Written by Penny Pullen

We cannot remain silent in our disappointment over the move by U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and U.S. Representative Chris Smith (R-NJ) to propose a federal ban on post-15-week abortions.

This proposal – introduced at a time when it has literally zero chance of passing – serves only to put pro-life candidates on the spot during an abortion-heated campaign season. Our candidates are being poorly served already by professional consultants brought in by the GOP leadership and campaign chiefs; dropping an unpassable proposal into the spotlight serves them even worse, pinning them to the wall.

Many states are already adopting stricter limits and even bans on abortion; a weaker federal proposal undercuts their pioneering efforts and state enforcement. And the response by DC sponsors that their bill will treat differently the lives of children in states with stricter policies calls into sharp question the constitutionality of such a proposal.

For so many inexcusable reasons, the proposal becomes a press-release bill, not a serious bid for serious reform. And it is inexcusably divisive within the pro-life community, just weeks before what will likely be a watershed election.

We suggest that if our federal lawmakers want to bring their pro-life convictions into a useful campaign for reform – even at this late date in the legislative process – they focus instead on such reforms as demanding that the Hyde Amendment be re-adopted as a no-compromise requirement for their votes on any spending measures.

And in light of the U.S. Supreme Court’s having sent the right to life of unborn children to the states for their widely varying lawmaking, we urge that our federal lawmakers revive now the Child Interstate Abortion Notification Act to protect the adolescents in states neighboring abortion havens. The disparate treatment of abortion law by the various states makes this long-languishing proposal now a matter of added urgency.

Another area our federal lawmakers should be addressing is the blocking of Biden Regime regulatory and bureaucratic schemes to push abortion through offering abortions at the VA – a federal issue – and the atrocious pressure coming from such bureaucracies as the Dept. of Health & Human Services, which is shredding conscience protections for medical personnel and finding contorted workarounds to put taxpayers on the hook for the killing of unborn children.

Let the states deal with abortion bans for now. There’s so much going on at the federal level – yes, on abortion – that you could be dealing with. Please, stay in your lane. If you do not rise up now on the Biden Regime’s undermining of the Dobbs ruling and of the right to life, which is in our nation’s founding charter, when will you? Leave the states to do their job. Please.

This article was originally published by Life Advocacy Project and is reprinted here with permission.

With a bang of a gavel in 1973, 63 million fellow Americans were condemned to die. And the number keeps growing.

Now if the U.S. Senate confirms Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, another pro-abortion justice will be added to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Last week, Judge Jackson, nominated by Biden to the U.S. Supreme Court, faced four days of hearings in the U.S. Senate. South Carolina Republican U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham raised an intriguing point to her: “Every group that wants to pack the court, that believes the court is a bunch of right-wing nuts who are going to destroy America, that considers the Constitution ‘trash’—all wanted you picked. That is all I can say. That so many of these left-wing radical groups who would destroy the law as we know it…supported you is problematic for me.”

Jon Schweppe of the American Principles Project noted, “On abortion and religious liberty, it’s clear where she stands. Jackson co-authored an amicus brief for the Massachusetts NARAL chapter characterizing pro-life sidewalk counselors as ‘indisputably harmful’ and supporting the notion that they should not be allowed anywhere near an abortion clinic.”

He adds, “Why would leftist groups like American Atheists, the Human Rights Campaign, NARAL, Planned Parenthood, the National Education Association and the Southern Poverty Law Center push the White House to nominate Jackson and the Senate to confirm?….Ketanji Brown Jackson is a woke Trojan horse, as the preponderance of evidence suggests.”

When asked to define what a woman is, Judge Jackson declined, claiming she’s “not a biologist.” When asked when human life begins, she said to Louisiana U.S. Senator John Kennedy: “Senator, um… I don’t know.”

Gary Bauer responded to her answer: “Of course, this well-educated, Harvard graduate knows life begins at conception. The problem is that she’s all in on abortion on demand.”

The U.S. Supreme Court decisions Roe v. Wade (1973) and Casey v. Planned Parenthood (1992) established by judicial fiat a right to abortion. Thus abortion, said Judge Jackson, is “settled law of the Supreme Court concerning the right to terminate a pregnancy. They established a framework the court has reaffirmed.”

One Constitutional authority had some criticisms of Roe v. Wade as a legal opinion. She said that Roe “tried to do too much, too fast—it essentially made every abortion restriction in the country at the time illegal in one fell swoop—leaving it open to fierce attacks. ‘Doctrinal limbs too swiftly shaped…may prove unstable.’”

Who was this radical anti-abortion activist that would dare criticize the left’s most beloved decision? It was Ruth Bader Ginsburg–before she became a justice on the high court who did everything in her power to preserve Roe v. Wade.

Writing for Lifenews.com, Micaiah Bilger observes that Judge Jackson has called peaceful pro-life sidewalk counselors at abortion clinics “hostile, noisy and in your face” people.

Bilger added, “Jackson has the support of NARAL Pro-Choice America, which advocates for abortions without limits up to birth…She also ruled against the Trump administration’s efforts to defund the billion-dollar abortion chain Planned Parenthood, and she clerked for pro-abortion Justice Stephen Breyer when he issued an opinion against the partial-birth abortion ban.”

I believe abortion is the single most important political issue of our time. It’s not complicated. Abortion takes a human life every time.

When judges rule in favor of abortion, they are playing God. I find it amazing that the left constantly decries bullying, yet they favor abortion rights. What could be more bullying than dismembering a defenseless, unborn child limb by limb because it is perceived as somehow inconvenient?

Some critics on the left, like Bill Maher, say that the only reason conservatives oppose Judge Jackson is because she’s black. But people need to remember that the founder of the nation’s leading abortion provider, Planned Parenthood, was Margaret Sanger, who spoke at a Ku Klux Klan meeting. She wrote a letter to one of her board members (Dr. Clarence J. Gamble, 12/10/1939): “We don’t want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population.” No wonder the majority of abortion facilities are in urban areas—to this day.

In our nation’s birth certificate, the Declaration of Independence, our founders said that our rights come from the Creator—and first among these rights is the “right to life.” Indeed, if you’re dead, how can you enjoy any other right?

The U.S. Constitution, which is predicated on the Declaration, notes in the preamble that one of its purposes is: “secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.” Our posterity? That is, the yet to be born.

To paraphrase Dr. D. James Kennedy, Judge Jackson should get down on her knees and thank God that her mother wasn’t “pro-choice.”

If you get abortion wrong, you tend to get everything else wrong too.

This article was originally published at JerryNewcombe.com.

On January 26th, various news outlets reported that U.S. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, who was appointed in 1994, planned to announce his retirement. This announcement was followed by multiple reports suggesting that Justice Breyer may have been ushered out by political activists/strategists within the Democratic Party. One report by FoxNews.com claimed that “groups such as Black Lives Matter and Women’s March launched an effort calling for the justice’s retirement.”

With the midterm elections just eight months away and a “red wave” predicted, time was of the essence. U.S. Senate Democrats could not afford to wait to fill the seat occupied by the oldest liberal member of the Court, even if that meant ushering Breyer out before he was ready to go.

Last Friday, President Joe Biden nominated federal appeals court Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to fill Breyer’s seat. According to background information provided by the White House, Judge Jackson, who currently serves as a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, was born in Washington, D.C. and grew up in Miami, Florida. She earned a BA from Harvard University in 1993 (magna cum laude), and then attended Harvard Law School, graduating cum laude in 1996. Judge Jackson clerked for a variety of judges after earning her JD, and in 1999 clerked for Justice Breyer. She worked in private practice and then as a public defender.

President Barack Obama nominated Judge Jackson as vice chair of the U.S. Sentencing Commission in 2009. She was confirmed unanimously for that position by the U.S. Senate in 2010 and served there until she was nominated by President Obama for a position on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. She was again confirmed by the U.S. Senate in 2013. Judge Jackson served on the District Court until 2021, when President Joe Biden nominated her for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. The U.S. Senate again confirmed her appointment in 2021 by a 53-44 vote with three Republicans joining all 50 Democrats voting “yea:” Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Susan Collins of Maine, and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.

Judge Jackson is currently visiting Senators as she begins the interview process for the U.S. Supreme Court. The U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee will commence confirmation hearings. If she is confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Judge Jackson would be the second youngest justice on the court—behind Justice Amy Coney Barrett—and the first Black woman to serve as a U.S. Supreme Court Justice. Of course, President Biden publicly and proudly announced to the nation that the race and gender of his nominee were pre-qualifying conditions for his consideration. (White males need not apply.)

So, what about her judicial philosophy about the U.S. Constitution, the sanctity of life and religious freedom? Well, according to an article by law professor Jonathan Turley,

What is most notable of the statements of support for Judge Jackson is how little is said about her judicial philosophy or approach to the law. The fact is that we have a comparably thin record of opinions in comparison to recent nominees. While she obviously has opinions as a district court judge, there are few opinions that shed light on her judicial philosophy. That is not surprising for a trial judge who issues hundreds of insular decisions on trial issues or outcomes. This is not about the years of experience on the bench, which I have repeatedly noted is a great strength in the nomination. It simply means that we have fewer opinions offering substantive insights into her approach to legal interpretation. The question is whether we will learn substantially more in this confirmation.

We can hope that the confirmation hearings for Judge Jackson, which are scheduled for March 21 through 24, will flesh out more about her views on key issues and her judicial philosophy.

Kelly Shackelford, President, CEO, and Chief Counsel for First Liberty Institute has a different perspective. He isn’t waiting to sound the alarm:

In nominating Ketanji Brown Jackson, President Biden is selecting a judicial activist for the Supreme Court. Her record from the beginning of her career shows hostility to religious liberty, free speech, and other constitutional rights. The American people do not want a liberal extremist on the Supreme Court. If confirmed, Judge Jackson’s judicial activism will place the constitutional rights of all Americans in jeopardy.

Other concerns about Judge Jackson’s positions have been raised by our friends at Family Research Council and Family Policy Alliance.

Written by Liberty McArtor

Proponents of court-packing argue that adding more judges to our nation’s judiciary is the magical solution to urgent problems, and even paint the picture that doing so is an act of goodwill. But far from being a necessity, court-packing is a brazen power-grab by one political party to fix the number of U.S. Supreme Court justices or federal judges to get the political results they want.

And when we look at the history of court-packing across the world, there’s no way around it: Court-packing is a dangerous scheme with severe implications that would erase freedom and rights for future generations and destroy America’s constitutional order.

To equip you—and all Americans—in exposing the lie and the radical plan to overthrow America’s court system, here are four common (or rather, bogus) court-packing claims debunked with facts and logic.

1. Myth: The Supreme Court has been stolen.

Fact: The U.S. Supreme Court currently has nine highly qualified, legitimately appointed and confirmed justices. The far Left just doesn’t like some of them.

The reason court-packing advocates say the U.S. Supreme Court was “stolen” is because they disagree with the political party and the president who appointed the latest three justices (Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett). For instance, they claimed that Justice Barrett’s confirmation happened too quickly. But as First Liberty President and CEO Kelly Shackelford has noted, justices have been confirmed in the same fashion nearly thirty (30) times. In fact, the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, whom Justice Barrett replaced, was confirmed in a similar time frame.

Ironically, stealing the U.S. Supreme Court is exactly what would happen if the coup attempt to add two, four or even six more justices were to succeed.

2. Myth: Court-packing has popular support.

Fact: Court-packing is widely unpopular—and historically has been within both parties. 

Polls conducted in the last few years show the majority of Americans oppose court-packing.

• In 2020, a New York Times-Siena College poll found that fifty-eight percent (58%) of likely voters opposed packing the U.S. Supreme Court.
  
• In 2019, Rasmussen polls found that only twenty-seven percent (27%) of Americans favor packing the U.S> Supreme Court with additional justices.

What’s more, opposition to court-packing is prevalent across the political spectrum.

Here are some quotes from several politicians and prominent figures on both sides of the political aisle, starting with the current president:

• President Joe Biden (D):

In 1983: “President Roosevelt clearly had the right to send to the United States Senate and the United States Congress a proposal to pack the court. … But it was a bonehead idea. It was a terrible, terrible mistake to make.”

In 2020: “I’m not a fan of court packing.”

• Ted Cruz (R-TX)

In 2020: “Packing the Court means one very specific thing: expanding the number of justices to achieve a political outcome. It is wrong. It is an abuse of power.”

• Joe Manchin (D-WV)

In 2020: “I want to allay those fears, I want to rest those fears for you right now because when they talk about whether it be packing the courts, or ending the filibuster, I will not vote to do that.”

• Lindsey Graham (R-SC)

In 2020: “I can’t think of a more destabilizing event for America than changing the number of [justices] on the Supreme Court every election cycle, because it becomes a winner take all for the Court.”

• Jon Ossoff (D-GA):

In 2020: “We shouldn’t expand the Supreme Court just because a justice may be confirmed with whom we disagree on policy.”

• Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg (1933 – 2020):

In 2019: “If anything would make the court look partisan…it would be that—one side saying, ‘When we’re in power, we’re going to enlarge the number of judges, so we would have more people who would vote the way we want them to.’”

The truth is both parties have long opposed court-packing, and the sudden flip by a select group of elites on the Democratic side on this issue exposes this scheme for what it really is: a barefaced power grab.

3. Myth: Court-packing is a routine procedure.

Fact: Changes to the size of the U.S. Supreme Court are very rare in America’s history, and the few partisan attempts at court-packing have been failures.

Congress has changed the number of U.S. Supreme Court justices only a total of seven times in American history. The radical Left distorts this fact to make you think court-packing is normal. But in nearly 250 years and 120 Congresses, the seven prior changes (many of them due to workloads and the addition of states to the Republic) do not offer a justification for packing the Court today. On the contrary, the seven changes show how rare court-packing is in America. What’s more, the number of U.S. Supreme Court justices hasn’t changed at all since 1869—that’s over 150 years!

4. Myth: Court-packing will save democracy.

Fact: Court packing will crush civil liberties by making the U.S. Supreme Court a partisan tool of whoever holds power.  

Using a baseball metaphor, U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts once said of a judge’s role, “It’s my job to call balls and strikes, and not to pitch or bat.”

What would happen if several partisan justices were added to the U.S. Supreme Court—justices who were instructed to “pitch” and “bat” for the team that appointed them? The U.S. Supreme Court would become an extension of the party currently in power. The fundamental principle of the “separation of powers” would be destroyed.

If more and more partisan judges are added to courts every election cycle, those in the minority—people who don’t agree with the current ruling party—would have their freedom squashed under the weight of a rigged judiciary. Civil liberties like religious freedom would have no stable protection.

Far from saving the principles of our democratic republic, court-packing would lead to the demolition of constitutional rights—just like it happened in other nations, such as Venezuela and Argentina.

This article was originally published at FirstLiberty.org.

Written by Rhonda Graff

There is another important U.S. Senate Bill that needs your attention. This proposal ( S. 3398) is sponsored by U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and is supported by the National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCOSE). Introduced on March 5th, it is now pending before the Judiciary Committee, and expected to be “marked up” by the Committee on Thursday, July 2.

The Earn It Act  (Eliminating Abusive & Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technologies Act) makes the Internet’s immunity from liability to be considered “CONDITIONAL” on complying with best business practices to:

a) Prevent online sexual exploitation including enticement, recruiting, grooming, and sex trafficking; and

b) Prevent and reduce the proliferation of child sexual abuse material (CSAM).

This bill revises the framework governing the prevention of online sexual exploitation of children.

The Earn It Act creates a new National Commission on Online Child Sexual Exploitation Prevention, charged with enforcing accountability on interactive digital platforms. This will be flexible in the face of fast-changing technology and online risks that often emerge overnight… a reality no legislative body is nimble enough to track or oversee.

The Earn It Act directs the commission to develop best practices for interactive online service providers (i.e. Facebook and Twitter) to prevent the online sexual exploitation of children. It requires online service providers to certify compliance with the best practices or else they lose liability protections from claims alleging violations of child sexual exploitation laws. Lastly, the Earn It Act replaces statutory references to child pornography with child sexual abuse material.

This legislation has bipartisan support, and is co-sponsored by U.S. Senators Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Josh Hawley (R-MO), Kevin Cramer (R-ND), Dick Durbin (D-IL), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Joni Ernst (R-IA), John Kennedy (R-LA), Doug Jones (D-AL), Bob Casey (D-PA), and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI).

Over 75 credible organizations have endorsed it including NCOSE, the National Center for Missing and Exploited, Shared Hope International. But Big Tech lobbyists are working overtime to defeat it. 

Take ACTION:  Click HERE to send a message to U.S. Senator Tammy Duckworth to ask her to co-sponsor the Earn It Act. U.S. Senator Dick Durbin is already a co-sponsor.

Additional talking points in support of the Earn It Act can be found at this link.

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