Hurricane Harvey dominated the news this past week as it wreaked havoc in Texas and parts of Louisiana. Many pro-life organizations and pregnancy resource centers were affected by the storm, and we ask all of our readers to take a moment and pray for everyone impacted by its devastation—including all of the rescuers who flocked to the area and reportedly saved thousands of lives.
The US Department of Health and Human Services continues to release information about the utter failure of the Obama-era Teen Pregnancy Prevention Programs. According to data from DHHS, 80 percent of teens exposed to the TPPP curriculum had a sexually transmitted disease and other negative results worse than, or the same as, teens not exposed to the programs. Over the Obama years, ALL’s STOPP program brought you news of this failure of the government-endorsed programs. The Obama administration would not publicly admit to the failures, but now that a new administration has taken charge, the truth is finally coming out. Parents knew all along that the TPPP efforts were nothing more than dangerous attacks on our children. Congratulations to all who valiantly fought against these programs. May we always be vigilant.
As Congress returns from its August recess next week, we will see a major discussion happening about pro-life in, of all places, the Democratic Party! In order to understand the significance of this, we need only to look at the official 2016 platform of the Democratic Party. It says:
- We will appoint judges who will protect a woman’s right to safe and legal abortion.
- We believe unequivocally . . . that every woman should have access to quality reproductive health care services, including safe and legal abortion.
- We will continue to oppose—and seek to overturn—federal and state laws and policies that impede a woman’s access to abortion, including by repealing the Hyde Amendment.
- We believe that safe abortion must be part of comprehensive maternal and women’s health care and included as part of America’s global health programming.
- We support the repeal of harmful restrictions that obstruct women’s access to health care information and services, including the “global gag rule” and the Helms Amendment that bars American assistance to provide safe, legal abortion throughout the developing world.
- We will stand up for Planned Parenthood . . . and . . . stand up to Republican efforts to defund Planned Parenthood.
This platform was described by many as the most pro-abortion party platform in the history of the United States. Democrats made it abundantly clear that they were the party of abortion. Pro-lifers need not apply. What happened? The Democrats lost the 2016 election—big time. They lost the presidency, lost the Senate, and failed to win the House. Being the abortion party clearly alienated them from the American people.
Now, a year later, Democrats have begun to realize this fact and are starting, ever so slowly, to pull back from this extreme position. Over the last few months, several Democrat leaders have begun softening the party position on abortion. These include House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi; Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer; Rep. Luján of Texas, the head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee; and California Gov. Jerry Brown.
While this discussion has not led to any significant change yet, it at least shows that the Democrats are beginning to understand that the American people do not want abortion in this country. We encourage our readers to keep the pressure on every member of every political party to save the babies from abortion and take all taxpayer money away from Planned Parenthood.