President Trump Announces Executive Order to Protect Abortion Survivors

President Donald Trump speaking for the
virtual National Catholic Prayer Breakfast

On Wednesday, President Trump announced that he will sign a Born Alive Executive Order requiring doctors to provide medical care to all infants born alive after failed abortions.

At the virtual National Catholic Prayer Breakfast on Sept. 23, Trump said, “Today I am announcing that I will be signing the Born-Alive Executive Order to ensure that all precious babies born alive, no matter their circumstances, receive the medical care that they deserve. This is our sacrosanct moral duty.”

A bill known as the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act has been introduced to congress multiple times, but it has failed to garner the support needed to be brought to a vote.

The proposed law would have required physicians to provide infants born alive after attempted abortions with appropriate medical care; the same care that would be given to any child of the same gestational age. Some states have passed similar legislation, but nothing has succeeded at the federal level.

The executive order is expected to take heavy inspiration from the proposed Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, but the text has not yet been released.

President Trump also announced that his administration would be increasing federal funding for neonatal research “to ensure that every child has the very best chance to thrive and to grow.”

“We believe in the joy of family, the blessing of freedom and the dignity of work and the eternal truth that every child born and unborn is made in the holy image of God,” the President said. “I will always protect the vital role of religion and prayer in American society, and I will always defend the sacred right to life.”

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40 Days for Life Kicks Off Record-Breaking Campaign

On Sept. 23, 40 Days for Life kicked off its fall campaign with a record-breaking number of applications, participating cities, and approved campaigns.

40 Days for Life is a global pro-life prayer movement that “aims to end abortion locally through prayer and fasting, community outreach, and a peaceful all-day vigil in front of abortion businesses.” 

In a letter to supporters, 40 Days for Life President and CEO Shawn Carney said that this fall's campaign will be the largest one ever, with a total of 588 cities worldwide participating.

In an August episode of the 40 Days for Life podcast, campaign director Steve Karlen said that the incredible size of this year's fall campaign should be attributed to pro-lifers taking a back-to-basics approach to the issue. “When you’re out on the sidewalk, on the street in front of an abortion facility, and you watch a woman walk into the facility pregnant and walk out later in the day not pregnant, with a broken heart, maybe crying, often limping, wounded physically, emotionally, and spiritually, you’re not thinking so much about debating or about Congress or about the Courts. All of those things are critical; they are certainly important, but I think we realize that this is something that has to come through the Lord.”

According to the 40 Days for Life website, the over 7,000 previous campaigns combined have saved 17,226 lives, caused 206 abortion workers to quit, and caused 107 abortion clinics to close. In the 13 years since 40 Days for Life was founded, it has carried out campaigns in more than 1,000 cities across 63 countries.

The fall 2020 campaign runs from September 23 through November 1. Click here to see if there is a campaign being run near you.

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Georgia Tech Settles Lawsuit with Students for Life; Revises Policy Discriminating Against Pro-Life Speaker

photo credit: Ryan Schreiber / Flickr

Students for Life of America (SFLA) has won its court battle with the Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech) for discriminating against the appearance of a pro-life speaker due to her religious beliefs. As a result, the school will need to pay $50,000 + attorney's fees to SFLA, and it will revise its policy to treat future speakers fairly.

In the fall of 2019, the SFLA chapter at Georgia Tech wanted to invite Alveda King, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s niece, to speak on campus. When the chapter requested funding from the student government to cover the cost of an event, student government leaders rejected the request. Their reasoning? The student government claimed Alveda King was “inherently religious.”

The policy change brought about by the successful SFLA lawsuit means that speakers can no longer be discriminated against by the school on the basis of their religious beliefs.

“The Constitution is clear that public universities can’t discriminate against students for their political or religious beliefs,” said SFLA president Kristan Hawkins. “[We] are hopeful that Georgia Tech’s decisive policy changes will set an example for universities around the country to uphold all students’ constitutional rights.”

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UN Passes COVID-19 Resolution Promoting Abortion Despite US Objections

Despite the protests by the US and several other countries, the UN passed a COVID-19 resolution which includes provisions promoting abortion.

US diplomat Jason Mack said, “We do not accept references to sexual and reproductive health.” The vague phrase is used in UN legislation to include abortion alongside actual medical care. “There is no international right to abortion, nor is there any duty on the part of States to finance or facilitate abortion.”

The US attempted to bring the section on "reproductive health" to a vote while the resolution was being formed, but the vote to change it failed by a wide margin. Only three countries sided with the US, while 122 countries voted for the pro-abortion wording. Only the US and Israel voted against the final resolution.

Several of those countries agreed with the US but wanted to ensure the resolution passed anyway. They presumably believed the potential benefits of the resolution outweigh the death toll that comes with increased abortion.

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David Daleiden and CMP Sue Planned Parenthood for Defamation

David Daleiden
photo credit: American Life League / Flickr

The Center for Medical Progress (CMP) and its president David Daleiden announced last week that they filed a defamation lawsuit against Planned Parenthood for repeatedly and publicly calling CMP reports of Planned Parenthood fetal harvesting practices fake.

 “Planned Parenthood has tremendous power and influence in our society. But even it must adhere to legal norms,” said CMP and Daleiden legal counsel Harmeet Dhillon. “We filed this lawsuit to hold PPFA accountable for damaging falsehoods it uttered concerning our clients’ groundbreaking journalism that exposed shocking practices it would rather keep hidden — for good reason. Planned Parenthood is not above the law. We look forward to the merits litigation of this lawsuit.”

After CMP released undercover videos in 2015 which exposed Planned Parenthood for harvesting fetal body parts from unborn children so they can be sold to researchers, Planned Parenthood repeatedly told the public that the videos were faked, and simply made “to manufacture a fake smear campaign against Planned Parenthood.”

In a statement about this lawsuit, Daleiden wrote, “Planned Parenthood admits my videos are true when under oath in federal court, but when speaking to the public, Planned Parenthood lies and calls the videos fake. I have put my life on hold for five years to report, with video evidence, the trafficking of aborted infants that I and others witnessed at the highest levels of Planned Parenthood and the abortion industry. It is time for Planned Parenthood to face the truth.”

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Planned Parenthood Clinic Refuses to Give Information and Hangs up on 911 Dispatcher

photo credit: Operation Rescue

During a conversation with a 911 dispatcher, a Planned Parenthood employee refused to give information about the nature of a medical emergency one of their patients were experiencing. The employee went as far as to hang up on the dispatcher rather than answer her questions.

911 call records obtained by Operation Rescue show that the incident occurred on July 23, 2020, at a Planned Parenthood abortion clinic in Cincinnati, Ohio. The clinic first placed an emergency call using an internet phone line that routed it through an intermediary call center. This delayed the emergency response. Even after this, the Planned Parenthood caller refused to answer questions and hung up on the 911 dispatcher.

Here is a short excerpt from the call records:

911: About how old is she?

PP: [Cross talk] . . . I can’t give you that right now.  Again —

911: Is it a female?  We need to get this information to the paramedics, ma’am.  They need to have the equipment ready.

PP:  Again, I’m calling from Planned Parenthood. We’re currently experiencing a medical emergency. We have physicians that are with the patient and they’ll be waiting for the paramedics’ arrival. Thank you.

After that, the caller hangs up. This kind of behavior is irresponsible and inexcusable when someone is experiencing an emergency and needs medical attention quickly. Women who feel they need abortions are not just profit opportunities for abortion clinics. They are real people whose lives matter. Planned Parenthood is showing that it does not believe the same, and it is willing to risk a woman's life so that it can hide abortion complications from 911 records.

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President Trump Says He'll Announce Supreme Court Nominee By Saturday

President Trump said that he will announce a Supreme Court nominee to potentially fill the seat left vacant by the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg before the end of the week.

Upon learning about the death of Ginsburg on Sept. 18, President Trump released a statement mourning her death and paying respects to her family and her accomplishments in life. It read in part,

"Today, our Nation mourns the loss of a trailblazer, not only in the field of law, but in the history of our country. Ruth Bader Ginsburg served more than 27 years as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. She was a loving wife to her late husband Martin, and a caring mother to her two children Jane and James."

On Monday, President Trump said on Fox News that he would announce a Supreme Court nominee by Saturday. “We won the election and elections have consequences,” he said.

President Trump told Fox News that he had narrowed his selection down to “five, probably four” choices. Trump would be announcing his nominee after the funeral services for Justice Ginsburg and not long before the first presidential election debate on September 29.

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Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg Dead at 87. Republicans Determined to Appoint New Justice Before Election.

Late Supreme Court Justice
Ruth Bader Ginsburg (1933-2020)

After a long bout with cancer, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg passed away on September 18 at the age of 87. She served as a member of the Supreme Court for 27 years after being appointed by President Bill Clinton in 1993. Many politicians on capitol hill have expressed their condolences and are mourning over the loss, but it is hard to ignore the increased pressure this puts on the current Senate as well as the presidential election just weeks before November.

President Donald Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell have already announced plans to vote on a new Supreme Court nominee before election day.

In a statement which mourned Ginsburg's passing and celebrated her accomplishments, Sen. McConnell wrote,

"In the last midterm election before Justice Scalia's death in 2016, Americans elected a Republican Senate majority because we pledged to check and balance the last days of a lame-duck president's second term. We kept our promise. Since the 1880s, no Senate has confirmed an opposite-party president's Supreme Court nominee in a presidential election year.

By contrast, Americans reelected our majority in 2016 and expanded it in 2018 because we pledged to work with President Trump and support his agenda, particularly his outstanding appointments to the federal judiciary. Once again, we will keep our promise.

President Trump's nominee will receive a vote on the floor of the United States Senate."

Ginsburg was one of several pro-abortion judges on the Supreme Court. A pro-life appointment by President Trump would present an unprecedented opportunity to overturn pro-abortion Supreme Court decisions such as Roe v. Wade. If this happens, the ability to prohibit abortion will be passed to the states.

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Baby Leo Saved Through Abortion Pill Reversal

In a heartwarming story, a mother named Amy told Pregnancy Help News how she saved the life of her now 5-month old son through abortion pill reversal.

“My first reaction to the pregnancy was thinking I didn’t want to have another kid,” Amy, 38, stated. “I told myself I didn’t want to take away from my two sons. I had built up anxiety, and on an impulse, I decided to get an abortion.”

Amy's two other sons are 16 and 14 years old. She had convinced herself that she was having an abortion for their sake, but she immediately felt regret after taking her first abortion pill.

“When I really took the time to think about it, I realized I had thought about everyone and everything else except this child and doing things God’s way,” said Amy. “God will always find a way to provide. Selfishness and ignorance were what led me.”

Amy searched the internet to find if there was anything she could do to prevent the abortion process that began when she took a dose of Mifepristone. She learned about abortion pill reversal and called the abortion pill reversal hotline. Workers from the Abortion Pill Rescue Network were able to find a doctor who was willing to help Amy on a Saturday morning. She obtained a prescription for progesterone, which can reverse the effects of the first abortion pill, and picked it up from her local Walgreens pharmacy.

“The people at Planned Parenthood offered zero support,” said Amy's husband, Tom. “Thank God, Amy went home, and she was determined to figure out how to reverse it.”

He had initially supported her idea to abort and had similar reasons, but he realized afterward that they were being impulsive.

“The stuff we were afraid of was all in our heads,” Tom said of the fear leading toward abortion. “Just stuff we conjured up.”

Leo's development was completely normal, and he is now a perfectly healthy 5-month old. He is just one of the many lives saved through abortion pill reversal. If anyone needs to contact the Abortion Pill Rescue Network, they can do so using the information on their website here.

Click here to read more of Amy's story.

Arkansas Abortionist Receives Emergency Suspension after Granting Minor a Medical Marijuana Card

Little Rock Family Planning abortionist and
owner Thomas Tvedten

Arkansas abortionist Thomas Tvedten of Little Rock Family Planning had his medical license suspended by the Arkansas State Medical Board after certified a young girl for a medical marijuana card.

The medical board came to the conclusion hat Tvedten's actions amounted to “gross negligence and ignorant malpractice.”

While it is unknown whether the minor was a patient of Tvedten, Operation Rescue President Troy Newman questioned whether the abortionist's actions had a more sinister motive: “the fact Tvedten was helping a little girl get marijuana raises disturbing questions about why he wanted that child drugged.”

He also noted that it is generally very difficult to convince a medical board that an abortionist's medical license should be suspended. The Operation Rescue president should know quite well what it takes to convince a medical board that an abortionist's license should be suspended or revoked. His organization constantly monitors abortion clinics for medical malpractice and advocates for the safety of vulnerable women who are harmed by abortionists.

More information about this specific incident will be available after an October 1 hearing.

To cover for Tvedten during his suspension, Little Rock Family Planning called on the infamous abortionist Willie Parker to serve as the abortion clinic's medical director for the time being. Parker was once idolized be pro-abortion advocates, but many distanced themselves from him after he was accused of predatory sexual behavior.

The clinic has seemingly replaced one irresponsible abortionist for another. Women and children (born and unborn) are not to be treated as commodities with price tags. They are people that deserve respect.

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March for Life Announces New Theme for 2021: ‘Together Strong: Life Unites’

On September 10th, the March for Life Education & Defense Fund announced the theme and date for next year's March for Life event. The 47th annual March for Life will use the theme, “Together Strong: Life Unites” and be held in Washington D.C. on January 29th, 2021.

The event's organizers call the March for Life "the largest annual human rights demonstration in the world." Pro-life advocates from across the country come to Washington D.C. for the event each year to celebrate the sanctity of life and energize one another for the pro-life cause. This year's theme is meant to further unify pro-life advocates during this discouraging and divisive time.

At last year's event, President Donald Trump became the first sitting president to ever attend and speak at the March for Life. This year, regardless of the outcome of the election, pro-life advocates must remain vigilant. There is more work to be done. As the organizers affirm, there are things we can all do to defend the lives of the unborn:

"Each and every one of us has an important role to play in building a culture of life. As Mother Teresa once said, ‘You can do what I cannot do. I can do what you cannot do. Together we can do great things.’ From choosing adoption to joyfully accepting the responsibilities of fatherhood and motherhood. From sidewalk counseling to lobbying. From prenatal care to post-abortion support. From praying for the most vulnerable to voting to protect them."

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NARAL Complains that Media Doesn't do Enough to Slant Coverage of the Abortion Debate

A new report by the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League (NARAL) complains that news outlets don't use enough pro-abortion language when covering the topic of abortion.

The report, which even cited articles from left-leaning media sources such as CNN, the New York Times, and Politico, gave several flawed reasons in its argument.

Among its complaints are that news articles about abortion are more likely to quote politicians than doctors. They argue that this trend can cause people to believe that abortion is a political issue and not a healthcare one. NARAL would be right in this assessment. Abortion is not healthcare, and the killing of innocent people should be considered a political issue. It is an issue of human rights, and the protection of human rights is among the most basic duties of government.

The NARAL goes on to lament the use of terms such as "infanticide," "heartbeat bill," and "partial-birth abortion." Despite its own inability to refute the fact that unborn children have heartbeats after six weeks of development, the pro-abortion organization continues to claim that these terms are inaccurate when used to describe abortion. Instead, they argued, "only 27 articles [out of 91 analyzed] noted that [six weeks] is typically before a woman even knows she is pregnant — a critical fact that gives context to the potential impact on women." This "critical fact" should not matter if a human life with a beating heart is being traded for this "potential impact on women."

This is a blatant attempt to control American culture by controlling the language we use. Pro-life advocates need to be wary of efforts like this and reject changes to our language that would trick others into believing the lie that abortion is just another medical procedure.

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Trump at Nevada Roundtable Claims Biden Supports “after-term abortion, which is basically baby execution."

photo credit: Gage Skidmore / Flickr

At a Hispanics for Trump roundtable event in Nevada, President Trump accused Democrat presidential nominee Joe Biden of supporting “after-term abortion, which is basically baby execution."

While some news outlets point out that Biden's voting record on abortion used to be more moderate, Biden's stance on abortion has shifted dramatically throughout his political career. Originally a strong proponent of the Hyde Amendment, a policy that prevented federal tax dollars from funding elective abortions, he now advocates against the policy. Additionally, conservative pundits argue that more radical pro-abortion voices such as Alexandria-Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders are pulling candidate Joe Biden's policy agenda even further in support of abortion.

Biden's vice-presidential selection, California Senator Kamala Harris, voted against the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act earlier this year. The bill would have legally protected children who survive attempted abortions by creating criminal penalties for abortionists who don't provide them medical care after they are born.

While it might be somewhat unclear just how pro-abortion the Democratic presidential ticket is this election, it is blatantly obvious that the ticket unequivocally supports the practice of ending unborn lives.

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Trump Administration Proposes Expansion to Mexico City Policy

photo credit: Gage Skidmore / Flickr

On Monday, the Trump administration proposed an expansion to the pro-life Mexico City Policy which would include military and government contracts.

The Mexico City Policy is not law, but it has been implemented by pro-life presidents since it was first implemented during President Ronald Reagan's administration in 1984. The current policy places limits on how US tax dollars can be distributed to Non-Governmental-Organizations (NGO's) in foreign countries. Specifically, it means that federal tax dollars may not be given to organizations that provide or promote abortion.

While the Mexico City Policy currently applies to nearly $9 billion in U.S. foreign aid, this expansion could further ensure that US funding is not being spent on organizations that will use it to promote the deadly practice of abortion. NGO's can do this by either directly committing abortions or by using US funds to subsidize lobbyists who fight for legalized or expanded abortion in their home countries.

In response, Planned Parenthood Action tweeted that the proposal is an “unprecedented expansion of a harmful policy.” That might be a sign that it's a good idea.

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8th Circuit Court of Appeals Could End Injunctions Against 3 More Pro-Life Arkansas Laws

Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge
photo credit: Gage Skidmore / Flickr

Only a month after remanding injunctions against four pro-life Arkansas laws, the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals will hear Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge’s request that it ends a separate injunction against three newer pro-life laws.

The three laws in question were passed in 2019 and blocked from enforcement by U.S. District Judge Kristine Baker on August 6, 2019.

The first of these is Act 493, which prohibits abortions after 18 weeks of pregnancy. This law would protect the most developed unborn children; ones that could survive birth if they were allowed to live just over a month longer.

The second is Act 619, which bans abortions “with the knowledge” that a woman is seeking it “solely on the basis” of a prenatal diagnosis of Down syndrome. This law would ban purely discriminatory abortions. A child's physical or mental abilities shouldn't determine its right to live.

The third is Act 700, which requires doctors who perform abortions in Arkansas to be board-certified or board-eligible OB-GYNs. Laws like this are passed in the hope that more qualified abortionists will at least have better regard for the safety of pregnant women who come to have abortions. All too often, stories come out about mothers who are hospitalized or killed by abortion providers. Pro-abortion advocates could not even allow a law like this to stay on the books, however.

Hopefully, Arkansas Attorney General Rutledge can successfully argue against the injunctions blocking these rightfully passed laws and save lives in the process.

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New Illinois Billboard Campaign Advertises Medicaid-Funded Abortions

Illinois state capitol
photo credit: Jim Bowen / Flickr

The Chicago Abortion Fund started a new billboard campaign designed to promote taxpayer-funded abortions through Medicaid.

The pro-abortion organization has paid for six billboards statewide which read, “Abortion is Healthcare. It’s Covered by Illinois Medicaid. We’re Here to Help,” followed by the Chicago Abortion Fund’s website address. Three of the billboards are next to heavily-trafficked interstates near Chicago, two are in Peoria, and one is by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The signs are currently scheduled to remain posted through the month of September.

One of the billboards is pictured in an article by the Journal Standard. Click here to see.

Unlike most states, Illinois allows Medicaid funding to go directly toward elective abortion. Other states require Medicaid funding to adhere to the requirements of the Hyde Amendment, which prevents tax dollars from funding elective abortions. This taxpayer-funding caused a notable increase in abortion after its passage under former Governor Bruce Rauner in 2018.

Illinois lawmakers have made the deadly practice of abortion increasingly accessible to residents, and has gone as far as to make the state an "abortion hub" for anyone in the midwest seeking an abortion. As pro-life lawmakers in nearby states enact laws regulating abortion, more and more women come to Illinois from those states because the gruesome practice is almost completely unrestricted.

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Tennessee State Representative Forced out of Democrat Party Due to Pro-Life Beliefs

Tennessee State Rep. John DeBerry Jr.
photo credit: Sean Braisted / Flickr

After being ejected from the Democrat party, ordained minister and pro-life Tennessee state Rep. John DeBerry Jr. will be running as an independent this year.

DeBerry was forcibly removed from the Democrat party after the Tennessee Democratic Party’s executive committee voted 41-18 to remove him from the August primary ballot. Luckily for him, legislators passed a measure which allowed him to be on the ballot for re-election even though he was unable to participate in the primaries. The Democrats removed DeBerry from their party after the filing deadline had passed to run as a Republican or independent, so he would have been unable to run at all even though he was currently an incumbent.

DeBerry, who serves as a minister for the Church of Christ, told the Catholic News Agency, “My work in Nashville as a legislator is nothing more than an extension of my work as a child of God, as a Christian,” he said. He added that it was ridiculous for the Democratic party to claim voters don't understand what he has been doing in office, or what his stance on abortion is. “So for them to say that folks don’t know where I stand, they actually said that the people in my district don’t have sense enough to elect their representative.”

CNA also wrote that DeBerry “was one of more than 100 Democrats at the federal, state, and local levels who recently asked the platform committee of the Democratic National Convention to moderate the abortion language in the party’s platform.”

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President Trump Releases New List of 20 Potential Supreme Court Nominees

photo credit: Gage Skidmore / Flickr

At a white house press conference on September 9, President Donald Trump announced a new list of 20 people he would consider as potential Supreme Court nominees if a vacancy appears.

Among the names he listed are Texas Senator Ted Cruz, Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton, Missouri Senator Josh Hawley, and U.S. District Court Judge Sarah Pitlyk. All three senators take pro-life stances, and Pitlyk used to be part of The Center for Medical Progress's defense team after it was sued by Planned Parenthood for releasing videos exposing its sale of fetal tissue harvested from aborted children.

Senator Hawley has since stated that he is not interested in holding a position on the high court. He has stated that he would ask Supreme Court nominees if they believed Roe v. Wade was wrongly decided as a "litmus test" for whether he would accept them, however.

The full list of potential nominees can be found here in the transcript of the president's Wednesday press conference.

Pro-life organizations applauded the president's list of potential constitutional conservative nominees. Susan B. Anthony List president Marjorie Dannenfelser said it was "full of all-stars," and National Right to Life President Carol Tobias wrote,

“President Trump’s expanded list of potential Supreme Court justices is laden with an impressive assembly of well-qualified men and women who would make outstanding additions to the Supreme Court, and who have demonstrated a commitment to defending the text and history of the Constitution and the principles of judicial restraint. President Trump’s list stands in stark contrast with the judicial-legislation activists who would be nominated by Joe Biden.”

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Assisted Suicide "Doctor" Says he Experiments on Patients to Find More Efficient Ways to Kill Them.

In response to a Mercury News article that celebrated the experimentation of an assisted suicide "doctor" trying to make the process of dying quicker, National Review Columnist Wesley Smith wrote an article criticizing the media for lifting up doctors like Lonnie Shavelson.

The Mercury News article was titled “How California Doctors are Fixing How We Die” and included quotes from Shavelson, who said that he is actively changing the drug cocktails he gives to patients who wish to die. His goal is to make the process faster so they don't suffer for hours after taking the poison he prescribes them, but his action amount to human experimentation.

Smith hits the nail on the head with his analysis of the situation, writing, "Let’s label this what it is: Shavelson using sick suicidal people as human guinea pigs in being made dead".

Not only will death doctors take advantage of sick and depressed individuals for a profit (Shavelson himself charges $2,000 for his services), but they will use these people as test subjects for their newest ways to kill people.

Every human being has value, and no doctor should reinforce the idea that disability or depression makes someone disposable.

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Church in Washington State Asks 9th Circuit to Overturn Ruling Forcing it to Cover Elective Abortion

Cedar Park Assembly of God, a church in the state of Washington, filed its opening brief with the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday. A lower court already dismissed the church's lawsuit against the state for forcing the church's health insurance plan to cover elective abortion, but the church hopes that the 9th circuit will overrule that decision.

The church's opening brief explains that  SB 6219 (the law forcing insurance providers to cover abortions), “contains no religious exception despite many religious organizations’ belief in the sanctity of human life and strong opposition to abortion. When churches protested, the bill’s sponsor suggested they sue if they did not wish to comply. This extreme abortion-coverage mandate had its desired effect: insurance providers began inserting abortion coverage into ministries’ health plans in direct violation of their religious teachings…. State officials thus deliberately targeted houses of worship for mandatory abortion coverage and, in so doing, intentionally violated their religious beliefs about the sanctity of human life.”

SB 6219 was signed into law back in March of 2018 and threatens criminal penalties if an organization refuses to provide abortion coverage as part of its maternity care.

“No church should be forced to cover abortions, and certainly not a church that dedicates its ministry to protecting and celebrating life like Cedar Park does,” said Alliance Defending Freedom Legal Counsel Elissa Graves. “Cedar Park believes and teaches that every human life begins at conception and is worthy of protection until natural death, so providing insurance coverage for abortions is clearly not something the church can or should be forced to do. And Cedar Park doesn’t simply believe in the importance of human life, it puts those beliefs into practice by partnering with a local pregnancy care center, hosting an annual camp for foster care children, and ministering to hundreds of couples struggling with infertility. The state has no legitimate legal basis to force this church—or any other—into contradicting its foundational belief that human life is sacred.”

Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys are assisting Cedar Park Assembly of God in its argument to the 9th circuit.

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