Great News

Judge Dismisses Bogus Charge Against David Daleiden for Exposing Planned Parenthood

   Steven Ertelt

Undercover investigator David Daleiden has been vindicated. Today, a Harris County, Texas judge dismissed the bogus misdemeanor charge against David Daleiden for allegedly trying to buy body parts from the Planned Parenthood abortion business he was exposing for selling them as a part of the Center for Medical Progress’ undercover investigation.

Daleiden has maintained from the beginning that he and the Center for Medical Progress followed all applicable laws in the course of its investigative journalism and that the indictments were politically motivated.
Read the judge’s order dropping the misdemeanor charge.
CMP responded to the dismissal in a statement to LifeNews:

Judge Diane Bull’s swift dismissal of the bogus charge against CMP founder David Daleiden of trafficking human organs is the latest confirmation that the indictments from a runaway grand jury in Houston were a politically-motivated sham all along. In finding that the indictment was void on its face, Judge Bull’s ruling directly contradicts the District Attorney’s argument that the indictment was valid despite the DA’s collusion with Planned Parenthood.
The dismissal of the first indictment today sends a strong message to Planned Parenthood and their political cronies that colluding to suppress the First Amendment rights of citizen journalists will never work. The Center for Medical Progress follows all applicable laws in the course of its investigative journalism work and as more details about Planned Parenthood’s contracts for aborted baby parts come to light, it’s clear that Planned Parenthood and their business partners like StemExpress are the ones who are guilty of trafficking in human body parts.

As the Houston Chronicle reports about the dismissed charge, Daleiden’s attorneys maintain District Attorney Devon Anderson has been working in cahoots with the Planned Parenthood abortion company to target Daleiden:

Daleiden is accusing the Harris County District Attorney’s Office of illegally colluding with the nonprofit organization.
“The DA’s office has chosen to wage a war on the pro-life movement,” said attorney Jared Woodfill. “We believe there is clear evidence of Planned Parenthood actually colluding with and pushing the district attorney’s office to move forward with these indictments.”

Daleiden still faces bogus charges alleging he used a false ID to gain access to a Planned Parenthood clinic for a meeting with staff.
Daleiden posted bail in response to what his attorneys and pro-life groups explain are bogus charges related to his undercover investigation and exposure of the Planned Parenthood abortion business selling the body parts of aborted babies. Dozens of pro-life advocates turned out to support him. He turned down a plea deal and Daleiden’s attorneys and supporters countered that Harris County District Attorney Devon Anderson is biased because of her association with an attorney for an abortion practitioner.
Last month, LifeNews chronicled the explosive new evidence  showing the Houston district attorney behind the bogus charges against pro-life advocate David Daleiden colluded with attorneys for Planned Parenthood.
According to attorney for Daleiden, District Attorney Devon Anderson shared confidential information with the abortion business, which she was supposed to be investigating for running afoul of state laws prohibiting the purchase or sale of body parts form aborted babies.
Yet, in recent court filings by the Harris County District Attorney’s Office, Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast’s attorney Josh Schaffer admitted in a sworn declaration that the Harris County DA’s office shared evidence with Planned Parenthood. That occurred even after the Texas Attorney General’s office had forbidden Anderson’s office from doing so.
The declaration was included as part of the DA office’s response to David Daleiden’s motion to quash the indictment against him, alleging prosecutorial misconduct.
Under oath, Schaffer, the Planned Parenthood attorney, admitted that he and Assistant District Attorney Sunni Mitchell attempted to do an end-run around the Texas Attorney General’s directive to Mitchell not to share raw video footage with Planned Parenthood: “I was told that the Attorney General’s Office agreed to give it to the HCDAO on the condition that the HCDAO not give it to PPGC. Mitchell told me that she would try to obtain the footage by other means.”
Mitchell was responsible in 2013 for a Grand Jury that failed to indict Houston’s late-term abortionist Douglas Karpen, after photographs and eyewitness testimony implicated him in illegal late-term abortions and killing babies who were born alive after failed abortions.
“The recent filings by the Harris County District Attorney confirm that the DA shared confidential documents and information with abortion provider Planned Parenthood, colluding with it in the prosecution of David Daleiden,” said Thomas More Society Special Counsel, Peter Breen, attorney for David Daleiden.
Breen told LifeNews: “These filings also include evidence that appears to show that the DA’s office worked with Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast to undermine the Texas Attorney General’s independent investigation of that abortion provider. The conduct of Harris County prosecutors in this case is outrageous and illegal. We look forward to pressing our motion to quash this indictment in court.”
This is the second time attorneys from Anderson’s office and Planned Parenthood were accused of working together.

Daleiden is facing politically-motivated attacks on multiple fronts. Earlier this year, a Texas grand jury whose task was to investigate Planned Parenthood turned on the pro-life citizen journalist instead.

A Texas grand jury indicted Daleiden and another pro-life activist, Sandra Merritt, behind the videos. Instead of prosecuting Planned Parenthood for selling aborted baby parts, Daleiden was indicted for buying them.
Daleiden rejected a deal for probation on those charges in February, and his attorney said he demands an apology from the Texas district attorney who filed the bogus charges.
Anderson has defended her indictment of pro-life advocate David Daleiden despite the fact that a Planned Parenthood abortion business board members works as a prosecutor in her office. And new information LifeNews uncovered shows Anderson’s campaign received more than $25,000 from the attorney who works for a late-term abortionist.
Since the indictment, Anderson is facing criticism over her failure to prosecute an abortionist known as the Kermit Gosnell of Houston.
Anderson oversaw a previous abortion-related grand jury investigation of Houston abortionist Douglas Karpen after Operation Rescue released evidence in the form of photos and witness testimony that babies were being born alive during abortions and intentionally killed by twisting their necks. This case garnered publicity in the wake of the conviction of Pennsylvania abortionist Kermit Gosnell on three counts of First Degree Murder for intentionally killing babies born alive during abortions in a similar fashion.
That Anderson-led grand jury failed to indict Karpen despite the considerable evidence against him.
Karpen was represented at his trial by attorney Chip Lewis, who donated more than $25,000 to Anderson’s re-election campaign. Anderson has an extensive relationship with Lewis as did her husband when he was district attorney.
Anderson has also come under considerable fire for what pro-life advocates call a politically motivated indictment and because a Planned Parenthood board member works for Anderson as an assistant district attorney. Lauren Reeder is a prosecutor in the Harris County District Attorney’s criminal family law division. Reeder is listed as a non-compensated “Director” on the 990 Tax Form for 2014 filed by Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast.
Although Anderson indicates Reeder had no role in the Daleiden indictment, there’s really no way of knowing if that is truly the case. Because of that, pro-life advocates have called for the appointment of a special prosecutor to look into the indictment and the fact that the grand jury never voted on charges related to Planned Parethood’s sale of aborted babies.
In April, pro-abortion California Attorney General Kamala Harris stole unreleased video footage concerning Planned Parenthood from Daleiden’s home.
California authorities seized a laptop and hard drives containing the video footage collected during Daleiden’s 3-year investigation of Planned Parenthood’s involvement in the illegal sale of aborted baby remains, according to a written statement made by Life Legal Defense Foundation, which is helping to defend Daleiden.
Harris, a pro-abortion Democrat, chose to focus her investigation on Daleiden and his associates rather than Planned Parenthood, even though the video footage so far released by Daleiden’s Center for Medical Progress shows clear evidence that Planned Parenthood was illegally altering abortion procedures to endure intact organs targeted for harvesting then selling the organs for profit.
Since the California Department of Justice, under the leadership of Democratic State Attorney General Kamala Harris, searched the home of David Daleiden on Tuesday, there have been numerous news stories noting an apparent conflict of interest in Harris’ investigation of Daleiden and the Center for Medical Progress that ignores obvious evidence of illegal conduct on the part of Planned Parenthood.
Planned Parenthood has donated $81,000 to Harris and, because of the massive conflict of interest, pro-life groups are calling for her resignation.
Harris also was endorsed by the pro-abortion National Organization for Women. NOW describes her as a “longtime, vocal supporter of Planned Parenthood” who promised to investigate CMP and fight for taxpayer funding of the abortion business.
Harris oversaw the raid — but she has significant conflict of interest problems. She is funded by Planned Parenthood and her web site is currently promoting a petition for the abortion business.
The expose’ videos catching Planned Parenthood officials selling the body parts of aborted babies have shocked the nation. Here is a list of all twelve:

• In the first video: Dr. Deborah Nucatola of Planned Parenthood commented on baby-crushing: “We’ve been very good at getting heart, lung, liver, because we know that, so I’m not gonna crush that part, I’m gonna basically crush below, I’m gonna crush above, and I’m gonna see if I can get it all intact.”
• In the second video: Planned Parenthood’s Dr. Mary Gatter joked, “I want a Lamborghini” as she negotiated the best price for baby parts.
• In the third video: Holly O’Donnell, a former Stem Express employee who worked inside a Planned Parenthood clinic, detailed first-hand the unspeakable atrocities and how she fainted in horror over handling baby legs.
• In the fourth video: Planned Parenthood’s Dr. Savita Ginde stated, “We don’t want to do just a flat-fee (per baby) of like, $200. A per-item thing works a little better, just because we can see how much we can get out of it.” She also laughed while looking at a plate of fetal kidneys that were “good to go.”
• In the fifth video: Melissa Farrell of Planned Parenthood-Gulf Coast in Houston boasted of Planned Parenthood’s skill in obtaining “intact fetal cadavers” and how her “research” department “contributes so much to the bottom line of our organization here, you know we’re one of the largest affiliates, our Research Department is the largest in the United States.”
• In the sixth video: Holly O’Donnell described technicians taking fetal parts without patient consent: “There were times when they would just take what they wanted. And these mothers don’t know. And there’s no way they would know.”
• In the seventh and perhaps most disturbing video: Holly O’Donnell described the harvesting, or “procurement,” of organs from a nearly intact late-term fetus aborted at Planned Parenthood Mar Monte’s Alameda clinic in San Jose, CA. “‘You want to see something kind of cool,’” O’Donnell says her supervisor asked her. “And she just taps the heart, and it starts beating. And I’m sitting here and I’m looking at this fetus, and its heart is beating, and I don’t know what to think.”
• In the eighth video: StemExpress CEO Cate Dyer admits Planned Parenthood sells “a lot of” fully intact aborted babies.
• The ninth video: catches a Planned Parenthood medical director discussing how the abortion company sells fully intact aborted babies — including one who “just fell out” of the womb.
• The 10th video: catches the nation’s biggest abortion business selling specific body parts — including the heart, eyes and “gonads” of unborn babies.The video also shows the shocking ways in which Planned Parenthood officials admit that they are breaking federal law by selling aborted baby body parts for profit.
• Unreleased Videos: Unreleased videos from CMP show Deb Vanderhei of Planned Parenthood caught on tape talking about how Planned Parenthood abortion business affiliates may “want to increase revenue [from selling baby parts] but we can’t stop them…” Another video has a woman talking about the “financial incentives” of selling aborted baby body parts.
• The 11th video: catches a texas Planned Parenthood abortionist planning to sell the intact heads of aborted babies for research. Amna Dermish is caught on tape describing an illegal partial-birth abortion procedure to terminate living, late-term unborn babies which she hopes will yield intact fetal heads for brain harvesting.
• The 12th video in the series shows new footage of Jennefer Russo, medical director at Planned Parenthood in Orange County, California, describing to undercover investigators how her abortion business tries to harvest intact aborted babies’ bodies for a local for-profit biotech company and changes the abortion procedure to do so.

The full, unedited videos have confirmed that revelations that some aborted baby remains sold by Planned Parenthood go to biotech companies for the purpose of creating “humanized” mice. Meanwhile, Planned Parenthood has been exposed as having sold body parts from aborted babies for as much as 15 years.  Source: LifeSite News

Supremes

 

Pondering what the Supreme Court may do in “Whole Woman’s Health vs. Hellerstedt”

By Dave Andrusko
There is likely only two weeks left in the current term of the Supreme Court. So, albeit to a lesser extent, this Monday, as in previous Mondays, there are stories speculating about what the justices will do about the outstanding “controversial cases.”
For pro-lifers, ours is HB 2, the 2013 Texas pro-life law that the High Court could render a verdict on as soon as this week.
As our readers are well aware, the two provisions under challenge in Whole Woman’s Health vs. Hellerstedt require abortionists to have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of the clinics (that is in effect) and mandate that abortion clinics meet the requirements of ambulatory surgical centers (not yet in effect).
Here are a few thoughts from various outlets.
Richard Wolf, USA Today writes: “A substantive ruling could represent the most significant abortion decision by the court since 1992.”
This is an allusion to several considerations, including that with the death of Antonin Scalia, there are eight justices on the court.
The decision could limit its effect to Texas by affirming the decision of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upholding HB 2 but without setting a national precedent. Or the justices could essentially return the case for more proceedings, as Justice Anthony Kennedy hinted at during the oral arguments March 2.
Reuters raised the possibility of a ruling against HB 2 or rendering a ‘split decision.’  Lawrence Hurley writes

Another possibility is that the justices strike down the law, or invalidate one of the two provisions at issue while keeping the other. It may be more likely that the admitting-privileges provision, already in effect, would survive, while the hospital-grade facilities requirements, which the justices themselves temporarily blocked, would not.

Last Friday, the Los Angeles Times spent most of its time painting a grim picture of fewer abortion clinics and longer waits. Not a word about something NRLC’s Dr. Randall K. O’Bannon has explored in great depth: that almost none of these closures can be definitely said to be related to the parts of the law that have been challenged in Whole Woman’s Health vs. Hellerstedt and that the longer waits simply assume that other abortion clinics (particularly Planned Parenthood’s “mega-clinics) wouldn’t pick up the slack.
More tomorrow

Source: NRLC News

Down A Very Slippery Slope

 

Advanced Request For Euthanasia?

Editor’s note. This article was written by Dr. Catherine Ferrier and published on June 10, 2016 by impact ethics in Canadian Bioethics, Death & Assisted Dying, Law & Policy, Mental Health.
Catherine Ferrier a physician in the Division of Geriatric Medicine of the McGill University Health Centre, is the president of the Physicians’ Alliance against Euthanasia.
“C-14” is the Canadian government’s bill to “regulate” euthanasia and assisted suicide. It is response to the 2015 Supreme Court of Canada decision in “Carter v. Canada.”
This was reposted on the blog of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition.
The June 6 deadline for legislation in response to the Carter judgment has come and gone, and our government has yet to adopt a law regulating medical assistance in dying. Too few of us have any idea what we are rushing into.
In the Carter decision the Supreme Court of Canada judges stated that the risks associated with physician-assisted death can be limited through a carefully designed and monitored system of safeguards.
In contrast, the pressure is on to offer death as a solution for all forms of suffering, available to virtually everyone, including those who fear future suffering or disability.
The Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs wants Bill C-14 amended to include the recommendation of the Special Joint Committee on Physician-Assisted Dying

“That the permission to use advance requests for medical assistance in dying be allowed any time after one is diagnosed with a condition that is reasonably likely to cause loss of competence or after a diagnosis of a grievous or irremediable condition but before the suffering becomes intolerable….”

I have spent the last 30 years diagnosing, treating, and caring for people with Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias. It takes no special insight to realize that they are the principal intended “beneficiaries” of this recommendation.
Dutch academic Boris Brummans wrote in his 2007 article “Death by Document” of his father’s euthanasia death through an advance directive. His father had cancer, not dementia, but the issue is the same.

I used to be in favor of euthanasia… Although the euthanasia was meant to liberate my dad from the conventional constraints of suicide, its textual, declarative form turned him into a prisoner of himself (and us into his cellmates). By signing the euthanasia declaration… my father created a persona of, and for, himself… based on the person he thought he would be. On what were these thoughts based? Hollow images of a self not yet lived; meager ideas about a life not yet fleshed out.

The mantra behind advanced directives is “choice,” whereby one chooses to die rather than live with the “indignity” of dementia, of dependence, of becoming a burden. Brummans questions whether one can truly choose for one’s future self. He describes how he and his family members projected themselves into the future “in ways that deprived us, especially my dad, from the very liberty we thought to have signed for.”
A diagnosis of dementia is a major life crisis. Those of us who have been through even lesser crises know that our judgment is not at its best when flooded with overwhelming emotions, fears, and questions. Most of us would be sensible enough to defer life-changing decisions until we are calm enough to think clearly.
But for the person diagnosed with dementia the clock is ticking and the advance directive must be signed before decision-making capacity is lost.

Source: NRLC News

Organ Donation by Euthanasia

 

Doctors say Let’s increase organ transplant rates by encouraging euthanasia patients to donate

By Michael Cook
Editor’s note. This is excerpted from a post that appeared at Bioedge.org.
Since 2005 about 40 people in Belgium and the Netherlands have successfully combined euthanasia with organ donation, according to an article in the Journal of Medical Ethics by ethicists and transplant specialists.
The [five] doctors are so enthusiastic about the procedure that they have proposed legal changes which will speed up the procedure and maximize the number of donations. Although the numbers are still low, the idea is becoming more popular in both countries, according to the authors.
(Not everyone – in fact, only a small proportion – of people who request euthanasia are potential organ donors. Most requests come from patients with cancer, which makes them unsuitable donors. Most of the Belgians who have already participated in the programme appear to have suffered from strokes or multiple sclerosis.)

However there are some legal and ethical wrinkles to be ironed out to make the transition from euthanasia to organ donation seamless.
Some regulations and laws are supposed to be safeguards, but they “slow” the procedure down. For example, in the Netherlands, euthanasia is not regarded as a natural death and so permission must be sought from the public prosecutor to dispose of the body. In Belgium (where euthanasia is regarded as “natural”), three doctors need to sign off on the procedure. …

Another consideration is whether informing euthanasia patients about organ donation puts pressure on them to agree. The authors believe that it doesn’t, provided that it is done tactfully.
According to the principles of the Hippocratic Oath, the authors argue, doctors may even have an obligation to inform patients because they will be saving lives of organ recipients. They also point out that “The patient could be very relieved discovering the existence of this option and receiving the possibility to give meaning to his or her own suffering, by potentially relieving the suffering of others.”
Until now, transplant protocols have specified a strict separation between organ donation and euthanasia. However, if the patient is [willing], this is not necessary. “As long as all due diligence requirements are fulfilled, it should not be an obstacle if euthanasia and donation are not fully separated,” the authors argue.

Finally, the “dead donor” rule is frustratingly inconvenient for organ donor euthanasia. Since the patient has chosen to die anyway, why shouldn’t it be possible, the authors argue, to have “a ‘heart-beating organ donation euthanasia’ where a patient is sedated, after which his organs are being removed, causing death”?
The authors conclude:

“Combining euthanasia and organ donation in a so-called ‘donation after circulatory death’ procedure seems feasible on legal, ethical or medical grounds, and is increasingly gaining social acceptance in both Belgium and the Netherlands. Since current legislation does not specifically focus on the—when drafted unpractised—combination, future redrafting may be necessary in perspective of the contemporary developments regarding occurrence of such combined procedures

– See more at: bioedge.org

Source: NRLC News

Life is Awesome

 

The enormous impact of a baby’s “first kick”

By Dave Andrusko
Editor’s note. If you want to peruse stories all day long, go directly to nationalrighttolifenews.org and/or follow me on Twitter at twitter.com/daveha
I became “pro-life” long before I realized that abortion had been legalized nationwide in 1973. And I didn’t even know it.
Even with my rapidly aging synapses, I still can recall that moment in 1964. My mom, already the mother of six children and over 40, encouraged me to touch her by-then prominent belly and then place my ear on it.
Talk about black and white becoming Technicolor. The abstraction that my youngest brother had been previously had now become a concrete, living, moving human being.
Wow.

That vivid memory was the first thing that crossed my mind when I read, “A Baby’s Kick Changes Everything about Abortion,” by Georgi Boorman.
After I read the post, it occurred to me how infrequently we talk about an unborn baby’s first kick these days, what we used to call “quickening.” Because ultrasound pictures are almost ubiquitous (and take place earlier in pregnancy), comparatively little attention is paid to that moment which occurs somewhere around the 20th week.

Boorman’s baby packs a wallop. As she writes,

No, it’s not comfortable. No, it doesn’t feel “natural,” not because it isn’t, but because there’s nothing I’ve felt quite like it. My husband told me our baby never felt more real than after she started kicking. The ultrasounds were beautiful, especially seeing her heartbeat. But it was still more conceptual at that point. When you feel her move, it’s like she’s saying, “I’m here! I’m real! I’ll be out in the world soon!”

Then, a few paragraphs later

For the first time in my life, the life of my baby is more than a concept, and so now all my reactions to pro-abortion articles are physical, not just intellectual or even emotional.

These reassuring comments are bracketed by her thoughts on abortion and help the reader understand her responses. First, quoting Lindy West, the pro-abortion author of a new book excerpted in Glamour magazine, she wonders how anyone can write the following:

I don’t give a damn why anyone has an abortion. I believe unconditionally in the right of people with uteruses to decide what grows inside their body and feeds on their blood and reroutes their future. There are no ‘good’ abortions and ‘bad’ abortions, there are only pregnant people who want them and pregnant people who don’t, pregnant people who have access and support and pregnant people who face institutional roadblocks…”

But they do. In more polite, more discrete language, that is precisely the view Hillary Clinton subscribes to.
On the back side of this quote, Boorman is particularly distraught by women who have already given birth to children but who, nonetheless, abort. I was encouraged that “a gentler thought [came] to cover my anger.”
That all women who’ve aborted not only “need healing” but also “need divine forgiveness and grace, as we all do.” She continues

The empathy I have with these mothers is that of a fellow sinner in need of redemption. … But grace has already come through Christ, and he mends what is torn. It is through him that we can love fully; he replaces the turmoil of our wrongdoing with a peace “that transcends all understanding.”

One other thought about Mrs. Boorman post at the Federalist.

My baby is real—not just real to me, but objectively real. She shows up in my blood test and on the ultrasound, and others can feel her kicks. She is very much a human being.

However, as the quote from Ms. West reveals, to the pro-abortion mind the child is not “objectively real.” Or, better put, it doesn’t make any difference. The only question is “wantedness.”
Thank goodness it would never have occurred to my mother that the lives of the seven Andrusko s depended on us being “wanted.”

Source: NRLC News

Unborn Babies

 

Protecting unborn babies “helps make the earth a better place for everyone”

By Maria Gallagher, Legislative Director, Pennsylvania Pro-Life Federation
I have found that some of the most eloquent spokespeople for the pro-life movement are the youngest ones.
That truth became abundantly clear as I was reading through dozens of “thank you” cards for state lawmakers that had been handmade by students, some as young as the first grade.
One card carried an ink drawing of a bumble bee. On one wing the student wrote, “I’m alive,” and on the other wing, “Alleluia.”

Another card, emblazoned with a pink heart, carried the message, “Dear fellow pro-lifer, thank you so much for your courage. I appreciate your support of the pro-life cause.”
A student named Jasmine submitted a card with a picture of a pair of baby feet on the front. Inside, the card read, “Save the babies. Don’t let your child die. Don’t kill babies.”

Students at St. Joan of Arc School in Hershey, Pennsylvania, sent cards with teddy bears carrying baskets of flowers on the front. Inside one of the cards, a boy named Tyler wrote, “Dear Legislator, thank you for saving the lives of unborn babies. Sometimes it’s hard to stand for what you believe in. Thank you for all of your efforts to stop abortion.”
A girl named Grace wrote, “Dear Lawmakers, thank you for supporting pro-life. We really appreciate all your help! It is so sad to hear about all the babies in trouble or that have passed. Then when I hear people are helping, supporting, and protecting them, it makes me feel happy. We are praying for you, and thinking of your work.”

One school—Good Shepherd in Camp Hill, Pennsylvania—submitted more than 100 cards for legislators. A strong, encouraging pro-life message appeared in each one!
Reading through the large volume of thank you notes, I was once again reminded of the enthusiasm of so many young people for the pro-life cause. Even the littlest ones know that babies are precious and should be protected under the law.
These young citizens are using the resources available to them—markers, crayons, pencils, pens, and construction paper—to send an important message to their elected officials. They want innocent human life to be protected, beginning from its earliest stages of development forward.
What is our job as adults? To encourage young people in their pro-life advocacy. When they get to college, they will be bombarded with anti-life messages. It may take every ounce of strength they have to resist the pervasive culture of death.
With all the death and destruction that has been in the news as of late, it is easy to lose heart. Please don’t.

The next generation is willing and able to accept the pro-life torch and raise it high. Their earnest efforts can lead to a nation where every child is cherished and each mother is respected and supported.
Remember the words of Caroline, a student at Good Shepherd, “Thank you for protecting babies and supporting them too. This helps make the earth a better place for everyone.”

Source: NRLC News

Life- A Beautiful Choice

 

‘Fox & Friends’ Interviews Mom Who Refused to Abort Down Syndrome Baby

By Katie Yoder
The pro-life movement doesn’t just have science on its side. It also has heart.
During Fox & Friends Thursday, co-host Ainsley Earhardt turned to the viral story of a mother who penned a “powerful message” to the doctor that suggested she abort her baby with Down syndrome. Earhardt invited the mother, Courtney Baker, on the show with her now 15-month-old daughter Emersyn (Emmy).
Earhardt began by citing Baker’s letter to her doctor that went viral after ABC News heavily promoted it:

“You were so very wrong to say a baby with Down syndrome would decrease our quality of life… So my prayer is that no other mommy will have to go through what I did. My prayer is that you, too, will now see true beauty and pure love with every sonogram.”

“She is just so sweet!” Earhardt exclaimed to Courtney when she first appeared on camera with little Emmy.
As Emmy waved at the camera, Baker spoke out against abortion.
“We knew we were going to keep her,” she said of Emmy, even though she was “terrified” when she first discovered her daughter had Down syndrome.
With the help of her letter, Baker wanted the doctor see past the “misconception that there’s no value in the life” of someone with Down syndrome.
Because, as Baker put it, Emmy is “changing the world.”
“[T]hese babies are so – so precious and I want every – not just all the doctors to know that, I want all the mommies to know that, that are pregnant right now who are in that – making that decision,” Baker added.
While Baker was a “little afraid,” she “absolutely fell in love” with Emmy the first night following her birth.
“[T]his has been the best year of my life by far,” she said of Emmy. “She’s brought so much joy to – to me and to so many other people.”
Baker described Emmy’s personality as “hilarious,” “smart” and “fun” – as well as a baby who has changed the lives of her entire family.
“She’s really grown our faith,” Baker said of Emmy’s impact on herself, her husband and her two older daughters. “She’s grown us as people.”
Because of Emmy, Baker’s oldest daughter wants work with special needs children and both of her daughters want to adopt babies with Down syndrome.
“It’s changed who they’re going to be,” Baker said. “It’s changed the trajectory of their lives. And, they’re proud of her. And they’re better people – we’re better people because of her.”
Baker also had a message for pregnant women who might find themselves in a similar position as she once was:

“That little baby inside of you is going to change the world. It’s going to change your world. It’s – you know, I really felt like my life was over. And my life just started. And, you know, your life is just beginning and that’s the – the greatest, it’s the greatest thing in the world.”

Editor’s note. This appeared at Newsbusters.

Source: NRLC News

Ireland

 

U. N. committee again harshly criticizes Ireland’s protective abortions laws

By Dave Andrusko

Cora Sherlock

Since the United Nations and Amnesty International have been targeting Ireland’s pro-life laws for some considerable time, it came as zero surprise that the Geneva-based U.N. Human Rights Committee found that the nation’s “abortion law violates the U.N. International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and called for widespread reform,” to quote the Associated Press.
More specifically, the 29-page report targeted the country, in this instance, because it does not permit abortions in cases where the unborn is diagnosed as having a fatal anomaly.
In 2011 Amanda Mellet complained to the Committee that she’d been told in the 21st week of pregnancy that her baby had a heart defect and “likely would die” inside the womb or shortly thereafter.
“After three weeks, she checked with doctors to see if her now 24-week-old fetus still had a heartbeat and, when told it was still alive, traveled with her husband to the English city of Liverpool” where a premature delivery was induced, the AP reported. 36 hours later she delivered a “stillborn baby girl.”
According to Reuters, “The U.N. report said Ireland’s law made the rights of inviable [nonviable] fetuses superior to the rights of women and this arbitrary imbalance ‘cannot be justified,’ because the unborn child’s life cannot be saved.”

The New York-based Center for Reproductive Rights welcomed the “ground-breaking ruling” as sending “the clear message that Ireland’s abortion laws are cruel and inhumane, and violate women’s human rights.”

Amnesty International/Ireland, which is the forefront of the campaign to overturn the Eighth Amendment, chimed in, “The Irish government must take its head out of the sand and see that it has to tackle this issue.”

This tragic case is part of the larger objective–to eliminate Ireland’s “Eighth Amendment.”
“The 8th Amendment (Article 40.3.3.) to the Irish Constitution is the original Life Equality Amendment,” Deputy Chairperson Cora Sherlock of the Pro Life Campaign has explained. “It protects the equal right to life of unborn children and their mothers.”
The pro-life community in Ireland has made an especially concerted effort to defend babies diagnosed with life-limiting conditions. Last year a bill was introduced by Clare Daly to legalize abortions in cases of babies with life-limiting conditions but it was defeated.
“Everyone in the Dáil [the lower house of the Parliament of the Republic of Ireland] knows that Deputy Clare Daly supports abortion on demand up to birth,” Sherlock said at the time.

“The fact that she keeps introducing bills in the Oireachtas [the Parliament] to allow for abortion where unborn babies have life-limiting conditions is just part of her campaign for wider abortion. But it is deeply hurtful to families who opted against abortion in these situations to hear Deputy Daly and her colleagues describe their babies as ‘non-viable’ and ‘incompatible with life’.
Sherlock continued, “It is absolutely reprehensible that some members of the Oireachtas have described the utterly defenceless babies in these situations as ‘simply a piece of flesh with no sensation, capacity for sensation or any form of feeling.’ What a grossly ignora

Source: NRLC News

Abortion Clinics

 

Abortion worker: Women who asked to see their aborted babies were shown egg whites

  Sarah Terzo 

There have been many cases of abortion facility workers withholding key facts from abortion minded women. In some cases, staffers outright lied. For example, in this article, a post-abortive woman recalls being told that her baby was just “a clump of cells”:

When I saw that a 3-month-old “clump of cells” had fingers and toes and was a tiny, perfectly formed baby, I became really hysterical.

I’ve been lied to and misled, and I’m sure thousands of other women are being just as poorly informed and badly served. To prove it, John [her husband] and I visited most every clinic in Cleveland. I pretended I was pregnant and asked for guidance.

What we heard was incredible. One counselor told us the fetus did not begin to resemble a human being until 7 months, another said 5 months, and so it went.

Based on countless testimonies from former abortion providers and abortion patients (here are just a few), we know that many abortion facilities deceive women before their abortions. Live Action investigated the industry’s rampant lying and manipulation of women.
But a staffer has come forward to say that the deception by abortion workers sometimes continues even after the abortion is over.
Former clinic worker Laurel Guymer explains how some women ask questions after their abortions. Some of the women even want to see the remains of their aborted babies. The clinic had a very special way of dealing with such requests.

When the women woke up in recovery they often whispered to me, “Was it a girl or a boy?” I was instructed to tell them it was too small to know for sure. But occasionally a woman would ask, “Can I see the fetus?” The standard line in an abortion setting was “a pregnancy is a bunch of cells, too early to differentiate” (unlike in IVF, where the women having miscarriages at earlier stages were told they have lost the “baby”). But some women insisted on seeing the fetus, so we would check how many weeks they were and select the appropriate pot off the shelf.

None of the containers had a fetus in them, nothing recognizable to the naked eye at least. The contents resembled pavlova mixture: egg whites stiffly beaten, floating in a clear solution. They never saw their own fetus. It had been dismantled by the abortion procedure, suctioned into a glass container, then strained like peas in the slush room, the foot measured to estimate gestation, then finally discarded in the biohazardous waste.

While the real aborted babies were fully developed with feet that could be identified and measured, women were shown a carefully concocted bowl of indistinguishable muck.  What the women saw bore no resemblance to the babies they had just aborted.
In this way, the woman was able to go home with the belief that she hadn’t killed anything remotely resembling a baby. She would believe what the clinic workers told her – that the abortion only removed “a bunch of cells.” If she stumbled across pictures of aborted babies or information on fetal development later, she would be convinced that the pictures were fake and the information lies- because, after all, she saw the remains of her baby with her own eyes.

Not only has the abortion industry deceived these women, but they have inoculated them against the truth.  Arguments from pro-lifers will fall on deaf ears, because the woman cannot imagine that the abortion clinic has tricked her.
This type of deception both hardens a woman’s heart towards the plight of preborn babies in our society and interferes with her healing. Instinctively, women feel a connection with their preborn babies. Guilt may lurk below the surface, and facing reality is often the catalyst that brings healing.
One thing to take away from Guymer’s testimony is that abortion clinics can be quite sophisticated in deceiving women. They have to be. If women knew they were going to have their babies dismembered and thrown out as medical waste, many of them would say no to abortion.  There would be fewer patients, which means less money for the abortion facility, which ultimately leads to centers going out of business. Workers fight to prevent that from happening, even if it means lying to their patients.
 Source: Melinda Tankard Reist Giving Sorrow Words: Women’s Stories of Grief after Abortion (Springfield, IL: Acorn Books, 2007) 181

Source: LiveAction News

Life Wins

 

Abortion still “morally wrong,” latest Gallup shows

By Dave Andrusko
A Gallup poll conducted May 4-8 finds that more Americans still find abortion “morally wrong” (47%) than “morally acceptable” (43%). In 2015, Gallup’s numbers were 48% and 42% , respectively.
The breakdown along party lines is that only 24% of Republicans said abortion was morally acceptable, 44% of Independents, but 62% of Democrats.
A couple of background items.
First, the question is asked in this manner: “I’m going to read you a list of issues. Regardless of whether or not you think it should be legal, for each one, please tell me whether you personally believe that in general it is morally acceptable or morally wrong. How about abortion?”
As we have written countless times, if you breakdown responses to the question under what circumstances should abortion be legal, a majority opposes the reasons for which at least 90% of all abortions are performed. So, to most people, “in general” doesn’t necessarily tell you what you need to know about abortion in general, its morality in particular.

Second, “morally wrong” is much more categorical than “morally acceptable,” much more black and white. “Acceptable” is hardly an endorsement. What would be the response if the second option was whether the person thought abortion is “morally commendable”?

Third, when a recent survey conducted for the Knights of Columbus asked the question, 60% said they believed abortion is morally wrong, while only 37% think it is morally acceptable. Interestingly, exactly one-third of self-identified pro-choicers said abortion is morally wrong.
On an encouraging note, while there is still a majority who found “Doctor Assisted Suicide” morally acceptable, the numbers are down slightly from 2015 (naturally not noted by Gallup).
In 2016, 53% responded that they believed Doctor Assisted suicide is morally acceptable to 41% who said it is morally wrong .

In 2015, 56% said they believed Doctor Assisted Suicide was morally acceptable, to 37 who told Gallup they believed it was morally wrong.
Needless to add, the “Doctor assisted” label increases support. Even now, people are more likely to voice support when a “doctor” is involved.

Source:NRLC News

Our Job This Summer & Always

 

No matter how disguised, abortion is not “care”

By Carol Tobias, President
Last week the Los Angeles Times did a story on the so-called “abortion desert,” a term used to describe a number of states that have few abortion facilities. By way of preface, pro-lifers see the “desert” as an oasis, where commonsense abortion laws are like a spring of compassion. But back to Molly Hennessy-Fiske’s article.
Hennessy-Fiske credits/blames the “desert” mostly to the enactment of pro-life legislation. Women have to travel farther to find a facility willing to abort her child.
I’m sure that the principle purpose of the article was to make the reader feel sorry for women who have to drive a longer distance. Why do I think that? Because nowhere in the article is there a whisper about the reason for the trip: the unborn baby.
Willie Parker, who performs abortions in Alabama, Georgia, and Mississippi, told the reporter that many providers in the region won’t handle abortion beyond 15 weeks. “If they don’t make the cutoff, they’re [the women] coming over to Tuscaloosa,” he stated.
It’s unfortunate that Hennessy-Fiske didn’t inform the reader Parker is an itinerant abortionist who aborts babies well past 15 weeks, or that by 15 weeks the unborn baby is fully formed—organs are functioning, blood is pumping, the baby can make a fist, etc. No, we are to focus solely on the perceived roadblocks to abortion and the difficulties placed on the women.
One of the facilities mentioned is South Wind Women’s Center (SWWC) in Wichita, Kansas. In a video accompanying the article, SWWC founder and CEO Julie Burkhart refers to “abortion care,” trying to associate a warm fuzzy feeling to one of the most gruesome procedures imaginable. (NRL News and NRL News Today have run many stories about Burkhart, a former associate of the late abortionist George Tiller, who was infamous for performing abortions so late in pregnancy virtually no one else would do them.)
Burkhart’s effort to make us think positive thoughts about abortion reminded me of the abortion “spa” that opened in Maryland a couple years ago. Women who entered the facility to get an abortion would be given a cup of hot tea and a nice bathrobe. But no matter how hard they try, the abortion industry can’t make us forget that there are two human beings involved in each abortion—the mother and the unborn baby.
Knowledge about the development of the unborn child and the use of sonograms to see that baby moving about in the amniotic sac create too powerful an image. We see two lives.
Whether the abortion performed is the dismemberment procedure, tearing the arms and legs off a fully formed little unborn girl or boy, or the swallowing of a dangerous abortifacient just six weeks after that new life has begun, a human being dies.
No matter how hard the abortion industry tries to remove the stigma of abortion from our consciences, they can’t do it. Too many Americans know that an innocent human life is ended each time an abortion is performed. The myriad of women who have been involved in abortion and who now oppose it can’t be ignored.
At our upcoming National Right to Life Convention July 7-9 in Herndon, Virginia (see page four), we will hear from women who worked in the abortion industry and what pulled them away from it. We will hear from women who have had abortions. We will hear the stories of abortion survivors. We will learn more about how abortion is contributing to the rise of breast cancer. We will hear how abortion is not “care” for women.
The abortion industry argues that abortion is a “safe” procedure for the woman. However, as Olivia Gans Turner, director of NRLC’s American Victims of Abortion, says about her own abortion– she will always be the mother of a dead baby.
Summer is often a time to slow down, take a family vacation, read that book that’s been on the shelf or e-reader for a while, but we can never stop. The lives of unborn children and their mothers are at risk.
We are making great strides but we have been called to do a job many of us consider sacred. Let’s keep on doing it.
Editor’s note. This appeared on page three of the June digital edition of National Right to Life News.  Please be sure to share with your pro-life friends and family using your social networks.

Source: NRLC News

Calfornia Enacts Legal Assisted Suicide

 

Assisted Suicide Will be Legal in California Tomorrow, Targeting the Elderly and Disabled

  Micaiah Bilger 

California’s new assisted suicide law takes effect on Thursday, opening the doors to potential abuses of the vulnerable, elderly and disabled.

The West Coast state became the fourth in the U.S. to legalize deadly doctor-prescribed suicides in October, following Oregon, Washington and Vermont. Euthanasia advocates pushed for the legislation by using the tragic story of Brittany Maynard, a young woman who had terminal brain cancer. A California native, Maynard moved to Oregon where she committed doctor-prescribed suicide in November 2014.
The California bill is modeled after Oregon, which, in 1994, became the first state in the nation to legalize doctor-prescribed suicide. The deadly procedure involves a doctor prescribing a lethal dose of medication to an adult patient who has been diagnosed with a terminal illness.

Proponents argue that such laws are necessary to provide “compassionate aid in dying for terminally ill patients” and point to safeguards similar to Oregon, but the rhetoric obfuscates the real truth.
Disability rights groups, many in the medical community, pro-lifers and others are upset by the new law because of the potential for horrendous abuses of human life. One of their concerns is that doctors are not required to be present when the patient takes the deadly medicine; therefore, there is no way of knowing whether the person is taking the medicine of their own free will.
Carol Tobias of National Right to Life previously pointed out that the law “shows a blatant disregard for the lives of California’s medically vulnerable citizens and sends a message to these citizens that their lives are less worthy to be lived.”

“It is a well-established fact that nearly every terminally ill patient who desires death is suffering from treatable depression,” Tobias said. “In Oregon, fewer than 6% of patients have been referred for psychiatric evaluation before obtaining life-ending drugs.”

The California law requires that patients be mentally competent to be approved for doctor-prescribed suicide; however, psychiatric evaluations are not required.
Profit-driven motives of families, doctors, insurance companies and the state also are concerns. Assisted suicide is cheaper than many medical treatments for the terminally ill and disabled. In Oregon, there have been several cases of cancer patients being pushed toward assisted suicide because it was cheaper than the medical treatment they needed.
At least one California doctor is planning to make a business of helping people commit suicide. The Mercury News reports Dr. Lonny Shavelson is ready to welcome assisted suicide patients to his Bay Area office on Thursday. His new office is focused solely on “helping” patients kill themselves through the new law, according to the report.
Disability rights advocate Marilyn Golden said Shavelson’s new practice is alarming. She told the newspaper that the law puts the poor, the elderly and others at risk of coercion and abuse.
“How dogged are they (doctors) going to be in their pursuit of solutions that address the patient’s underlying reasons for requesting death?” Golden said. “If they go all the way to the nth degree of assisting that person, that’s terrific. But it’s worrisome to see people advertising themselves for this, unless they plan on talking everybody out of it by getting them services.”
Euthanasia advocates already are dropping hints about forcing Catholic hospitals to comply with the deadly new law in the name of “access” to “end of life options.” According to the Religion News Service:

The next step, said Matt Whitaker, Compassion & Choices state director for Oregon and California, is to ensure access in a state where the two largest faith-based health care systems, Catholic hospitals and Adventist Care hospitals, have announced they will not participate.
Other large California systems, such as Kaiser Permanente and the Sutter Medical Foundation, the two largest HMOs in the state, are setting up procedures for doctors who say they are willing to aid patients seeking this option.

The law currently has conscience and religious exceptions for medical professionals who are morally opposed to assisted suicide. However, future measures forcing hospitals to offer or refer patients for assisted suicide are plausible. California recently began forcing pro-life pregnancy centers to advertise abortions.
Ironically, the bill was passed during a special session of the California State Legislature, which was originally called to address cost savings for the state’s MediCal program. Indeed, there are many who would see doctor-prescribed suicide as a “cost-savings” measure. Writing about the bill’s passage in The New York Times, Ian Lovett included an observation by Dr. Aaron Kheriaty, director of the medical ethics program at the University of California, Irvine, School of Medicine:

…[Kheriaty] said that low-income and underinsured patients would inevitably feel pressure to end their own lives in some cases, when the cost of continued treatment would be astronomical compared with the cost of a few lethal pills.

Alex Schadenberg of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition previously told LifeNews.com that people need to know of the dangers associated with assisted suicide.
“Does legalizing assisted suicide show care and concern to someone who is living with psychological pain? Recently, Dr Will Johnston wrote about a young adult patient who became suicidal after watching a video about Brittany Maynard, the California woman who moved to Oregon to die by assisted suicide,” he said. “A primary risk associated with depression is suicidal ideation. The data indicates that legalizing assisted suicide does not reduce suicide, rather it appears to have a suicide contagion effect.”

Source: LifeSite News

Pro-Life In Action

 

Pro-Life Groups Defeat “Pro-Life Traitor” Renee Ellmers, Who Almost Sabotaged Abortion Ban

  Steven Ertelt 

 

For a short time last year, Congresswoman Renee Ellmers was public enemy number one of the pro-life movement.

Congressional leaders had planned for weeks to bring up a bill to ban abortions after 20-weeks on the anniversary of Roe v. Wade. But Ellmers sabotaged the bill by insisting that broad rape and incest exceptions needed to be added to the bill that many pro-life groups were worried would undermine the bill entirely and render the ban moot.
Due to her attacks, Republican leaders were force to pull the bill and rework it — and it eventually passed.
Ellmers caused a firestorm of controversy to the point that multiple pro-life groups like National Right to Life and the Susan B. Anthony List actively worked against her this year and supported her pro-life primary opponent, George Holding , who defeated her handily in last night’s primary in North Carolina’s 2nd Congressional District.
National Right to Life president Carol Tobias outlined the problem with bringing Ellmers back to Congress: “Both behind the scenes and publicly in the press, Ellmers was the most outspoken representative opposing the bill, even though she had previously pledged to support it – and had even voted for the exact same bill in the previous Congress.”

“Nothing has the potential to do more damage to pro-life efforts than people who run as pro-life candidates back home in their pro-life districts and then stab the babies in the back when they come to DC and work against pro-life efforts,” she said.
“Thankfully, we’ve been given the chance to send Rep. Ellmers packing,” she said. “George Holding is a pro-life stalwart who was always taken a pro-life position – at home and in Washington. George Holding is the kind of congressman the babies can depend on.”
Meanwhile, SBA List urged pro-life voters to “Dump Ellmers” after she actively worked in 2015 against the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, the group’s top legislative priority. Last month, SBA List and the North Carolina Values Coalition announced their joint endorsement of Rep. Holding.
SBA List’s North Carolina team, a ground operation of five field staff and more than 200 canvassers who have been active in the state since 2014, has had a team knocking on more than 12,500 doors across NC-02 in the last few weeks. In addition to reaching NC-02 pro-life primary voters at their door, SBA List also reached 90,000 voters through digital advertising. To date SBA List canvassers have knocked on a total of 185,000 doors throughout the state to educate voters on pro-life issues in the presidential race.

“Susan B. Anthony List exists to support and amplify pro-life women’s voices. Rep. Renee Ellmers was our ally until she led the charge to derail the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act. That’s why we had to flex the political muscle of the pro-life movement,” said Marjorie Dannenfelser, SBA List president and a North Carolina native. “She has her own failed leadership to blame for this loss.”
FRC Action PAC President Tony Perkins made the following comments:
“We congratulate Congressman Holding, a great advocate for conservative principles, on his victory in North Carolina. Voters sent a message tonight that they will do more than take notice when Members of Congressbetray thepro-life principles that they were elected to champion.
“American families are looking for leaders who will address the pressing issues we face as a nation, and who will not just make campaign promises but also follow through on them once elected to office.

“Rep. Holding’s pro-life, pro-family record stood in stark contrast to the incumbent, Rep. Renee Ellmers who lost significant support among pro-life voters after she undermined the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act last year. This important legislation would prevent abortion after 20 weeks — a point at which science has proven unborn babies can feel excruciating pain. Abortionists kill about 13,000 babies every year through late-term abortions.
“We look forward to continuing our work with Rep. Holding in advancing constitutional limited government, individual liberties, and strong family values,” concluded Perkins.

Source: LifeSite News

Planned Parenthood

Planned Parenthood Bashes Donald Trump: “He’s a Dangerous Bully” Who Would “Ban Abortions”

  Steven Ertelt  

The Planned Parenthood abortion business has sent out a fundraising email to its supporters trashing presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump. The email slams Trump as supposedly “racist and sexist.”

“Make no mistake about it: Donald Trump is a dangerous bully this country can’t afford. He’s notoriously racist and sexist, often personally attacking and retaliating against people,” Planned Parenthood’s vice president says in the fundraising email.
The abortion business continues: “That’s not someone you want in charge of the nuclear codes, and certainly not someone you want making decisions about the rights of women, people of color, and immigrants — people he’s demonized again and again.”

In the email LifeNews.com received, The abortion company adds:

He’s promised to ban abortion, “punish” women, and consider a judge for the Supreme Court who called Roe v. Wade “the worst abomination in the history of constitutional law.” He wants to build the biggest wall you’ve ever seen along the U.S.-Mexico border to keep out Mexico’s “rapists.” He’s even called for a total ban on Muslims entering the U.S and stated that a judge should be disqualified because he’s Mexican-American.
Electing Donald Trump would send a message to employers, policy makers, and foreign leaders that sexism and racism are now American values.
There’s no doubt about it — Donald Trump’s policy agenda would be dangerous for this country. We can’t afford to sit this one out, and we can’t let our friends and family sit out either.

This isn’t the first time Planned Parenthood has gone after Trump. Earlier this year, the abortion giant called him “dangerous” because he would “ban abortions”
Recently, Trump announced a list of 11 potential Supreme Court nominees — a list pro-life and conservative groups praised for having potential judges who would be Constitutionalists.
The list of potential nominees for the seat of pro-life Supreme Court Justice Antnoin Saclia that Trump would conifer include  Steven Colloton of Iowa, Allison Eid of Colorado and Raymond Gruender of Missouri.

Also on the list are: Thomas Hardiman of Pennsylvania, Raymond Kethledge of Michigan, Joan Larsen of Michigan, Thomas Lee of Utah, William Pryor of Alabama, David Stras of Minnesota, Diane Sykes of Wisconsin and Don Willett of Texas.
“This list was compiled, first and foremost, based on constitutional principles, with input from highly respected conservatives and Republican party leadership,” Trump’s campaign said.
If Trump is the nominee, he would present a stark contrast on abortion to pro-abortion Democrat Hillary Clinton.

Trump has specifically promised he would sign a bill as president to de-fund Planned Parenthood. In an interview with David Brody of CBN, Trump made that promise:
David Brody: “As a President Trump, if a bill came to your desk that would defund Planned Parenthood you would support that, you would sign that?”
Donald Trump: “Yes, because as long as they do the abortion I am not for funding Planned Parenthood… As long as they’re involved with abortion, as far as I’m concerned forget it, I wouldn’t fund them regardless. I would defund Planned Parenthood because of their view and the fact of their work on abortion…. I am for defunding Planned Parenthood as long as they are involved with abortion.”

As far as Trump’s comments on Planned Parenthood funding are concerned, Trump has fairly consistently said he opposes taxpayer funding but he’s also made some remarks about the “good things” Planned Parenthood does that have alarmed pro-life voters — as if any “good thing” could make up for the fact that planned Parenthood kills 330,000 unborn babies a year in abortions and then sells their body parts for profit.

Meanwhile, Trump said he thinks the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court case that ushered in an era of 48 million abortions was “wrongly decided.” Trump said he would appoint “very good judges” who would ultimately “change it” but he opposed Roe without specifically saying it should be overturned.
Here are some of the headlines we’ve carried at LifeNews.com in recent months that provide further details on what Trump has said regarding Planned Parenthood funding:

July 23: Donald Trump: The Planned Parenthood Abortion Business Should “Absolutely be De-Funded”

August 4: Donald Trump: Shut Down the Federal Government to De-Fund Planned Parenthood
August 11: Donald Trump: Planned Parenthood is an “Abortion Factory”
August 17: Donald Trump: Videos of Planned Parenthood Selling Aborted Babies Were “Disgusting,” De-Fund It
August 26: Donald Trump: Planned Parenthood is an “Abortion Factory” That Sells Baby Parts Like Automobiles
October 19: Donald Trump: “Planned Parenthood Should Absolutely be De-Funded”
December 2: Donald Trump: De-Fund Planned Parenthood and “Look Carefully at” Overturning Roe v. Wade
December 22: Donald Trump: Unless Planned Parenthood Stops Doing Abortions, We Should De-Fund It

Source: LifeSite News

Pregancy Help Centers

 

Loss of Newborn Sparks Couple’s Long-Term Ministry to Moms

By Rachel Leigh

Randy and Evelyn James open up their regional center, which can house up to 30 women and children.Photo Courtesy: Paul Stefan Foundation

When Randy James and his wife, Evelyn, found out they were pregnant with their sixth child, they were thrilled. Their joy at the news was quickly replaced by fear when the first sonogram showed their son suffered from a diaphragmatic hernia—a condition that impedes the growth of the baby’s lungs.
After being sent to four different specialists in Washington D.C., the couple was given the heartbreaking news that there was no hope whatsoever of their son surviving birth.
“The doctor told us that the baby was incompatible to life,” Randy James said. “They recommended late-term abortion.”
The doctor advised them to travel to Kansas for a late-term abortion. As the couple left the office and headed back home to Locust Grove, Va., midway between Washington, D.C. and Richmond, they put aside their grief and vowed that no matter what happened in the life of their son, they would join the fight to stop abortion.

Paul Stefan James was born Dec.13, 2005. He was named after Fr. Paul Scalia—son of late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia—and the James’ parish priest, Fr. Stefan Starzynski.
“We got to take pictures with him and forever we have a picture of my baby boy,” James said.
As Randy held his son in his arms, he realized those precious moments had almost been stolen from him by abortive doctors.

“They were stealing our joy from holding him and kissing him,” James said.
Although he survived less than an hour after his birth, the ripple effects of Paul Stefan’s short time on earth continue over a decade later. At his son’s funeral, James was approached by a woman from their parish who was praying for a home for unwed mothers. Both James and his wife felt this was the unmistakable calling of the Lord.

After Fr. Starzynski mentioned the idea during a homily, a local company decided to lease two homes for the ministry for a dollar per year. Another parishioner also donated $100,000 for renovations.
James, a builder and developer by trade, personally oversaw the renovations.
“We called it Paul Stefan foundation after Paul,” James said. “The death of a baby was the birth of a foundation.”
From the beginning it was clear God had His hand in the matter.
“From the day Paul died to the opening of the first house was just over nine months,” James said. “The first mother to stay at the home gave birth to her child a year to the day Paul was born.”
In the ten years since the loss of their son and the birth of the foundation, the James family has seen 170 women and their babies come through the Paul Stefan homes.
However, their next venture might prove to be the most exciting yet; a regional housing and maternity center repurposed from an old hotel James recently purchased.
“We can have up to 30 women and children,” James said. “We are going to partner with four local colleges and are going to educate them so they can get an IT certificate. We want them off the welfare system so they can have their dignity back and go out and be productive and feel good about raising their children.”
Although he faced many critics in the process, James said he waited on God to open the regional center.
“He opened the doors. Just the hotel property was worth $1.3 million. We bought it for $575,000.” James said.
After purchasing the property, the next hurdle was to begin renovations. Deciding to involve the local community in the process, James went to local churches, small groups and even the Chambers of Commerce to ask for volunteers who would be willing to decorate a room.
“Each room is individual to the people that decorated it,” James said. “Each bedroom is unique.”
The ground floor of the regional center will be allocated as a soup kitchen for the community as well as an educational center for the mothers. The second floor will house women and children, and the top floor will be for pregnant women.

Though the regional center may look like a broader ministry, their vision remains the same.
“It’s not a shelter, it’s a program,” James said. “You want to get your life on track, get a safety net and have goals in your life; we’ll help you get there.”
The stories of changed lives are a constant motivation to stay on the path on which God has placed them.
“One girl came here who was actually on the abortion table,” James said. “For some reason, they couldn’t get her blood pressure right so they sent her home. She came back again but they messed up the paperwork and sent her home again. In the meantime she met someone who gave her our number.

“She came here and had the baby. One day she came into my wife’s office sobbing and holding the baby saying, ‘I love her so much and I was going to kill her!’ She realized what she could have done. And that’s the biggest success story right there.”

While hoping to open the top floor of the regional center in August, James is already looking at opening similar centers across the country. The legacy of his baby boy—born without lungs—lives on, breathing hope and life into new communities.
Editor’s note. This appeared at Pregnancy Help News.

Source: NRLC News

Men and Abortion

 

How Little we Know about Men and Abortion

By Dave Andrusko
Editor’s note. Father’s Day is a week from Sunday. As we do each year we are running stories about one of the most neglected subject areas in the entire abortion debate: a father’s role and responsibility in the death of his child.
The following, which first ran in 2012, references the Association for Interdisciplinary Research in Values and Social Change. The Association is having its annual meeting at the NRLC Convention. For more about this year’s gathering, see here.
After nearly 40 years, you’d think almost everything that could be said about abortion has been said. However, as Wednesday’s annual meeting of the Association for Interdisciplinary Research in Values and Social Change demonstrated, there are many gaping holes beginning with the topic of last night’s session: men and abortion.

The four presenters provided everything from an overview of the research done to date through a very powerful personal testimony of one man’s abortion experience to a new organization that will help buttress the case using scholarly analysis that abortion hurts women and men.
Catherine Coyle explained the paucity of scholarly study, although in the last few years, she said, the pace had picked up considerably. Coyle began by elaborating on an almost forgotten consideration.
We tend to forget that even after Roe, there was hope that husbands would be given a say, or at least notified of the impending abortion of their child. Subsequently Supreme Court decisions made unmistakably clear those fathers—unmarried or married—had no voice. Coyle discussed the symptoms that many post-abortive fathers experience including guilt and overpowering grief.
She keenly observed that men have a paternal instinct that is much underrated. Like all presenters, Coyle offer quotes from fathers devastated by the death of their unborn children.

Coyle also noted that the failure to communicate may play a part in more abortions than we would ever imagine. On the one hand, women are looking for affirmation from men that they want them to continue the pregnancy and will support them. On the other hand, men are anxious to “support” whatever decision the women in their lives make, even if they do not want an abortion. Their noncommittal responses are interpreted as indifference, at best.
David Russell provided a moving testimony about the abortion many years ago of a child he subsequently came to name Mathew David. The audience listened with rapt attention as Mr. Russell talked of how he felt he had taken the “easy way out,” that his aborted son had deserved a father “who would protect him,” and that Mathew David “deserved better than he got.”
He said unequivocally, “Men regret abortion every bit as much as women.” His comparison of men who sit by while women abort their children to Saul holding the cloaks of those who stoned Stephen make the audience’s heads snap to attention.
Greg Hasek offered a very provocative plan for treating men who have gone through an abortion experience—or more than one. Hasek believes that men do not often come to counseling to talk about abortion. They come for other reasons (which he calls “presenting symptoms”) but that unresolved and unacknowledged grief is at work in their hearts.
Hasek also argues that men respond (in a therapeutic setting) much better to the idea of “lost fatherhood” than to abortion. He ended his talk with his own recommendations for how to help men suffering from what is, after all, a traumatic experience.

Priscilla Coleman, whose work we have frequently run or commented about in NRL News Today, ended the evening’s program with an explanation of WECARE—the World Expert Consortium for Abortion Research and Education (www.wecareexperts.org).
Launched in January2012, WECARE is designed to “foster international research, provide experts for litigation, and disseminate information on the health effects of abortion.”

Source: NRLC News

Post Abortion and Men

 

Remembering Thomas

Responsibility, Guilt and a Child Who Never Was

By Phil McCombs, Washington Post Staff Writer
Editor’s note. Father’s Day is less than two weeks away. We’ve been running some new, some older stories about one of the most neglected subject areas in the entire abortion debate: a father’s role and responsibility in the death of his child.
Phil McCombs’s agonizing 1995 account arguably is the finest post-abortion reflection on abortion from a man’s perspective ever written.
This year’s March for Life in which 45,000 abortion opponents picketed the Supreme Court, didn’t have the emotional impact on me that these events often do. I was on my way out of town on business, and scarcely noticed.
Looking at reports later it seemed that everyone had been on his or her best behavior. The abortion opponents were making it plain that they oppose the use of violence to close clinics. And counter-demonstrations by abortion rights advocates as we’re careful to call them were rare.
…
I like prayer. It’s all I have left. And pain.
When the abortion was performed I was out of town on business, too. I made sure of that. Whatever physical, emotional and spiritual agony the woman suffered, I was not by her side to support her. I turned my face away. My behavior was in all respects craven, immoral.
For some instinctual reason, or just imaginatively, I’ve come to believe that it was a boy, a son whom I wanted killed because, at the time his existence would have inconvenienced me. I’d had my fun. He didn’t fit into my plans.
His name, which is carved on my heart, was Thomas.
My feelings of responsibility and guilt are undiminished by the fact that the woman had full legal authority to make the decision on her own, either way, without consulting me or even informing me. In fact, she consulted in an open fashion, reflecting our shared responsibility and I could have made a strong case for having the child. Instead, I urged her along the path of death.
And skipped town.
It’s not a lot of help, either-emotionally or spiritually-that the high priests of the American judiciary have put their A-OK on this particular form of what I personally have come to regard as the slaughter of innocents. After all, it’s the task of government to decide whom we may or must kill, and not necessarily to provide therapeutic services afterward. In the Army I remember being trained at public expense in the “spirit of the bayonet,” which is, simply put, “to kill.” The spirit of abortion is the same in my view, though the enemy isn’t shooting back.
I feel like a murderer, which isn’t to say that I blame anyone else, or think anyone else is a murderer.
It’s just the way I feel and all the rationalizations in the world haven’t changed this. I still grieve for little Thomas. It is an ocean of grief. From somewhere in the distant past I remember the phrase from Shakespeare, the multitudinous seas, “incarnadine.”
When I go up to the river on vacation this summer, he won’t be going boating with me on the lovely old wooden runabout that I can’t really afford to put in the water but can’t bring myself to discard, either.
He won’t be lying on the grass by the tent at night looking at the starry sky and saying, “What’s that one called, Dad?”
Because there was no room on the Earth for Thomas.
He’s dead.
The latest numbers show abortions in America have been running at about 1.5 million annually [Ed. Note. Now just over 1 million annually]. That’s a lot of pain.

Secular men’s groups have tended to be focused on the “no say, no pay” issue.
“These men feel raped,” says Mel Feit of the National Center for Men. “They lose everything they worked for all their lives. In many cases they had an agreement with the woman not to have a baby and when she changes her mind they call me up and say, “How can she do this to me? How can she get away with it?” Feit plans to bring suit in federal court.

I’m more interested in the traumatic pain that many men, as well as women often feel after an abortion. A healing process of recognition, grieving and ultimately forgiveness is needed.
“There’s a lot of ambivalence for men when they get in touch with their pain,” says Eileen C. Marx, formerly communications director for Cardinal James A. Hickey of Washington and now a columnist for Catholic publications. “They didn’t have the physical pregnancy, so often they feel they’re not entitled to the feelings of sadness and anger and guilt and loss that women often feel.”
She tells of one man, a friend, whose wife had an abortion. “He pleaded with her not to have it. He said his parents would raise the child, or they could put it up for adoption. The marriage broke up as a result of the abortion and other issues. He was really devastated by the experience.”
Marx has recently written about a post-abortion healing ministry called Project Rachel in which more men are becoming involved-husbands, boyfriends and even grandfathers. There are 100 Project Rachel branches, including one in Washington.

I found it helpful just talking with Marx, a caring person, on the phone: though it was a little tough when she mentioned being pregnant and hearing the heartbeat and feeling “this wonderful celebration of the life inside you.”
She said not to be too hard on myself, that healing is about forgiveness and God forgives me.
I said sure, that’s right but some things are still hard.
Like looking in the mirror.

Editor’s note. This first ran in the Washington Post on February 3, 1995. It was reposted at priestsforlife.org.

Source: NRLC News