual reports show record billion-dollar revenues. Its own employees have accused it of being more concerned about money and prestige than women in need. And yet, the abortion chain continues to receive hundreds of millions of taxpayer funds each year. With pro-abortion Democrats in control of the U.S. House, that likely will continue – unless Americans vote in pro-life leaders in November.
You can find this article at Life News.
Jonathan Alexandre | Sep 30, 2024 | 6:31PM | Washington, DC
With less than six weeks until the presidential election, every word a candidate says is crucial. But as of late, Kamala Harris is reticent to comment on her actual policy positions or speak unscripted to the press, as she attempts to fabricate a persona based on “vibes” rather than policy or political record.
Besides being a part of the Biden-Harris White House for the past four years, one must go back to her pre-vice-presidency days to uncover her radical statements on controversial topics like gun control, fracking, reparations, and economic policy. But there is one policy position Harris is unafraid to shout from the rooftops: abortion.
The bottom line with Kamala Harris and the Democrats of today is their relentless support of the so-called “right” and “freedom” to kill children in the womb. Harris never shrinks away from spouting off the lengths she would go to enshrine the ability to destroy the preborn under the guise of “health care.” This is the driving force of the modern-day Democratic Party and the focal point of Harris’s political trajectory.
In a radio interview on Tuesday, Harris doubled down in her support of killing preborn babies, going so far as to say it’s worth ending the Senate filibuster over this issue.
“I think we should eliminate the filibuster for Roe,” she said, “And get us to the point where 51 votes would be what we need to actually put back in law the protections for reproductive freedom and for the ability of every person and every woman to make decisions about their own body and not have their government tell them what to do.”
This rhetoric is dangerous, no doubt, but what’s most concerning is that though calling for the end of the filibuster is nothing new for far-Left Democrats, Harris may just be radical enough to do it.
It’s hard to overstate the filibuster’s role in safeguarding from tyranny in American government. The 60-vote filibuster threshold, or three-fifths of the 100-seat Senate, requires members to negotiate,
deliberate, build consensus, and work to find the sense of the people.
One of the longest-standing traditions in U.S. government, the filibuster is a sort of “cooling” function for heated policy debates that finds the middle ground, gives the minority a voice, and prevents mob rule. It provides a way to prolong debate (sometimes by “talking a bill to death”) and delay or stop a vote on an issue.
The filibuster is to the legislative branch what the Electoral College is to national elections. It’s a pivotal foundation put in place for a purpose and prohibits unrestrained power from one person or population.
Democrat-turned-Independent Senator Joe Manchin (W.Va.) said he won’t endorse Harris because of her filibuster position. “Shame on her,” he said. “She knows the filibuster is the Holy Grail of democracy. It’s the only thing that keeps us talking and working together.”
If eliminated, the legislature would no longer be a check on the president’s policies but would instead be a political pawn in the hands of a tyrant. A filibuster-less Senate would essentially rubber-stamp the agenda of a same-party president and remove one of the key “checks and balances” to restrain power. This is a dangerous and shortsighted path to travel down for a litany of reasons.
If Harris would eliminate the filibuster to impose unrestricted abortion nationwide by codifying Roe v. Wade, there would be no reason for her not to use it to force other radical agenda items in Congress, such as:
From becoming the Democratic nominee without earning a single primary vote to pledging to eliminate the filibuster, Kamala has proved she is willing to push through her radical agenda, regardless of the will of those she governs, or the guardrails set in place. Instead of following the time-tested process essential to the functioning of our constitutional republic, Harris would rather take a sledgehammer to the filibuster and slash the opposition, destroying government as we know it.
We are treading on a slippery slope at the edge of a cliff. It won’t stop here, and Harris has made it resoundingly clear throughout her career that she will stop at nothing to force her priorities through without any regard to the Constitution, Congress, or the country, much like her running mate, Tim Walz. The American people must make it resoundingly clear in November that we will have no part in this radical restructuring of government or the policies that come with it.
This article can be found on the Life News website.
Since the fall of Roe v. Wade, horror stories have emerged from multiple media outlets, as well as claims from high ranking politicians, alleging that state protections for living preborn babies have created confusion for women experiencing natural miscarriages.
The media narrative suggests that somehow pro-life laws are to blame when women cannot get the health care they need. But while the media suggests that doctors in multiple states are “confused” and putting women at risk, the nation’s largest abortion chain —Planned Parenthood — is not confused at all, and is offering miscarriage care in these same states.
According to Live Action News’ research, at this time, Planned Parenthood has facilities offering miscarriage care in 11 of the 14 states that have the most pro-life protections in place (Alabama, Arkansas, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, and West Virginia).
Since this article has so much information in it, I have chosen not to paste the entire article on our page.
The first debate between former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris took place Tuesday night on ABC News with the two candidates facing off on numerous pressing issues, including abortion. Multiple times, misinformation was shared regarding the current state of abortion laws in the United States — including abortion in cases of medical emergencies and cases of infanticide. Aside from the usual false rhetoric about “Trump’s abortion bans” (which are both figments of the imagination and propaganda), here are four lies told regarding abortion during the debate:
Truth: Abortion is legal for any reason up to birth in nine states and DC.
After being asked to discuss his position on abortion, Trump claimed that pro-abortion politicians want abortion to be legal “in the ninth month.”
Harris responded to that comment, saying, “I absolutely support reinstating the protections of Roe v. Wade, and as you [pointing to moderator and sorority sister Linsey Davis] rightly mentioned, nowhere in America is a woman carrying a pregnancy to term and asking for an abortion. That is not happening; it’s insulting to the women of America.”
But this is inaccurate.
Abortion is legal through nine months of pregnancy for any reason in nine states plus Washington, D.C. Those states are Alaska, Vermont, Oregon, New Mexico, Colorado, Minnesota, Michigan, Maryland, and New Jersey. Even more states than this will allow abortions up to birth for certain other reasons, such as to preserve the life or the very broad “health” of the mother. And women are having abortions late in pregnancy for a multitude of reasons that are not related to their health.
As writer Sarah Terzo reported just hours before the debate, an example of this exact situation was shared in the book, “Why I am an Abortion Doctor,” written by abortionist Suzanne Poppema, who was a board member of the National Abortion Federation at the time. Poppema wrote about a woman who came to her abortion business in active labor with a full-term baby. She wrote:
The staff woman told me that there was ‘something weird’ in the woman’s vagina and that should couldn’t find the cervix. This poor woman was writhing on the examination table with fluid here and there, dripping all over the place. The diagnosis was obvious.
The woman was nine months pregnant and in labor and the “something weird” was the baby’s head, which the medical professional at the abortion facility was too undereducated to realize.
Poppema told the woman she was in labor, and the woman replied, “But I can’t have a baby. I won’t have a baby.”
This isn’t the only case of a woman going in for an abortion late in pregnancy. Thousands of children are aborted after 21 weeks — so far, the youngest surviving age of a premature baby — every year. Using data compiled by both the Guttmacher Institute and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Live Action research fellow Carole Novielli reported that abortions committed after 21 weeks are estimated to have been committed on 10,370 preborn babies in 2023. That’s a national death toll of 28 preborn babies older than 21 weeks every single day.
Read more here.
Truth: ‘After birth abortion’ does occur, and three states have loopholes that allow it.
At one point, debate moderator Davis inappropriately jumped in to debate Trump, telling him, “There is no state in this country where it is legal to kill a baby after it’s born.” She is incorrect.
Colorado, Michigan, and California have all recently enacted laws that include the term “pregnancy outcomes.” These states have moved to make abortion a “right” and allow women to make choices about abortion based on undefined “pregnancy outcomes.” The vague term could encompass situations like birth, miscarriage, abortion, and even death after birth.
Since these “outcomes” are not defined, a post-birth death that is caused deliberately or even by negligence is not excluded.
“Under the rules proposed by this bill, if a child is delivered alive during an abortion the doctors are under no legal compulsion to provide standard medical care as they would in any other circumstance and attempt to preserve the child’s life,” explained Live Action’s VP of Communications and Director of Government Affairs, Noah Brandt. “Medical providers would listen to the mother’s instructions, which could include not providing life-sustaining medical care to the child, which would lead to the child’s death, which most reasonable people would consider infanticide.”
In addition, just because it is illegal in many states to kill a newborn baby doesn’t mean it isn’t happening and that abortion advocates don’t support it. Abortionist Kermit Gosnell is in prison currently for actively killing babies who survived his abortion procedures. But he’s not the only one to carry out such horrific acts. Douglas Karpen has been called the “Texas Gosnell,” with claims of infanticide being leveled against him. Abortion advocates will deny that abortion survivors exist at all, but they do.
And what’s worse, pro-abortion politicians have consistently voted down laws to protect abortion survivors from infanticide and medical neglect. Records show that at least 220 children survived abortions from 1999-2023, in eight states alone. Since there are no federal abortion reporting requirements, and because only a handful of states even report abortion survivors, this number is likely much higher — and the fate of the infants is most often death by neglect (a decision to provide no life-sustaining care).
Read more here.
Truth: No pro-life law prohibits legitimate health care.
Harris claimed during the debate, “… Trump abortion bans… make it criminal for a doctor or nurse to provide health care. In one state, it provides prison for life. I have talked with women around our country. You want to talk about, ‘This is what people wanted?’ Pregnant women who want to carry a pregnancy to term suffering from a miscarriage being denied care in an emergency room because the health care providers are afraid they might go to jail and she’s bleeding out in a car in the parking lot. She didn’t want that. Her husband didn’t want that.”
None of the traumatic stories the media and abortion advocates have promoted in the last two years required induced abortion (intentional killing of a preborn child) as the standard of care for resolving the condition. Women are not being denied treatment for ectopic pregnancy, pregnancy complications, or miscarriage, as Harris claims, because of pro-life laws. These laws all hold exceptions for ectopic pregnancy and the life of the mother and do not include miscarriage treatment (such as the administration of a drug or a D&C after the accidental death of a child in the womb) in their definitions of abortion.
No woman who claims she was ‘forced’ to travel out of state for an abortion actually needed an induced abortion. Every story in the media of a woman denied a so-called ‘medically necessary’ abortion or ‘forced’ to travel for a ‘medically necessary’ abortion has been proven to be misleading and false. No pregnancy complication requires the preborn baby to be deliberately killed prior to an emergency delivery. Read more on that here, here, and here.
In addition, one story of a Texas woman allegedly denied miscarriage care was also proven to be inaccurate. Miscarriages are treated in pro-life states, but because of the lies being spread by pro-abortion media and politicians, women suffering miscarriage are being misled to believe that unless they are offered immediate, emergency surgery, that they are not receiving the standard of care for miscarriage. This is entirely false. Read more on that here.
Pro-life laws ban one thing: the direct and intentional killing of a preborn child in which the desired result of the procedure is a dead baby.
Truth: No pro-life law prohibits IVF.
During the debate, Harris claimed, “Understand what is happening under Donald Trump’s abortion bans. Couples who pray and dream of having a family are being denied IVF treatments.”
This claim was born from a decision made by the Alabama Supreme Court (which had nothing whatsoever to do with any sort of “abortion ban”), which ruled in February that human embryos created via IVF are to be considered children under the state’s Wrongful Death of a Minor Act. The ruling — in the case of parents suing over the destruction of their embryos — went no further than that, and stated that if embryos are destroyed in an IVF clinic by accident or without the permission of the parents, those parents are legally allowed to file a lawsuit under the Wrongful Death of a Minor Act.
It did not give personhood to embryos, and no fertility clinic in the state was told to cease operations.
Despite this, fertility clinics temporarily ceased IVF treatments while they determined if they could continue practicing IVF knowing the large number of embryos that are destroyed as a standard part of the IVF process. Read more on the mass destruction of embryos during IVF procedures here.
IVF treatments are still widely available in the United States, though pro-lifers considering using the technology should reconsider for these reasons.
This article is available at: Four pro-abortion lies from the presidential debate (liveaction.org)
At last night’s presidential debate, Donald Trump explained why he opposed a pro-abortion ballot initiative in Florida:
“ … they have abortion in the ninth month … you can look at the governor of West Virginia [Virginia], the previous governor… not the current governor, whose doing an excellent job, but the governor before, he said, ‘The baby will be born, and we will decide what to do with the baby,’ in other words we’ll execute the baby.”
ABC debate moderator, Linsey Davis, quickly corrected Trump with a false debate fact check:
“There is no state in this country where it is legal to kill a baby after it’s born.”
Set aside that neither debate moderator fact-checked any of the many false assertions made by Kamala Harris. Is Ms. Davis correct?
Yes and no. In typical Trump fashion, the former president used hyperbole in the use of the verb ‘execute.’ What typically occurs in these tragic circumstances is a lack of care. The baby who survives an abortion is left to die.
If the definition of execute is ‘put to death,’ that is effectively what happens when the human being who survives an abortion is deprived of care. Five such babies were allowed to die under Tim Walz’s watch as Governor of Minnesota after they survived ‘botched’ abortions.
So what did Governor Walz do about it? He had the legislature, controlled by his pro-abortion party, change the law to cover his tracks. You can see the redactions below:
Sec 56. Minnesota Statutes 2022 section 145.423, subdivision 1, is amended to read:
Subdivision 1. Recognition; medical care.A born aliveAn infantas a result of an abortionwho is born alive shall be fully recognized as a human person, and accorded immediate protection under the law. All reasonable measures consistent with good medical practice, including the compilation of appropriate medical records, shall be taken by the responsible medical personnel topreserve the life and health of the born-alive infantcare for the infant who is born alive.
EFFECTIVE DATE. This section is effective the day following final enactment.
Notice the intent:
Two of the babies allowed to die under Tim Walz’s watch received ‘comfort’ care instead of authentic medical care intended to preserve the life and health of the born-alive infant.
Was this an execution? You decide. The result was the same. These outcomes amplified former Virginia Governor Ralph Northum’s statement on the subject in 2019:
“The infant would be delivered. The infant would be kept comfortable. The infant would be resuscitated if that’s what the mother and the family desired. And then a discussion would ensue between the physicians and the mother.”
Did you pick up on the word ‘comfortable’? If the family decided their baby wasn’t worth keeping, under Democrats’ abortion-without-limits regime, the baby would be allowed to die by withholding life-saving care.
The Merriam-Webster’s third definition of the verb, ‘execute,’ is to put someone to death. That is what Ralph Northum, Tim Walz, Kamala Harris, and their entire political party allows … and with which it is clearly ‘comfortable.’
We don’t understate the use of the word ‘comfortable.’
In response to Northum’s remarks, Republicans crafted legislation to address the plight of babies who survive their abortions.
It does 5 things:
1. Creates criminal penalties for doctors who withhold medical care to babies who survive an abortion attempt.
2. Mandates that these survivors be transported from the abortion clinic to a real hospital for medical treatment.
3. Mandates that these health-care practitioners report violations.
4. Grants women cause for action against her abortionist.
5. Protects mothers from prosecution.
Democrats unanimously opposed the bill each time Republicans introduced it (in the 114th, 115th, 116th, 117th, and 118th Congresses).
It seems the Abortion Party wants to let abortion ‘doctors’ off the hook.
In 2019 in New York, the legislature wiped way practically all abortion restrictions with the Reproductive Health Act. Significantly, the law moved abortion regulations from the state’s criminal code to the health code, thereby eliminating the threat of legal repercussions for abortion providers.
So when Linsey Davis said, “There is no state in this country where it is legal to kill a baby after it’s born,” that’s a false debate fact check.
So who fact-checks Linsey Davis? Pulse Life Advocates.
W. James Antle III
Aug 28, 2024
When Rudy Giuliani ran for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination, he had already flip-flopped on abortion once. Having switched from pro-life to pro-choice in his first New York City mayoral campaign, he didn’t think he could plausibly change back for the Republican presidential primaries.
Still basking in the glow of being “America’s Mayor” on 9/11, Giuliani sought the presidential nomination of a pro-life party as a pro-choice candidate. But he did make a few modifications to his position: He defended the partial-birth abortion ban, which he had opposed during his short-lived 2000 Senate campaign in New York, backed parental notification laws, and vowed to appoint “strict constructionists” to the Supreme Court who might someday vote to overturn Roe v. Wade.
Giuliani sat atop the national polls for most of 2007, making him the Republican frontrunner. But his pro-choice position ultimately proved fatal, as it informed his disastrous political strategy of skipping the early states. Iowa and South Carolina were too socially conservative for a New York abortion rights advocate. New Hampshire might have more fertile ground, but he feared losing to Mitt Romney, then of neighboring Massachusetts.
Romney switched from pro-choice to pro-life and was rewarded with the Republican presidential nomination four years later. (He would later have to switch states from Massachusetts to Utah to continue his political career, but that’s another story.) So did Donald Trump four years after that.
Unlike Romney, Trump was elected president. And unlike Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and George W. Bush, the judges Trump appointed did overturn Roe v. Wade. If Robert Bork as well as Clarence Thomas had been confirmed, it might have happened 30 years earlier—but he wasn’t, and it didn’t.
All this history comes in the context of the first post-Roe presidential race. Trump is panicking about abortion. And pro-lifers are panicking about Trump.
Trump has gone too far in using phrases like “reproductive rights” to describe abortion (though he might have meant IVF, which is different, though it raises its own set of pro-life ethical issues). He excessively diluted the pro-life plank of the Republican platform, making it the weakest it has been since 1976. He still takes credit for Roe’s reversal but is clearly rattled by recent Republican electoral setbacks on abortion, especially now that he is running a more competitive race against a female opponent.
Much as was the case when Trump’s pal Rudy was the GOP frontrunner all those years ago, Republicans who don’t care much about abortion are telling pro-lifers to shut up and fall in line if they want to win.
While I have defended Trump for not wanting to rush headlong into where the pro-choice position is strongest, his backsliding on abortion has become excessive. And like his ditching of Project 2025, it risks shifting from a strategic retreat from movement conservatism’s excesses to reinforcing one of Trump’s worst tendencies: treating loyalty as a one-way street.
It would still be disastrous to the pro-life cause for Vice President Kamala Harris to be elected president. Her Justice Department would continue the persecution of pro-life activists and pregnancy centers, which are now more important than ever. If Harris ever got to govern with a Democratic Congress, the Senate filibuster would probably be gone and she would sign into law a bill that would usher in a worse national abortion policy than prevailed for most of the final 30 years of Roe. The health exception would make most existing abortion restrictions toothless, and she would move to promote taxpayer funding of abortion.
Regardless of whether Trump was the most sincere pro-life president, he was the most successful one during his first term. The power of pro-lifers to enact their preferred policies at any level of government hinges at the moment on this election. The fact that they cannot do so in many states has more to do with the weakness of their current position than with Trump’s lack of pro-life fervor.
The question is how to improve that position. Defeating Giuliani to ensure the GOP remained a pro-life party advanced the cause. But that was during the Republican primaries, while abortions were declining and after years of intermittent pro-life gains both legislatively and in public opinion, and ahead of a general election that was probably unwinnable for any Republican after Iraq and the Great Recession. This by contrast is a winnable election against a candidate who supports federally funded abortion on demand as well as measures that codify the most permissive reading of Roe and packing the Supreme Court to topple its current anti-Roe majority.
Even if Trump lost because he did not motivate pro-life voters to turn out for him, there is a strong chance Republicans would reach the opposite conclusion—that he was defeated because of his role in undoing Roe—and run further away from abortion. That is what they will hear from donors, and the media. It’s also what Republicans have done after losing elections the past, even when there has been fairly strong exit-polling evidence to the contrary.
Trump is a unique figure who isn’t influenced in the same ways as a normal politician, and he is limited to a single term. He has chosen a running mate who is more pro-life than he is, even if J.D. Vance currently has to follow the boss’s line (as Dick Cheney once did on gay marriage).
It’s possible that pro-lifers could luck out, and Harris won’t have the congressional support necessary to enact the most radical pro-abortion policies. Even the worst-case scenario in November suggests Republicans could hold 51 Senate seats next year. An election forecast by the Hill and Decision Desk gives House Republicans a better chance of retaining their majority than Trump winning the White House.
Then maybe Harris is unpopular again and Democrats have a bad midterm election. The 2026 Senate map looks favorable to the GOP. But have politics for the past decade really been that predictable?
These are the dilemmas that face a pro-life movement that no longer has meaningful bipartisan support. The future is hard to predict. The past track records and current positioning of the two major-party candidates shouldn’t make this a close call for prudent pro-lifers, especially those living in battleground states.
Trump delivered the biggest pro-life victory in 50 years. Harris wants to take it away.
Gov. Pritzker signs package of bills expanding abortion rights in Illinois
CHICAGO (WGEM) - Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker signed three bills into law Wednesday strengthening reproductive rights in the state.
Passed by lawmakers during the 2024 legislative session, all three new laws aim to protect women seeking abortion care in Illinois.
“The three bills that I am signing today send a single straightforward message. Illinois will always be a place where women have the freedom to make their own medical decisions,” said Pritzker, a Democrat.
One law codifies the federal Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act. This means Illinois hospitals would be required to care even if the U.S. Supreme Court rules federal law does not mandate it.
Another new law expands Illinois’ shield laws. This means state and local authorities are barred from providing any information or resources to help any out-of-state entity from investigating health care legally provided in Illinois, including abortion and gender-affirming care.
The third law adds reproductive health decisions to the Illinois Human Rights Act making it illegal to deny someone employment, housing and a loan or credit based on their reproductive health decisions.
“Six years ago, I promised the women of this state that their bodily autonomy is sacrosanct and that I would work with the general assembly to enshrine that into law. Today is another day of progress and fulfillment on that promise,” Pritzker said.
Republicans who opposed all three new laws argued the anti-discrimination legislation did not have adequate protections for religiously-affiliated organizations.
They argued the shield law expansion could protect criminals, including human traffickers, as providers in Illinois will be unable to report and help other states prosecute those crimes.
“You can talk about protecting reproductive rights all you want but we better get it right and not provide cover for human traffickers, rape and incest of minor children, whatever state they’re from,” state Sen. Jil Tracy, R-Quincy, said during Senate debate.
Republican opponents also argued the legislation codifying EMTALA into state law is not needed since abortion is not a medically necessary procedure.
Illinois Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton, however, believes these new laws are absolutely necessary to protect women in Illinois and across the U.S.
“I am overwhelmingly grateful that we have the tools to protect our people because in Illinois, we trust women and we are never going back,” said Stratton, a Democrat.
She also mentioned Iowa’s “fetal heartbeat” abortion ban, which recently went into effect. Iowa now joins Kentucky, Missouri and Indiana as Illinois’ neighboring states with strict abortion restrictions.
Copyright 2024 WGEM. All rights reserved.
There are concerns with the vaccines currently being distributed (Moderna and Pfizer) and those still in development. According to the CDC, at this time there are three vaccines in Phase 3 clinical trials (AstraZeneca, Janssen, and Novavax).
The concern centers on whether or not abortion-derived embryonic cells have been used in the development, production, and/or testing of the vaccines. Many organizations and media outlets have published facts and opinions. Some of the facts are not accurate.
We recommend the organization Children of God for Life as a reliable source of information. Since its founding 22 years ago, this organization has been the go-to resource for accurate, up-to-date information on vaccines of all kinds. The founder, Mrs. Debra Vinnedge, has recently retired, and the organization is now in the capable hands of Jose and Stacy Trasancos.
On the website, you will find these pages of interest, plus much more information:
Testing and Production are Ethically Equal
Explains the confusion over the term "confirmatory testing" which allowed some vaccines that are unethical to be judged ethical.
Covid-19 Vaccines and Treatments in Development
Chart listing all vaccines, updated 1/12/21, with sources of information for each vaccine.
Measuring Moderna’s COVID-19 Vaccine: Now’s the Time to Press Hard for Ethical Options
In-depth information on the Moderna vaccine and the use of the HEK293 cell line in it's development
Vaccination Expert Says Unborn Babies Used For COVID-19 Vaccines Were Alive During Tissue Extraction
Babies are subject to an extreme amount of pain.
Brother-in-law of abortionist Klopfer tells of finding aborted remains:
‘My heart broke’
Hoarder abortionist had 2,246
aborted babies stored in his home
and 160 in a car trunk
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These billboards having been popping up around Illinois, including one on War Memorial Drive in Peoria. They are part of a billboard campaign by the Chicago Abortion Fund and are designed to alert pregnant women that their abortions may be covered by Medicaid.
In 2017, after promising not to do so, then-Governor Bruce Rauner signed into law HB40, a law that expanded public funding of abortion to include Medicaid recipients and those covered under state health care plans. The bill took affect January 1, 2018 and provides abortion funding for any reason through all nine months of pregnancy, and also contains a provision to keep abortion on demand legal in Illinois in the event Roe v. Wade is overturned.
Upon this bill being signed by the governor, Illinois became one of 16 states using their own funds to pay for abortion, sidestepping the 1977 Hyde Amendment, which bans the use of federal funds for abortion coverage through Medicaid except in case of rape, incest, and life endangerment.
Illinois is now one of the most abortion-friendly states in the Midwest. Abortion providers responded by opening four new abortion facilities, Carafem in Skokie, and Planned Parenthood in Flossmoor, Fairview Heights, and Waukegan.
Here's how our legislators voted on HB40:
Rep. Michael Halpin - Yes
Rep. Tony McCombie - No
Sen. Neil Anderson - No
An Iowa State University professor is drawing nationwide attention after warning students they could be dismissed if they make arguments against abortion or same-sex marriage in class projects.
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