(LifeSiteNews) — Major retailers should “resist political pressure” and refuse to sell dangerous chemical abortion drugs, wrote a “coalition of firms, financial advisers, and thousands of Costco members” in a recent letter.
Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) spearheaded letters to major retailers, including Costco and Walmart, urging them not to sell chemical abortion drugs through their pharmacies, according to a news release on Monday. They also sent the letters to Albertsons, Kroger, and McKesson Corporation.
The financial professionals represent clients who hold tens of millions of dollars of shares in the various companies contacted in the letter.
A news release from ADF warned of a potential Bud Light backlash if the companies sell abortion drugs, also referencing successful boycotts against Disney and Target for embracing leftist politics.
The letter follows a demand from New York Comptroller Brad Lander that the companies sell abortion drugs” or risk losing investor confidence.”
“Comptroller Lander warns the companies risk investor confidence if they do not provide timely and accessible reproductive healthcare,” a July 17 news release from his office stated. “New York City’s pension systems own over $1.32 billion in total shares of the companies.”
“By failing to become certified mifepristone dispensers, these pharmacy giants put both women’s reproductive health care and investors money at risk,” Lander stated.
But the opposite is true, according to financial advisers and medical experts, as noted in ADF’s letters.
The pro-life letter stated:
Maximizing shareholder value requires Costco to avoid politicizing its services and to continue to do what it has always done best, provide excellent grocery and retail goods to families. The ‘growing market opportunity’ of abortion drugs is legally and politically fraught, raises significant reputational issues, and reduces the company’s customer base, both literally and because it would drive away many existing customers.
The “legality” of abortion drugs is also “in flux,” according to the letter. It noted that while the Supreme Court allowed President Joe Biden’s loosened regulations to stand, it did so “on procedural grounds and left unresolved whether the current system of dispensing and distributing the drug is legal.” The Supreme Court ruled earlier this year in FDA v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine that pro-life health professionals did not have standing to challenge the loosened rules.
One legal problem, according to the letter, is that the Comstock Act prohibits the mailing of abortion drugs – and even if the current administration is ignoring the long-standing law, that won’t protect the companies from a future president.
“Violating the Comstock Act alone carries a prison sentence of up to 10 years,” the letter reminded the recipients. “And the statute of limitations is five years, so the current political leadership at the U.S. Department of Justice cannot provide you cover if the administration changes parties.
While New York wants the retailers to sell abortion drugs within the state, that will not stop “political backlash that reduces market opportunity and increases legal risk,” according to the pro-life letter.
The abortion drugs are also not safe, and the FDA relied on questionable data in their approval, the letter argues. (Regardless of any study, no abortion drug is truly safe since it ends an innocent preborn life.)
Even incomplete data from the FDA ” has documented 32 deaths, 4,218 adverse events, 1,049 hospitalizations, 604 blood loss incidents requiring transfusions, 418 infections, and 75 severe infections from the drug from 2000 to 2022,” the letter notes.
The coalition concluded:
Mifepristone terminates life and does so in ways that the FDA acknowledges risk serious harm to the mother. Dispensing it is filled with legal and political risk and will inject McKesson into the middle of an intense political battle at great expense to its reputation. It is also wholly unnecessary to your business. We urge you not to dispense mifepristone.
None of the retailers have responded to ADF’s letter yet, a spokeswoman told LifeSiteNews on Tuesday. They also did not respond to a Tuesday inquiry from LifeSiteNews asking about the letter and how the company planned to respond, as well as any plans to distribute the abortion drugs.
LifeSiteNews also left a voicemail message with McKesson and Kroger on Wednesday. The listed media phone number for Albertsons did not work and Walmart does not have a public media relations number. LifeSiteNews called Costco’s corporate office after emailing its investors email address. An operator provided a media email address but said it would take three to five days to get a response.
‘Brand reputation’ at risk, like Bud Light, finance CEO says
A financial company CEO and supporter of the letter said that companies that sell abortion drugs could face the Bud Light treatment, referring to the consumer backlash against the beer company after it partnered with “transgender” influence Dylan Mulvaney, a man who calls himself a woman. It included a massive drop in sales and was called the “most successful in recent history,” by LifeSiteNews’ Jonathan Van Maren.
“There’s simply no question that Costco’s decision to sell abortion drugs would automatically risk its brand reputation,” Inspire Investing CEO Robert Netzly stated in the ADF news release. “Entering the abortion drug marketplace is an inescapably political decision. This is just like Bud Light (InBev), Disney, and Target. All three have taken affirmative stances on controversial issues in recent years and have yet to recover from the backlash.”
Target has also faced boycotts for marketing “pride” swimwear for “trans kids,” as reported by LifeSiteNews in May 2023.
The backlash included the company losing $9 billion in stock valuation, hurting investors.