SBA List launches $52M effort to reelect Trump, 'most pro-life president in history'

By Brandon Showalter, Opinion writer and social commentator Monday, January 20, 2020

President Donald Trump speaks during the Susan B. Anthony List's 11th annual Campaign for Life Gala at the National Building Museum May 22, 2018, in Washington, D.C. President Trump addressed the annual gala of the anti-abortion group and urged people to vote in the midterm election. | Alex Wong/Getty Images

A prominent pro-life group is launching a $52 million campaign to help reelect President Trump by galvanizing pro-life voters in 2020.

The Susan B. Anthony List announced Friday that along with its partner super PAC, which is called Women Speak Out PAC, its plans include a robust boost to on the ground grassroots efforts, voter contact mail, phone calls, and digital ads. Their teams have reportedly already visited over 460,000 homes in swing states and are reaching out to voters in battleground states such as Arizona, Florida, and North Carolina.

Before Election Day, the SBA List intends to expand its efforts to Iowa, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Wisconsin and visit 4 million voters.

"The stakes have truly never been higher for unborn babies and moms," SBA List founder and President Marjorie Dannenfelser said in a tweet Friday about her group's efforts.

In an interview with LifeNews, the group's national spokeswoman Mallory Quigley said she expects the abortion radicalism of the Democratic Party will be a "liability" when it comes time to vote.

"From now until Election Day, our team will go door-to-door visiting traditional Democrat voter groups who may simply be unaware of the Democrats’ support for extreme pro-abortion policies. Our focused, battle-tested voter outreach method will ensure we reach the voters who can provide President Trump and pro-life Senate candidates the winning margin on Election Day,” Quigley said.

To the surprise of many, even though Trump identified himself as pro-choice years before his political career ever began, pro-life advocates have often noted that his administration has delivered on its promises when it comes to pro-life policies.

And though abortion giant Planned Parenthood remains federally funded through certain avenues like Medicaid — a 2017 attempt to defund the outfit failed in the Senate during a failed vote repeal of the Affordable Care Act — the Trump administration instituted a new rule last year forbidding Title X grant recipients from providing or referring pregnant women for abortions. As a result of the new rule, Planned Parenthood withdrew from the program, forfeiting approximately $60 million annually in federal funds.

Soon after taking office, Trump reinstated and expanded the Mexico City Policy, barring foreign aid dollars from funding entities that provide abortion overseas.

The abortion issue rose to the fore of American politics in 2019 as liberal state legislatures in New York and Illinois expanded abortion access up to the moment of birth.

Vermont lawmakers also passed a bill that codifies the state’s existing abortion laws that allow abortion in the third trimester up to birth.

Other states with majority pro-life legislators and governors passed laws that require clinics to meet health and safety standards and place limits on abortion. Those states are: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Ohio, Oklahoma, and Utah.

Utah and Arkansas both passed laws banning the abortion of babies diagnosed with Down syndrome. Louisiana, Georgia, Kentucky, Missouri, and Ohio passed laws banning most abortions as soon as a preborn baby’s heartbeat is detected. Kentucky also passed a law banning abortion based on sex, race and disability, as well as a law banning second-trimester dismemberment abortions that was later blocked by a judge.

Alabama’s Republican Gov. Kay Ivey signed a bill into law making abortion a felony in the state, with no exceptions for rape or incest.

Many pro-life state laws are already being contested in courts, representing ongoing conflicts that will likely percolate up through the federal judiciary and perhaps challenge the national abortion regime as set forth in Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey.

Whether the Supreme Court will revisit the core holdings in those cases remains to be seen, but with the balance of the high court now tilting more conservative with the addition of Trump-nominated Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh to the bench, pro-lifers are cautiously optimistic and note that abortion policy is at a critical juncture.

The high court will soon hear oral arguments in the case of a Louisiana law requiring abortion facilities to have admitting privileges to hospitals within a 30-mile radius in June Medical Services v. Gee.

Politico quoted an official with the SBA List Friday who said the group was distressed during the 2016 campaign when a 2005 "Access Hollywood" tape was released in which Trump was heard making lewd remarks about women in a conversation with then host Billy Bush. Trump subsequently apologized for his comments and the pro-life group stuck by their support for Trump, with the official adding that, "what we have now is the most pro-life president in American history.”