Legislators in 13 States Have Introduced 15 “Abortion Abolition” Bills in 2025

Inside a dingy convention room within the North Dakota state home, Texas legal professional Bradley Pierce coolly made the case that the 14th Modification and biblical scripture require the state to cost anybody who obtains an abortion with homicide.

When requested by North Dakota Consultant Jayme Davis (D–9) about whether or not the overtly Christian foundation of his reasoning disregarded different individuals’s freedom of faith, Pierce responded with a wry smile and a remark to match. “Nicely, you already know, I believe the Aztecs believed it was okay to tear the hearts out of youngsters and supply them as a burnt sacrifice to their gods, and I believe that must be unlawful.”

Pierce’s testimony in assist of HB 1373, a invoice that might criminalize all abortions in North Dakota, was one in all greater than a dozen heard by the state’s Home Human Providers Committee on February 5. Different supporters taking the rostrum that morning contained in the crowded Pioneer Room included the son of Democratic profession diplomat Susan Rice, the co-executive director of a Wisconsin-based community of disaster being pregnant facilities, and a “post-abortive” activist from North Dakota.

HB 1373 just isn’t a “typical” anti-abortion invoice in post-Roe America. Launched in January, it could develop the definition of “human being” within the state’s Century Code to incorporate zygotes at “the start of organic growth in the meanwhile of fertilization” for the express function of banning all abortions and subjecting anybody who performs or obtains one to felony punishment. Below this regulation, anybody who harms a zygote or embryo in North Dakota could possibly be prosecuted for homicide or assault, or sued for wrongful demise.

Regardless of the impassioned in-person and written testimony from supporters of HB 1373, the invoice was so excessive that even the co-director and common counsel of the North Dakota Catholic Convention testified towards it, prompting the committee to situation a “Do Not Move” advice. The invoice went on to fail decisively in a full House vote every week later, incomes a mere 16 “yeas” out of 93 votes forged.

“Abortion Abolition” Payments Launched in 13 States This 12 months

The introduction of this excessive invoice in North Dakota was not an remoted incident. This 12 months alone, no less than 14 different so-called “abortion abolition” payments have already been launched in a dozen different states.

Since 2017, state lawmakers have thought-about abortion abolition payments in no less than 21 states. Usually referred to as “prenatal equal safety” acts, most have been launched after the Supreme Courtroom overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022 and opened the door to such a laws, which had beforehand run counter to SCOTUS precedent on abortion.

Even in states with extreme restrictions on abortion entry and felony penalties for abortion suppliers, those that truly get hold of an abortion usually are not topic to prosecution themselves. Nevertheless, beneath abortion abolition legal guidelines, they’d be.

The specific felony legal responsibility for the one who obtains an abortion is essentially the most essential distinction between abortion abolition payments and different extra frequent anti-abortion laws. Some of these payments amend state felony codes to cost those that get hold of an abortion with murder for the “demise” of their “unborn youngster,” together with anybody who self-induces an abortion utilizing treatment legally prescribed and mailed from one other state.

No exceptions are made for rape and incest. The payments do embody obscure, ill-defined allowances for making an attempt to save lots of the lifetime of a pregnant particular person, however solely insofar that this try is “accompanied by cheap steps, if out there, to save lots of the lifetime of her preborn youngster.”

Although none of those payments has ever survived a easy majority vote in state legislatures, the fast reemergence of abortion abolition laws throughout the nation signifies the rising affect of a radical, militant faction of anti-abortion fanatics whose final aim is nothing in need of the whole and complete eradication of abortion entry within the U.S.

Excessive Christian Patriarchy

The abortion abolitionist movement is a comparatively nascent one, tracing its origins to a brand new technology of largely white, male, conservative Baptists, Presbyterians, and Christian Reconstructionists emboldened by the anti-abortion stance of the Trump administration.

Whereas anti-abortion activists have likened abortion to slavery for the reason that passage of Roe v. Wade greater than a half a century in the past, the abortion abolition motion takes this comparability to extremes. Abolitionists applicable rhetoric from the anti-slavery abolitionists of the nineteenth century, using an “equal safety” argument from the 14th Modification to match embryos and fetuses to enslaved individuals.

One other distinguishing characteristic of abortion abolitionism is its “maleness.” For example, T. Russell Hunter heads Abolitionists Rising, a bunch that organized the primary abortion abolition national conference in 2020. End Abortion Now, an “outreach ministry” of Apologia Church, has an all-male workers of 4, three of whom are pastors. Red State Reform, a 501(c)4 on the IRS auto-revocation checklist, options former pro-baseball participant Dennis Sarfate as president. That is in distinction to the feminine figureheads of the most important so-called “pro-life” organizations, akin to Marjorie Dannenfelser of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, Carol Tobias of National Right to Life, Lila Rose of Live Action, and Kristan Hawkins of College students for Lifetime of America.

Abortion abolitionism differs from the pro-life motion in different key methods. Abolitionists discover the pro-life motion to be insufficiently opposed to abortion, claiming that the pro-life place is simply too secular, too incrementalist, and too complacent within the aftermath of the Supreme Courtroom’s reversal of Roe. Most professional-life organizations have lengthy maintained that as a result of girls are the “second victims” of abortions and that almost all of abortions happen beneath some type of duress, people who get an abortion must be mechanically exempt from felony prosecution. Abolitionists fundamentally reject this premise, arguing that except coercion is confirmed on a case by case foundation, anybody who has an abortion is an energetic and prepared participant within the “homicide” of her “preborn youngster.”

Abolitionist leaders are moderately express about this. Based on NPR, Hunter instructed a crowd of a number of hundred supporters at an April 2024 Abolitionists Rising occasion, “We all know the mom is the abortionist or the daddy is the abortionist. Whoever it’s, the abortionist must be punished and we’re not going to lie about it so as to be associates with the world, as a result of that’s exactly what the pro-life motion has carried out and is doing.”

Jeff Durbin, chief of Finish Abortion Now, takes this place to its most extreme conclusion. In an audio recording, the Christian pastor calls for ladies who’ve abortions to be executed by the state.

“In the event you take the lifetime of a human being, unjustly, then what the state owes you — if it’s confirmed and it’s true — is capital punishment. You forfeit your proper to dwell.”

Origins of the Mannequin Invoice

Regardless of advancing a broadly unpopular position, legislators have launched 15 abolition payments in 13 states to this point this 12 months. These payments don’t simply share an underlying ideology. An evaluation by the Heart for Media and Democracy (CMD) discovered the identical language — word-for-word or almost word-for-word — in all however one invoice. This implies that these abortion abolition payments all emanate from a single supply that gives lawmakers with a template to shortly and simply draft laws.

One particular person stands out because the most certainly writer of this template: Bradley Pierce, the Texas legal professional who used such forceful language when testifying earlier than the North Dakota Home Human Providers Committee in February.

Pierce is the co-founder and president of Abolish Abortion Texas, a state-based abolition group, and the vp and common counsel of Heritage Protection. His public LinkedIn page additionally identifies him as an “allied legal professional” with Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF).

Most importantly, Pierce leads a nationwide abolitionist nonprofit referred to as Basis to Abolish Abortion (FAA), which he based in 2019. Based on the group’s IRS form 990 from 2023, its mission is “to exalt and vindicate the picture of God” via “selling sound public coverage that gives all preborn human beings the equal safety of the legal guidelines.”

FAA’s income for 2023 reached over $350,000, with no less than $85,000 coming from the Nationwide Christian Charitable Basis, a favourite donor conduit of the Christian Proper that funneled greater than $2 billion in donations that 12 months to its most popular causes. Apart from this one grant, the sources of FAA’s funding are unclear.

As the only workers member listed on FAA’s web site, Pierce is described as a “constitutional lawyer” who claims that he has drafted “dozens of equal safety payments filed to abolish abortion.” The 990 kind additionally discloses that FAA “draft[s] and analyze[s] laws.”

In 2022, Pierce filed an amicus brief in assist of the petitioners in Dobbs v. Jackson Ladies’s Well being Group, the case that overturned the constitutional proper to abortion established by Roe v. Wade in 1973, on behalf of 21 organizations and 20 state lawmakers. In it, he laid out the identical argument of “equal safety” beneath the 14th Modification and Christian scripture that’s the foundation for previous and current abolition payments.

The lawmakers who signed this temporary included 4 state Freedom Caucus members and 6 state legislators affiliated with the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). Solely 9 of the 20 state lawmakers who signed the temporary are nonetheless in workplace simply three years later, however six of these 9 have sponsored abortion abolition payments launched throughout this legislative session.

Pierce has continued to attach with state lawmakers throughout the nation, establishing relationships that doubtless present him with the type of entry vital for advancing his legislative agenda. In January, he appeared on a Crosspolitic podcast episode with Idaho State Senator Brandon Shippy (R–9) and first-term Texas State Consultant Brent Cash (R–2), the sponsors of Idaho SB 1059 and Texas HB 2197, respectively.

Neither Shippy nor Cash are significantly coy about how intently they work with Pierce. Shippy disclosed that, “With the assistance of Bradley Pierce, we drafted some laws that might primarily present equal safety for the infant within the womb, the preborn youngster,” referring to Idaho’s “Prenatal Equal Protection Act.”

Shippy has beforehand mentioned that beneath SB 1059, regulation enforcement officers could possibly be approved to analyze miscarriages as suspected abortions, in line with the Idaho Statesman.

Pierce describes his nationwide attain much more bluntly, stating, “We’re working, getting payments drafted and prepared for legislators across the nation…. We’re anticipating round 20 to be filed this 12 months.”

Emails obtained by CMD via an open data request present that Missouri is one other state the place FAA has been deeply concerned in pushing abortion abolition laws.

“At Basis to Abolish Abortion, we provide to jot down the press releases for our legislators to save lots of them time,” wrote John Rice-Cameron in a January e mail to Missouri State Consultant Justin Sparks (R–110) and State Senator Mike Moon (R–29), sponsors of HB 1072 and SB 619, respectively. Sparks is the vice chair of Missouri’s Freedom Caucus, whereas Moon is without doubt one of the signatories of the Dobbs amicus temporary.

Rice-Cameron, the son of Susan Rice, testified in favor of North Dakota’s HB 1373 and isn’t listed as a workers member on FAA’s web site, nor did he disclose this affiliation throughout his testimony. Nevertheless, the registration page for an Equal Safety Advocacy Workshop occasion held in February describes him as a “Legislative Liaison” for FAA.

Additionally included on this e mail trade was Wesley Scroggins, the executive director of Abolish Abortion Missouri and a professor of administration at Missouri State College. In a single e mail, Scroggins asks whether or not FAA can be prepared to deliver a authorized problem towards Modification 3 if the abolition payments sponsored by Sparks and Moon handed.

Regardless of attempts by Missouri Lawyer Basic Andrew Bailey (R) to maintain the initiative off the poll final November, a majority of voters authorized Amendment 3, which overturned the state’s complete ban on abortion and as an alternative enshrined the appropriate to abortion within the state’s structure. Since then, Bailey has affirmed that he’ll interpret Modification 3 as narrowly as attainable, whereas Republican lawmakers are at the moment engaged on a constitutional amendment to avoid the referendum and restore the state ban abortion.

“If the invoice have been to cross, the AG ought to defend it,” responded Pierce. “That mentioned, if the AG wouldn’t, sure we’d [be] more than pleased to take action.”

Abolition Advances

North Dakota’s abortion abolition invoice is the one one to obtain a flooring vote to this point this 12 months, and its resounding failure within the Republican-dominated legislature means that no abolition payments stand a robust probability of changing into regulation this 12 months. Three out of 4 People oppose felony prosecution of medical doctors and oldsters for abortion, and different anti-abortion laws presents a far much less politically dangerous various.

However, abortion abolitionists proceed to make incremental headway. Though the “Georgia Prenatal Equal Safety Act” (HB 441) didn’t make it out of committee earlier than “Crossover Day” (the deadline for a invoice to cross out of 1 chamber in order that it may be thought-about within the different), it was nonetheless granted a public hearing on March 26.

Pierce sat facet by facet with the invoice’s sponsor, Georgia State Consultant Emory Dunahoo (R–30), who explicitly launched him because the writer of HB 441. Pierce additionally answered questions requested by members of the committee.

Abolitionists confirmed up in full power, with representatives from distinguished abolitionist teams like Operation Save America, Operation Gospel, GA Proper to Life, and Finish Abortion Alabama. Durbin, the top of Finish Abortion Now who voiced assist for executing abortion sufferers, was one in all almost a dozen abolitionists who testified. Throughout an trade with Consultant Esther Panitch (D–51), the one Jewish member of the Georgia Meeting, Durbin instructed her that her understanding of the teachings of her personal religion relating to abortion was incorrect, and equated her pro-choice viewpoint with the Nazi’s dehumanization of Jews in the course of the Holocaust.

The committee additionally heard from Coleman Boyd, an anti-abortion activist who’s at the moment serving 5 years on probation after being convicted in 2024 of felony conspiracy and violation of the Freedom of Entry to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act. These costs stemmed from a 2021 incident during which Boyd and others affiliated with Operation Save America blockaded a reproductive well being middle in Nashville for nearly three hours.

Whereas HB 441 won’t be put to a vote this 12 months, Georgia’s two-year legislative system signifies that this identical invoice might be mechanically reconsidered subsequent 12 months, giving it one other probability to cross. As in lots of different states the place abolition payments have been launched, Georgia permits the demise penalty for acts of murder.

Abortion abolitionists are additionally changing into extra organized. The Colorado Times Reporter famous in 2023 that Pierce promotes a “precinct technique” for influencing native Republican events on the state stage. This “ground-up” method allows abolition activists to infiltrate state and county Republican events, successfully making their extremist place extra acceptable inside the broader occasion by suppressing extra reasonable voices.

Pierce’s precinct technique might in actual fact be working. A coalition letter printed in assist of Georgia’s HB 441 included the anticipated names of these affiliated with abolitionist organizations and ministries. Nevertheless, it was additionally signed by the chairs of a number of Georgia county Republican events as effectively. An identical joint statement in favor of Texas HB 2197 was signed by 52 “conservative leaders,” together with the chair and vice chair of the Republican Social gathering of Texas, members of the State Republican Government Committee, county chairs, and state representatives.

Help for this place in Pierce’s house state has grown a lot that in Might 2024 the Republican Social gathering of Texas adopted abortion abolitionism as a part of its official platform, changing into the primary within the nation to take action.

At an abolitionist occasion in August 2024, visitor speaker Rice-Cameron presented an implicitly transactional method to lobbying state lawmakers: abolitionists supply their money and time to assist the campaigns of conservative lawmakers who reveal an openness to abortion abolitionism. He alluded to the profitable use of this technique within the case of Texas “abolitionist champion” Cash, who unseated the reasonable Republican incumbent, boasting that abolitionists helped him win by canvassing for him within the lead-up to the election.

“To the extent that you may, construct relationships with sympathetic legislators early on of their political profession, ideally earlier than they even get into workplace, whereas they’re nonetheless campaigning,” Rice-Cameron mentioned. “It’s necessary to comprehend that prior to truly successful an election a politician is much more open-minded than after being in workplace for a while.”

Activists like Pierce are beneath no delusion that their payments will cross in any state legislatures this 12 months. Nevertheless, the work they do now via abolition organizations and ministries builds essential relationships with state lawmakers and native Republican leaders that improve their prospects of success in future years.

The rising variety of abolition payments, co-sponsored by more and more extra lawmakers, signifies that this place is step by step changing into extra mainstream among the many conservative base. It’s a place that, if absolutely realized, would make getting an abortion a capital offense in lots of states.