News

Tuesday October 5, 2010


AUL Action “Life Counts Campaign” Targets ObamaCare’s Pro-Life Dems

By Peter J. Smith

WASHINGTON, D.C., October 5, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Americans United for Life’s (AUL) political action committee announced Tuesday that they are making the push in the final weeks of the November election campaign to target Democrats who cast votes critical to the passage of the unpopular health care reform law.

AUL Action’s has poured $600,000 into its “Life Counts” campaign, which will target twelve battleground districts held by Democrats in the 2010 midterm elections with online grassroots organizing, radio ads, and email blasts, in order to get out the pro-life vote on November 2.

Half of the ads began last month. The “Life Counts” campaign started running ads in the other six Democrat-held districts on Monday.

“Americans are overwhelmingly opposed to taxpayer-funded abortion,” said Dr. Charmaine Yoest, President and CEO of AUL Action. “Candidates who supported the largest expansion of federal funding of abortion ever are going to find out that in this election, Life Counts.”

The “Life Counts” campaign targets six pro-life Democrats and six pro-abortion Democrats over their votes for the national health care reform law, the “Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.”

Pro-life groups saw the legislation as opening many backdoors for public subsidies of abortion, and are not convinced that an executive order obtained by Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) will have the effectiveness of the statutory ban on such funding first sought by Stupak.

Those fears were confirmed in July, when the National Right to Life Committee blew the lid on Obama’s Department of Health and Human Services approving federally funded high risk pools in three states that included abortion as a covered benefit.

Pre-existing Condition Insurance Plans (PCIPs), a $5 billion HHS stopgap program for those with pre-existing medical conditions until 2014, technically were not covered by the executive order. Only after the matter was exposed in the press, did HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announce that Stupak’s sought-after restrictions would apply to these programs in HHS guidelines.

Barely half of pro-life House Democrats voted with Stupak to support the “Affordable Care Act.” Both Reps. Dan Lipinski of Illinois and Marion Berry of Arkansas switched their votes from “yes” to “no” on the final vote to join 21 Democrats with complete or partial pro-life voting records scored by NRLC against the bill. Twenty pro-life Democrats, including Stupak, voted to approve the bill with the promise of Obama’s executive order.

The targeted pro-life Democrats in the “Life Counts” campaign include U.S. Reps. Baron Hill (Ind.-09), Chris Carney (Penn.-10), Tom Perriello (Va.-05), Paul Kanjorski (Penn.-11), Kathy Dahlkemper (Penn.-03), and Joe Donnelly (Ind.-02).

Pro-abortion Democrats in battleground districts include US Reps. John Boccieri (Ohio-16), John Spratt (S.C.-05), Bob Etheridge (N.C.-02), Alan Grayson (Fla.-08), and John Salazar (Colo.-03).

Also targeted is Democrat state Sen. Joyce Elliott, who is competing in an open election for Arkansas’ second congressional district.


See related coverage by LifeSiteNews.com:


HHS Moves to Block Abortion Funding in High-Risk Pools Following Controversy

https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2010/jul/10071511.html

The House of Pro-Life Democrats Divided on Health Care Bill

https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2010/mar/10032605.html

ObamaCare Lowdown: What Exactly Will the Health Reform Bill Do?

https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2010/apr/10040115.html

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