SAN FRANCISCO (LifeSiteNews) — Frank Pavone, national director of Priests for Life, gave a speech at the 2025 Walk for Life in San Francisco, California. He discussed why Planned Parenthood is a “criminal enterprise” and “political machine,” how to weaken the organization and the entire abortion industry, President Donald Trump’s recent pro-life executive orders, and more.
A ‘criminal enterprise’
Pavone opened his speech by discussing how Planned Parenthood is a “criminal enterprise,” noting the horrifying films released a decade ago that showed abortionists discussing selling body parts.
“About a decade ago, there were hearings in Congress after the revelation of films that show the illegal selling of body parts by this business,” he said.
Pavone then dove into other alleged illegal activity done by Planned Parenthood that he and other pro-life activists have uncovered over the years, telling the story of a young woman being coached to get around the law to have an abortion.
“The young lady presented herself as a minor coming in for an abortion. And she was coached on the phone as to what her boyfriend should say so that the law that would require the Planned Parenthood workers to report suspected sexual crimes could be skirted. ‘Don’t mention your age,’ for example,” he said.
A ‘political machine’
Pavone underscored that not only is Planned Parenthood a “criminal enterprise,” it’s also a “political machine” that masquerades as a women’s healthcare organization.
“It’s a political machine. They give tens of millions of dollars to candidates who, I wonder what party they belong to, all Democrats who are just invested in baby killing, invested in such a way that the moneys that are spent on their campaigns, it’s blood money coming from the actual selling of the abortions,” he said.
“So you have this wicked dynamic going on of the money being spent to kill the babies then being poured into the campaigns of those keeping the baby killing legal.”
Defunding the abortion industry
Turning to how pro-life activists can end the evil of abortion, Pavone stressed that in addition to changing hearts and minds and electing pro-life candidates, they also need to weaken the abortion industry by defunding it.
“You’ve got to defund this Goliath of a business, and this is where right this moment we are basking in the glow of some actions that were taken less than 24 hours ago by a certain man by the name of Donald J. Trump,” Pavone said.
He explained that one of those orders Trump signed resumed the enforcement of the Hyde Amendment, which protects taxpayer dollars from funding abortion.
“Now, don’t oversimplify this, there are many different streams, many different rivers of abortion funding … so there’s always money flowing in, and there are a lot of levers that have to be turned on and off,” Pavone said.
“But [Trump] did a large measure of this yesterday by saying, ‘Look, we’ve already got a law that protects your money from going for abortion, it’s time for us to enforce it.’”
Click here to watch Frank Pavone’s full speech at the 2025 Walk for Life.
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