The Michael Knowles Show - Choosing Life： The Legacy of Dobbs

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00:00:31.000 No matter what the Roe Court said, it was never settled law.

00:00:35.840 And the Supreme Court finally admitted it now in 2022.

00:00:40.060 This is a change in history, an opportunity to rewrite the script.

00:00:45.480 We have to really be focused on what women need. 1.00

00:00:49.460 Women don't need abortion in order to be equal to men. 1.00

00:00:52.960 What we need to do is recognize that we're complementary.

00:00:56.620 That we are created as different but equal.

00:00:59.360 Pro-life laws affirm women's dignity. 0.97

00:01:02.700 They prioritize the physical and emotional health and well-being of women.

00:01:06.680 And obviously, they're prioritizing the sanctity of human life.

00:01:10.420 There are resources available to women who find themselves sort of stymied by this

00:01:15.480 unanticipated, significant consequence in their lives.

00:01:22.160 There are options.

00:01:23.600 There are resources available.

00:01:25.000 This is really a tremendous opportunity to welcome these women with open arms, to encourage

00:01:31.200 them to choose life.

00:01:32.960 Hey, welcome back to the Choosing Life podcast.

00:01:39.340 The final episode of the Choosing Life podcast.

00:01:43.040 My name is Ian Reid.

00:01:44.900 I'm the interviewer that you've heard throughout the last 10 episodes, talking with our incredible

00:01:49.280 guests.

00:01:50.520 When you press play on this episode, you probably expected to hear Michael.

00:01:54.760 But because this is the final episode, we want to do something a little different.

00:01:58.780 For the past year, my team and I have had the privilege of conducting in-depth conversations

00:02:03.780 with the leading pro-life advocates, former abortionists, abortion survivors, and defenders

00:02:10.400 of truth.

00:02:11.720 The majority of the episodes in this series were the long-form, uncut interviews that we

00:02:16.460 captured in the creation of the Daily Wire's film Choosing Death.

00:02:19.500 And what a privilege it's been to share these conversations with you over the past 10 episodes.

00:02:26.080 I'm not a Daily Wire employee, but perhaps because of that, what I'm about to say I hope

00:02:32.180 carries even more weight.

00:02:34.160 From the earliest conversations that I had with Ben, Jeremy, and the entire leadership

00:02:38.640 team at the Daily Wire, they wanted to produce and release as much information as possible

00:02:43.500 about abortion for free to the public.

00:02:46.880 The history, the stories, the scientific data, research, and testimonials of those at the

00:02:53.340 center of the fight.

00:02:55.580 The Daily Wire is not paying me to say this.

00:02:57.560 In fact, I decided to add this at the last minute right before recording.

00:03:01.860 But I am so appreciative to the Daily Wire for allowing my team and myself to tell these

00:03:07.700 stories and to share these conversations for free with you.

00:03:12.800 That's why I wanted to take the opportunity to host this final episode.

00:03:16.880 This sort of content isn't cheap to make.

00:03:19.180 And the Daily Wire funded weeks of research, travel, editorial work, and post-production

00:03:24.100 because they actually believe it's vital for people to know the truth.

00:03:28.780 And that sort of commitment, you know, beyond the lip service to actually put their money

00:03:32.340 where their beliefs are is something that I really, truly admire.

00:03:36.720 But I also wanted to thank you, the listeners, the viewers of the film, the people in the movement

00:03:42.960 fighting for life.

00:03:44.680 Thank you for your support.

00:03:46.680 By listening to this series, you've prepared yourself to be an advocate in one of the most

00:03:50.380 important issues of our time, to protect the unborn and to advocate for their mothers

00:03:54.980 and families.

00:03:55.520 So, what are we doing in this episode?

00:04:01.160 Well, for this entry in the series, we wanted to hear from those who are at the center of

00:04:05.580 the headlines related to Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Clinic.

00:04:09.380 So today, we're sharing with you not one, but three brand new, never-before-heard conversations

00:04:15.660 that dive into the Dobbs case, its facts, and the impact that the decision has already had

00:04:20.700 across the country.

00:04:21.380 We have the woman behind it all, Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch, whose bravery

00:04:26.760 to bring this case to the Supreme Court is to thank for the landmark decision passed

00:04:30.760 down in June.

00:04:32.260 We'll also be talking with Kristen Wagner, President and General Counsel of Alliance

00:04:36.020 Defending Freedom, who partnered with and assisted the state of Mississippi in crafting

00:04:40.260 not only the legal argumentation, but Mississippi's laws themselves to build a winning case for

00:04:45.680 life.

00:04:46.640 And to better understand the context and legal analysis of the Dobbs decision, we'll be

00:04:51.360 talking with Sarah Parshall Perry, Senior Legal Fellow at the Heritage Foundation.

00:04:56.640 So, as we begin this final episode, let me just say thank you again for letting us take

00:05:01.920 you on this journey.

00:05:03.760 May God use the Dobbs decision, and all of us, to build the bedrock of a culture of life

00:05:09.900 for future generations.

00:05:11.620 Right now, I would strongly recommend you go to hallo.com slash choose life, because today's

00:05:27.660 world is a scary one.

00:05:29.700 Too many people don't seem to care about the truth, and I would suggest that that's all

00:05:34.480 rooted in people becoming less, or really, just anti-religious.

00:05:39.800 That's why it's more important than ever to keep our relationship with God strong.

00:05:45.000 Hallow is the number one Christian prayer app in the United States.

00:05:48.220 It's like Calm or Headspace, but rooted in Catholic faith.

00:05:51.460 It is the perfect resource to deepen your relationship with God and find peace through audio-guided

00:05:57.140 prayer and meditation.

00:05:59.140 Several of hallo's meditations encourage you to choose life and to pray for others to choose

00:06:03.440 life, such as their Litany for Life with Lila Rose.

00:06:06.780 hallo is free to download.

00:06:08.760 It will help you find peace and calm throughout your day.

00:06:11.920 So do it.

00:06:12.500 Do it right now.

00:06:13.480 Download the app for free at hallo.com slash choose life.

00:06:18.340 That is hallo.com slash choose life.

00:06:29.540 So right now we're talking with Sarah Parshall Perry, Senior Legal Fellow at the Edwin Meese

00:06:34.160 Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at the Heritage Foundation.

00:06:37.220 And we're going to be talking about the Dobbs case, the history of abortion law, and the

00:06:41.820 impact that Dobbs has had across society.

00:06:44.680 Thank you so much for joining us, Sarah.

00:06:46.800 Thanks for having me.

00:06:48.340 So, Sarah, tell us about yourself.

00:06:50.400 What's your emphasis of study and how does your work relate to the Dobbs case?

00:06:55.080 Well, I'm a senior legal fellow here in Heritage's Meese Center for Legal and Judicial Studies.

00:07:00.640 And I was very closely following the Dobbs case because I recognized that this was an opportunity

00:07:08.040 to once and for all put sort of the nail in the coffin of Roe versus Wade.

00:07:13.040 Now, personally, I've been involved in the pro-life trenches for many, many years.

00:07:19.320 In fact, my first introduction to public policy and to politics was at 14 when I testified in front of the Wisconsin Assembly on a parental notification bill designed to limit a minor's ability to get an abortion without involving her parents.

00:07:37.080 So, this is something about which I have been extremely passionate.

00:07:41.620 We were involved as a family in the early fight in the late 70s, early 80s.

00:07:48.420 We engaged in the March for Life.

00:07:50.580 We donated to crisis pregnancy centers every Christmas.

00:07:54.040 So, I had a lot of skin in this game, so to speak.

00:07:57.660 I've also had three children.

00:07:59.920 I have three teenagers.

00:08:00.920 So, I have experienced sort of that journey of what it's like to be a mom as well.

00:08:06.100 And so, I had a great deal invested both emotionally and legally because I did recognize that this was sort of the culmination of a decades-long battle to finally overturn what many of us considered to be one of the worst precedents in the American Supreme Court jurisprudence.

00:08:25.520 I'd love to touch on your last comment there.

00:08:28.320 Throughout our journey documenting the history of abortion over the last several months, we've heard a lot of people criticize the legal decision-making in Roe.

00:08:36.640 What made it such a legal train wreck?

00:08:39.560 Yeah, that's a great question.

00:08:41.220 It really was a decision that established a right to abortion very much out of thin air.

00:08:47.520 And many liberal scholars, as well as conservative scholars, have criticized it for precisely that.

00:08:52.480 In fact, it gave no impression of being a constitutional decision.

00:08:56.900 Even John Hart Ely, who was an extremely liberal law professor who taught at Harvard for some time, has said specifically it was not a constitutional decision and didn't actually make an attempt to be.

00:09:09.380 Justice Blackmun decided that there was a right to abortion.

00:09:13.020 He sort of saw the seas changing tide a little bit when it came to the women's liberation movement and to feminist advancements.

00:09:20.420 And so he truly found, by way of the Ninth Amendment, a right to privacy applied to the states through the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution.

00:09:31.380 And by the time we've seen sort of the iterations of that, it expanded what the court had never before considered, which is where those applications of privacy begin and where they end.

00:09:46.020 But to say that the right to an abortion emanates from a right to privacy and is applied to the states by way of the Fourteenth Amendment was really the thinnest veneer of legal reasoning.

00:09:59.940 It was more about social sciences.

00:10:02.740 It was more about political commentary than it was about law.

00:10:07.040 And people have roundly criticized the decision for precisely that.

00:10:11.120 Unfortunately, we were left with the stain of Roe when, in fact, in 1992, in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, the Supreme Court was again asked to consider whether or not they wanted to overrule Roe v. Wade.

00:10:24.820 And their response was, no, we want everyone to essentially adhere to this as the finalized law of the land.

00:10:33.700 And we are affirming, Roe's, what they called essential holding, that there is a constitutional right to abortion.

00:10:41.660 And so many of us were waiting with sort of bated breath.

00:10:44.940 I know I was.

00:10:45.760 I was a senior in high school in 1992 and sort of really beginning my interest in law and policy.

00:10:52.640 And we were all very hopeful that we would see the end of Roe in 1992.

00:10:57.340 But it wasn't until the Dobbs decision nearly 50 years later that for many of us that dream came to fruition.

00:11:05.500 So you mentioned that in Roe there's a sort of linking of different amendments to craft a novel legal reasoning.

00:11:10.900 Is that traditionally how Supreme Court decisions are decided or was this an anomalous approach?

00:11:17.060 Well, it was a little bit of both.

00:11:19.040 Now, when I say it was a little bit of both, the Roe Court was not what I would call an originalist court.

00:11:24.960 So the court that we have now, the composition of those Supreme Court justices, in large part is an originalist court.

00:11:31.440 And they are guided by history, structure, text, and tradition.

00:11:35.740 And they look first to the text of the Constitution.

00:11:37.940 And there is a difference between enumerated rights and unenumerated rights.

00:11:42.060 Now, of course, we know, for example, the First Amendment right to freedom of speech, religion, petition, assembly, and press.

00:11:48.520 We recognize those as being enumerated rights.

00:11:51.640 But the unenumerated rights are where it gets tricky.

00:11:55.680 And this was a consideration stemming from an unenumerated right.

00:12:00.320 Well, we find that in something called substantive due process, which is a fancy descriptor for essentially saying, listen, we think based on where history was at the time and what the founders wanted and what is essential to a component of ordered liberty.

00:12:16.060 That, in fact, this is a right that should be protected, that was intended to be protected.

00:12:23.560 But it's specious to say that when the Constitution was ratified, of course, there was ever the assumption that there would be a protected right to abortion.

00:12:32.640 And in fact, for a lot of people, particularly for a lot of liberal scholars, they were up in arms after the Dobbs decision because Justice Clarence Thomas, in his separate concurring opinion, pointed out that substantive due process is a very tricky line of reasoning.

00:12:51.180 And it actually has formed the basis of quite a number of sort of these unenumerated rights determinations, including, among other things, a right to contraception, a right to same-sex marriage from Obergefell versus Hodges, a right to interracial marriage.

00:13:08.260 And so people read this concurring opinion and were suddenly terrified, determining that they, of course, would now see all of these rights that they've relied on for so many years suddenly rolled back.

00:13:22.300 But what I will say to that is that Justice Thomas has correctly, accurately identified that there is a trickiness in when we begin to expand the scope of constitutional rights outside what its original founders and framers intended them to be.

00:13:39.680 He identified these rights from which we've pulled from this 14th Amendment, substantive due process, jurisprudence.

00:13:47.760 And basically, he said it's formed the basis of too many of these opinions.

00:13:53.360 What we need to do is give these issues to the states to determine for themselves.

00:13:59.320 Now, he was alone in his concurrence.

00:14:01.580 In fact, even Justice Kavanaugh, who himself wrote a separate concurrence in that opinion, said specifically, listen, we're not going to revisit all of our 14th Amendment cases.

00:14:14.420 And in fact, the majority in writing the opinion, Justice Alito taking the pen, said this is only concerning the right to abortion.

00:14:22.600 I think the court rightly recognized that there would be a fair amount of hysteria and flag waving about losing these fundamental social rights that these individuals have relied on for so long.

00:14:35.280 But it is very limited to the issue only of abortion.

00:14:39.440 Let's talk a little bit about that hysteria and flag waving.

00:14:41.960 For the last year, many on the left have loudly proclaimed that if Roe was overturned, that literally any unenumerated right, I mean, same-sex marriage, contraception, a host of others, that those could all be in the chopping block.

00:14:56.760 Was that critique valid?

00:14:58.820 No, not at all.

00:14:59.640 Well, and I think because Alito's majority opinion was so careful to limit it and to make the pronouncement that it was related only to abortion and to no other unenumerated rights, that we can take comfort in the fact that they're not going to revisit this 14th Amendment jurisprudence.

00:15:16.760 And in fact, in his separate concurrence, Kavanaugh disagreed with Clarence Thomas and said, regardless of any perception of the 14th Amendment jurisprudence on which we've relied for so many years, we are not going to revisit that now.

00:15:33.120 And I will tell you, I don't think Justice Thomas, much as I love his jurisprudence and his particular legal writing, has the votes to take up a case that would determine that these particular rights needed to be eliminated.

00:15:47.560 This itself was related to abortion because the decision itself, Roe v. Wade, was so poorly written, it was so poorly reasoned, and it truly was reliant on the thinnest of all constitutional bases.

00:16:05.280 It really was, if you've read the opinion, a desperate grasping at straws.

00:16:09.420 It was a justice who was keen to sort of move with the social tide, not away from the social tide.

00:16:15.720 Right. And unfortunately, it took us 49 years to finally see the court put that mistake right.

00:16:22.660 For those who might not be familiar with the details of Dobbs, what were the facts of the case and what was the majority opinion of the court?

00:16:28.920 So the case centered on the constitutionality of Mississippi's Gestational Age Act, which put the actual state in between sort of, I would say, a rock and a hard place.

00:16:40.580 But in fact, it was correctly and brilliantly positioned to take the issue of viability head on.

00:16:48.720 Now, viability, of course, when we know that an unborn child can live outside the room, whether with or without medical help.

00:16:55.900 But in drafting the bill and in passing it into law, it was the only law at the time that took specifically into consideration this notion of viability.

00:17:07.020 The court from 1973 forward had never considered the issue of viability head on and why they plucked that determination specifically out of thin air.

00:17:18.780 Why could a woman get an abortion before a child was viable, but could be subject to certain government restrictions after a child was viable? 1.00

00:17:28.360 Well, because this took precise aim at why they set that as the dividing line, it was perfectly positioned to take Roe head on.

00:17:37.360 And in fact, in open court, the arguments from Mississippi Solicitor General Scott Stewart, he mentioned, among other things, the fact that viability is sort of a moving target.

00:17:49.820 In fact, we've now seen that unborn preemies as early as 21 can live with medical assistance.

00:17:58.140 So with technological advancements and with the knowledge we have now of fetal development, their pain, what we know about neurological processing, their physiological functions, the advent of 3D ultrasounds,

00:18:12.960 we are in such a different phase now in American science and in the pro-life field that they couldn't arguably uphold viability as the appropriate standard, that it was inappropriate and therefore unconstitutional because it did not rely on a foundation that was ultimately solid.

00:18:35.220 The response for Elizabeth Prelogger, who is the solicitor general for the United States, who joined with the attorney for the abortionist Jackson Women's Health Organization, basically said, listen, and I will say I have to chuckle at this, very little commentary on law, lots of commentary on social policy, both from Elizabeth Prelogger and the attorney for the women's health organizations.

00:19:04.660 Both of them, both of whom could not justify Roe's essential holding, its constitutional basis, its insightful legal reasoning.

00:19:13.180 Instead, their arguments were ultimately sort of weighted upon a reliance interest.

00:19:20.540 Women have relied on this for too long. 1.00

00:19:22.740 We cannot take this away.

00:19:24.380 It's going directly to the issue of women's advancements. 0.95

00:19:27.140 And in fact, it was one of my favorite justices, Justice Amy Coney Barrett, herself, a mother of many children who understands what it is to be a constitutional scholar and a mom, was very quick to point out that there are safe haven laws in all 50 states in the union where a woman can relinquish her newborn without any fear of criminal prosecution whatsoever.

00:19:54.280 And so, in fact, when the solicitor general and the attorney for the abortionist both argued it's too much of a reliance interest, her response was, well, it's really simply that reliance interest that only goes to the issue of carrying a pregnancy to term.

00:20:10.700 It doesn't have to do anything with ultimately women's advancement, their opportunity for economic freedom, their ability to move forward in the workforce or their educational opportunities. 0.98

00:20:22.600 We're simply talking about the period of a few months.

00:20:26.200 And if that's sufficient to find a right in the Constitution, then ultimately we have no Constitution at all.

00:20:33.380 Justice Kavanaugh had a brilliant line of reasoning describing more than 50 years of precedent that had overturned prior what was considered bedrock precedent.

00:20:45.280 Chief among them, I give you Plessy v. Ferguson, which instituted the now fallacious separate but equal that was overturned by the Seminole Brown v. Board of Education, 0.64

00:20:56.600 and desegregating all American public schools, really a triumph for the Supreme Court, multiple cases like that have been decided by the Supreme Court.

00:21:06.900 The Supreme Court is not infallible.

00:21:09.540 And, in fact, stare decisis, which is Latin for let the decision stand, something by which the justices are generally bound, it is an opening salvo.

00:21:19.600 It is not exactly where they end up if they determine that a previous iteration of their constitutional law is, in fact, incorrect, fallacious, was not constitutional.

00:21:33.220 They are wholly within their right to actually overturn that precedent.

00:21:37.760 And that's what they decided to do in Roe v. Wade.

00:21:41.100 Justice Alito's majority opinion, which, of course, we know now, was leaked in May, differed very little from that leaked opinion in the two months between the leak and the final concretized opinion.

00:21:55.700 And, in fact, I believe was brilliantly written.

00:21:58.020 He went through 150 years of American history to describe the fact that this was never a right that was intended to be protected, not only just by the framers of the Constitution, but by anyone in a seat of power in government and administration, state by state at the time.

00:22:15.740 In fact, there were criminal prosecutions for many women who took steps to end their own pregnancies.

00:22:21.860 So to say it was an element of our ordered liberty to give a woman a right to have an abortion was simply wrong.

00:22:29.580 His opinion went on to address the fact that there was no constitutional basis for Roe, that they were only addressing the issue of abortion, and that they were, in the end, sending the issue of abortion back to the people and their elected representatives, where they could be debated in the state houses and in an open forum,

00:22:48.920 and where those difficult, moral, philosophical, and cultural questions were going to ultimately be answered.

00:22:56.360 And that just seems to be something that the current dialogue about Dobbs is missing.

00:22:59.920 Every day I see pundits and memes and one-liners about how the court's decision sets women's rights back by decades, but what does the decision actually do to the issue of abortion?

00:23:10.800 That's a great question.

00:23:11.680 In fact, by sending this back to the people's representatives, it's really going to be a question that allows answers from the common public in an open forum.

00:23:23.480 And, of course, Congress has certain enumerated powers, limited enumerated powers, to decide particular questions of law.

00:23:31.620 For example, under the tax and spend clause, it has the opportunity to pass legislation like it did with the Hyde Amendment that eliminates taxpayer funding for abortion.

00:23:42.300 So it, too, will have a role to play in this.

00:23:44.820 But the primary source of this particular sort of legislative response will indeed be in the states.

00:23:51.380 And it will also be with the state constitutions, where now we will see people debate and we will see the courts in the states determine ultimately what their own constitutions mean.

00:24:04.840 It's a tremendous opportunity to really vote your values, which I know has been ultimately relied upon for fundraising in the Democratic Party going into the midterm season.

00:24:17.140 They've seen a boon to their fundraising platform as well, simply because these are issues that are hotly debated.

00:24:24.640 They have always been sort of sacred cows for the left when it comes to the issue of advancement and women's rights. 0.97

00:24:32.000 But now having an opportunity to ultimately elect people who represent your perspective and to go out to vote on, for example, constitutional referenda that will appear on some midterm ballots.

00:24:46.360 Six lawsuits are currently pending right now across the country on particular state constitutions that, in one way or another, either protect life or protect a right to abortion.

00:24:57.780 Ten constitutions in total protect the right to abortion as written into the Constitution, some of which are a function just of when those constitutions were ratified because they were so many years, for example, after our own federal United States Constitution.

00:25:15.060 But now we're going to have a chance at the most granular level to have an impact to vote specifically, not only for these referenda, but for individuals who represent our perspective.

00:25:28.540 It is not just a win for the cause of life, but I consider the Dobbs decision to be also a win for the democratic process.

00:25:36.520 Yeah, it strikes me that in contrast to the claim that Dobbs strips rights away from women, it seems to me like Dobbs, maybe in its most fundamental sense, actually gives the power back to the people.

00:25:49.000 Yes, it does. It does. And I will say of the three branches, right, the executive, the legislative and the judicial branch, we've seen the judicial branch finally admit its constitutional error and say we were wrong from the beginning.

00:26:01.100 We're sending it back to the legislative bodies. Now, we have seen an increase in efforts from the executive.

00:26:06.900 We know, for example, that President Biden has utilized something called EMTALA, which is the Emergency Medical Labor and Treatment Act, to try to treat as an emergency abortions and force emergency room doctors to perform elective abortions.

00:26:22.960 But the history of EMTALA and the fact that this is ultimately a funding provision for hospitals that take place in Medicare and Medicaid platforms is simply illegal.

00:26:35.260 We know it's subject already to one federal court loss. Another is pending as well.

00:26:41.280 So we'll see sort of a scrambling, I think, on the part of the executive while the current president remains in office to somehow protect, to crystallize what is left of any semblance of a federal right to abortion when, in fact, none exist.

00:26:57.280 And we've made sure in previous iterations of federal law, for example, like the Hyde Amendment, which specifically goes to that congressional power on spending and interstate commerce, they will have already made their pronouncements.

00:27:12.180 But I anticipate going into the election season, this is going to be a significant hot-button issue.

00:27:19.540 There are going to be numerous attempts, many of which I think will fail federal constitutional muster or an originalist or textualist reading of these statutes as they were passed by Congress.

00:27:32.700 But long story short, I think for these battles, many of them, most of them will transpire in the voting booths in November.

00:27:41.520 And in that respect, I think it really has allowed these particular women, both pro-life and pro-abortion, to be more involved in the democratic process, giving these women, even those who believe abortion is their fundamental right,

00:27:57.780 an opportunity to have an opportunity to have a say, again, at the most sort of microcosmic level, at the place closest to where individuals are led by their government agencies, I think ought to be an encouragement for all of us.

00:28:12.140 We don't want the judicial branch plucking a perceived constitutional right out of thin air.

00:28:18.600 I think that sends us in a very dangerous direction as a country.

00:28:22.060 So now that we're a few months into a post-Obs world, have any of the apocalyptic scenarios come true?

00:28:29.300 Because if you go back just a couple months, people were claiming that we were going to be entering a world reminiscent of something like The Handmaid's Tale.

00:28:37.000 You know, back alley abortions, women in danger of increased medical risks and death, subordinating women to men's whims and power. 0.97

00:28:45.900 Did any of these predictions come true?

00:28:47.960 Well, I think you've rightly identified the wailing and gnashing of teeth from the collective left over this.

00:28:53.460 Again, abortion being the sacred cow, we anticipated that there would be this level of hysteria coming from the left.

00:29:00.060 They would be sort of scrambling to figure out how to take any scrap of a federal abortion right and make sure that it was secure when, in fact, they were going to have to get themselves more involved, sort of at the very grassroots level.

00:29:15.320 But there are some messy consequences to a democratic decision.

00:29:20.860 And in that, I think we need to take heart because our constitutional republic is run in such a way that ultimately an abortion will be easier to acquire in a state like New York or California.

00:29:33.060 But it will be harder, for example, in Texas and Mississippi.

00:29:36.420 That is the nature of representative government.

00:29:39.600 We want the states to ultimately be able to make their determinations about these particular moral and philosophical questions, the big issues that will affect them closely.

00:29:51.320 But there will be a differing sort of patchwork of abortion laws. 0.99

00:29:56.300 There has been more interstate travel.

00:29:58.240 We've seen that as a consequence.

00:29:59.660 Now, I will say for individuals who have attempted in the state houses to restrict interstate travel through the particular legislation that they've passed, that, too, will not pass constitutional muster.

00:30:12.040 The Supreme Court's been very clear on a 14th Amendment right to interstate travel as part of that ordered liberty that we've talked about.

00:30:20.400 But we also want to make sure that we clarify ectopic pregnancies and miscarriages are absolutely not a part of this discussion.

00:30:29.120 And any hysteria on the left to describe those as being tantamount to a failure to provide abortion services is specious.

00:30:38.020 It actually misrepresents both the science, the reality of medicine and simple common sense.

00:30:44.020 So these have not been sort of the apocalyptic scenarios that we were told they were going to be.

00:30:51.800 They are differing from state to state, appropriately so. 0.82

00:30:55.780 And I think what they're going to ultimately determine is how passionate are individuals about their particular rights, their perceived rights, or what they believe ought to be a moral duty on the part of someone else.

00:31:11.500 Well, you have an opportunity to weigh in in November, and I think that's where these dialogues ought to be had.

00:31:18.920 If it requires interstate travel, if it requires a different doctor in a different facility who doesn't, for example, have a conscience objection, these are the difficult decisions that are going to be made.

00:31:33.160 And yes, it is a messy outcome, but it's the appropriate democratic response.

00:31:38.660 I think that mention of messiness is interesting because I think oftentimes when people think of government, they think, you know, big bureaucratic systems that don't change.

00:31:48.200 They don't really think of mess or working things out.

00:31:51.600 And, you know, what do you mean when you say that messiness is actually a feature rather than a bug and that perhaps the messiness of getting the voters and states involved is actually a good thing?

00:32:02.820 Well, I think the reason that it feels as though they have had no direct impact on the way that their lives are run and the way the government does things is because we're precisely in the crosshairs of an administrative state run by an agency that fully believes bigger government is better government.

00:32:24.820 When, in fact, the framers and their brilliance have given us the 10th amendment, all powers not specifically relegated to the federal government are for the states to determine.

00:32:35.160 And one of those chief among them is health, safety and welfare.

00:32:39.880 The Supreme Court's also said explicitly that medicine is precisely under that welfare state police power, those powers that emanate from the 10th amendment.

00:32:50.640 This is a Supreme Court that is what I would describe as a pro-federalism court.

00:32:55.800 In other words, the power really ought to be the state's first and only if the Constitution permits the federal government to exercise it should we allow them to do so.

00:33:05.880 So I feel as though this is a consequence of an administration that has grown the administrative state, that has grown the executive agencies, that has glutted them with more regulations than we've seen in the past three presidential administrations that can't stop spending money.

00:33:24.940 And growing, I give you 180,000 new IRS agents who will be apparently doing what we don't yet specifically know.

00:33:35.560 But there is a certain point at which we want the government to begin to minimize itself, to recognize its own limitations, to identify its constitutional import and say this ultimately is a question for the states to consider.

00:33:53.560 And in that way, while it is a messy outcome, while Dobbs sends this question largely back to the citizens of the United States, and while there will be disparate responses, and we'll see everyone trying to take a heartbeat or better approach to a third trimester abortion approach, this is precisely the way it ought to go.

00:34:15.720 It's what the Constitution anticipated, and it's what these Supreme Court justices have rightly recognized is an appropriate structure to our federalist system of government.

00:34:26.880 So if you take this Dobbs decision from the national level discussion and boil it down to a more personal level, how is the Dobbs decision impacting women in the unborn?

00:34:37.920 What sort of impacts have we seen so far from the court's ruling?

00:34:40.280 Mississippi alone, and remember Mississippi, their gestational age act, was right in the crosshairs of the Supreme Court's opinion in Dobbs. 0.55

00:34:49.640 We've already seen a saving of 180,000 unborn lives.

00:34:54.480 This is an opportunity for crisis pregnancy centers and nonprofits, many of which who are religiously organized, really step up to the plate.

00:35:03.260 There are more crisis pregnancy centers in the country, significantly more so than there are abortion clinics.

00:35:10.360 This is really a chance to stand in the gap, to use what we know are the resources that are coming predominantly from religiously affiliated nonprofits.

00:35:21.140 Most of the charitable work in the country, Pew Research tells us, is performed by religiously affiliated nonprofits.

00:35:28.280 I give you the Fulton v. City of Philadelphia case and Catholic Social Services in Philadelphia, who desperately wanted to participate in the foster care program but was eliminated by the city of Philadelphia specifically because of their beliefs on traditional human sexuality and marriage.

00:35:46.760 These are opportunities for groups like that to finally do what they have wanted to do for so long and to welcome these women with open arms, to encourage them to choose life.

00:35:58.840 And that's ultimately what we're already seeing at the state level.

00:36:02.320 Wow. And that's just in Mississippi since Dobbs.

00:36:05.400 In just the last few months, over 180,000 children's lives have been spared.

00:36:10.620 Yep.

00:36:11.180 And that's just one state.

00:36:12.440 That's just one state.

00:36:13.560 And I assume over the coming years we'll see more data from other states begin to accumulate.

00:36:18.200 But, wow, what an incredible saving of life, evident from just one state in only a matter of months.

00:36:24.700 Absolutely.

00:36:26.460 So, Sarah, as we conclude this conversation, what would you leave audiences with?

00:36:31.820 Whether it's a woman with an unplanned pregnancy or people just interested in learning more about the pro-life movement, what would you leave with listeners?

00:36:39.340 Well, I would say there are three primary points that I would leave people with.

00:36:43.940 First of all, this is a victory for the democratic process.

00:36:47.920 You have an opportunity in November to be active.

00:36:50.840 Perhaps you've never been active before, and this will encourage you to go out and register to vote.

00:36:56.120 Perhaps your state has a constitutional referendum that is currently under consideration.

00:37:00.100 Perhaps there's a particular individual that represents your perspective that's on the ballot in November.

00:37:06.200 That would be my encouragement would be to go out and vote because this is really a tremendous opportunity to be involved in the democratic process.

00:37:14.360 And on an issue that has really engendered so much controversy and so much discussion for the past 49 years, no matter what the Roe Court said, it was never settled law.

00:37:27.180 It wasn't settled law in 1992 in Planned Parenthood v. Casey.

00:37:31.280 And the Supreme Court finally admitted it now in 2022.

00:37:35.640 So I would say go out, participate in the democratic process.

00:37:39.240 I would say also, number two, is that there are resources available to women who find themselves sort of stymied by this unwelcome or sort of unanticipated significant consequence in their lives.

00:37:56.160 They have options.

00:37:58.000 In fact, among them, I would encourage them to go to heritage.org, where we work with a number of organizations who are similarly advancing the cause of life.

00:38:06.700 We have resources there.

00:38:08.340 We work with a number of crisis pregnancy centers here in D.C. alone.

00:38:12.260 Capitol Hill Crisis Pregnancy Center is simply a few blocks from us, and they are ready to welcome people with open arms.

00:38:18.840 There are resources available.

00:38:20.900 There is a network, Care Net, that specifically works with mothers who find themselves in these situations.

00:38:27.220 But there are options.

00:38:28.740 It isn't as insurmountable a task or such a black mark on an individual's opportunity to advance.

00:38:37.120 I say it as someone who is both a mother and a senior legal fellow.

00:38:41.980 It is possible to do both.

00:38:44.360 And I would say, number three, really, in the end, we want the Constitution to work for everyone.

00:38:50.640 And that's precisely what the Dobbs Court just reminded us.

00:38:53.920 Beautiful.

00:38:56.080 Thank you again, Sarah, for your incredible work and your insights into the Dobbs decision and the look ahead at what it means to build a culture of life.

00:39:03.180 You bet.

00:39:03.620 Thanks for having me.

00:39:06.420 That was our conversation with Sarah Parshall Perry of the Heritage Foundation.

00:39:10.180 Coming up next, we'll be talking to President of Alliance Defending Freedom, Kristen Wagner, with more analysis of Dobbs and the work that she and her organization did to help the state of Mississippi craft the legal argumentation to win this historic victory.

00:39:22.200 And after that, our exclusive interview with Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch, who was the strategist behind it all.

00:39:29.340 But first, a word about creating lasting cultural change.

00:39:37.360 Rose overturning was an historic victory, but abortion is still legal in many states.

00:39:43.500 And the only way we'll truly see lasting cultural change is by changing the hearts and minds of pro-abortion people.

00:39:50.560 Live Action is the most prominent pro-life online group in America, reaching millions of young men and women with the truth about the killing of pre-born children.

00:40:01.440 No other organization reaches as many people online as Live Action.

00:40:05.780 Its content has proven to transform opinions from pro-abortion to pro-life.

00:40:11.640 Most pro-choice people don't know what abortion actually entails.

00:40:15.260 When they see the brutality it inflicts on pre-born children, they rethink their stance.

00:40:21.720 You can save the lives of countless children by making a donation today at liveaction.org slash dailywire.

00:40:29.340 That's liveaction.org slash dailywire.

00:40:33.180 Live Action is a nonprofit organization that I support.

00:40:36.560 They've done tremendous work in building a culture of life.

00:40:40.120 Please make a donation today to help them reach young people with the truth so we can wipe out abortion in this country once and for all. 0.94

00:40:49.400 Donate today at liveaction.org slash dailywire.

00:40:53.140 That's liveaction.org slash dailywire.

00:40:57.040 And thanks for your support.

00:41:05.320 And now, our conversation with Kristen Wagner.

00:41:10.120 So, we're talking with President and General Counsel of Alliance Defending Freedom, Kristen Wagner.

00:41:16.180 Alliance Defending Freedom served on Mississippi's legal team in the Supreme Court's Dobbs decision,

00:41:21.220 which, if you don't know, happened to be the thing that overturned Roe v. Wade earlier this year.

00:41:26.980 Thank you so much for being with us, Kristen.

00:41:28.860 And can you tell us a little bit more about the case?

00:41:31.140 Thank you for having me.

00:41:32.460 ADF was privileged to be able to work with Mississippi to draft its 15-week pro-life law

00:41:37.400 and to serve on the legal team that defended the law at the Supreme Court.

00:41:41.260 It was an absolute delight to be able to work with Mississippi and especially Attorney General Lynn Fitch,

00:41:47.960 who ultimately had to make the courageous decision to tell the court Roe was wrongly decided

00:41:54.220 and to ask the court to overturn Roe.

00:41:57.360 And those types of requests don't come along very often.

00:42:01.080 In fact, in the issue of abortion, it had been 30 years since the court had last really grappled with the issue.

00:42:09.200 So, we are just so privileged to have such a brave attorney general in Mississippi

00:42:14.400 who also has led the fight in terms of insisting that Mississippi support women, 0.84

00:42:20.360 providing resources to the women, and supporting pregnancy resource centers.

00:42:23.820 So, what does that mean to be on a legal team in a Supreme Court decision?

00:42:29.320 What's involved in bringing a case before the Supreme Court?

00:42:32.460 And what's the journey that most people just might not be aware of?

00:42:37.160 It's a very long journey, usually.

00:42:39.640 It involves litigating the case at the lower courts, creating the record.

00:42:44.620 In terms of our role specifically, it was legislation that was challenged,

00:42:48.940 that was passed by the Mississippi legislature.

00:42:50.840 And so, we're involved in the legislative process and helping with the bill language

00:42:56.700 to make sure that it's constitutional, helping with creating a record,

00:43:01.140 and helping those Mississippi legislators navigate those thorny constitutional issues.

00:43:06.000 Then, when the abortion industry challenges that law,

00:43:09.680 we helped the state defend that law in a variety of different ways

00:43:14.340 and eventually made its way to the United States Supreme Court.

00:43:17.440 We've had the privilege of being able to win 14 Supreme Court cases

00:43:22.140 in the last 11 years at the Supreme Court.

00:43:25.340 And we have one coming up, another free speech case this fall that I'll also argue.

00:43:31.020 So, I think in June, a lot of people watched as the Supreme Court released its decision.

00:43:36.300 And earlier in the year, we watched as Politico published that leaked draft

00:43:39.900 of Justice Alito's opinion on the case.

00:43:41.680 And I think we could all use a bit of a refresher on how a case is heard by the Supreme Court,

00:43:46.320 how it's debated and decided on internally by the justices,

00:43:49.260 and how opinions, whether concurring or dissenting,

00:43:53.240 work in relation to the majority decision of the court.

00:43:56.260 Can you help lay that out for us?

00:43:58.840 Initially, it's the lower courts that will decide the cases,

00:44:01.740 and the record is established at the lower court.

00:44:04.700 They'll often take witness testimony or have declarations.

00:44:07.540 They'll also be looking at the legislative record, depending on the issue

00:44:12.380 and what the legislators say was the basis for the law.

00:44:17.020 And many of those decisions or inquiries are made at the lower court level.

00:44:22.140 Then they're appealed to the Court of Appeals,

00:44:25.440 and then they are appealed to the Supreme Court.

00:44:28.120 And you don't have a right to have the Supreme Court hear your case.

00:44:32.080 The Supreme Court only hears about 1% of all of the requests that it receives

00:44:36.180 in terms of cases that people would like to be heard by the court.

00:44:40.460 When the court does agree that it's an issue of national importance, for example,

00:44:44.840 and they say, we will hear this case,

00:44:47.400 that starts a rather lengthy process that involves, again, putting that record together,

00:44:53.580 demonstrating to the Supreme Court what the record was at the lower court,

00:44:57.020 and then briefing the case.

00:44:58.980 There are multiple opportunities and briefs that you have to prepare that are extensively researched.

00:45:05.680 And we just finished a reply brief in one of our other Supreme Court cases,

00:45:09.540 and I think we went through 17 drafts of the reply brief to let you know how intense that is.

00:45:15.180 In addition, there are friend-of-the-court briefs that are also filed with the court.

00:45:19.060 And in controversial cases, such as the Dobbs case and many of ADS other cases,

00:45:24.840 you can have over 100 friend-of-the-court briefs that are also filed to the court,

00:45:30.120 and the court reads all of those briefs.

00:45:32.740 That's why they each have four clerks, and they evaluate it.

00:45:36.860 There's nothing quite like arguing at the Supreme Court

00:45:39.780 because the justices are so prepared and well-versed in the law

00:45:45.100 that you know when you stand before them and they ask their questions

00:45:48.760 to refine and understand your arguments,

00:45:51.160 they will be the toughest questions you've ever had.

00:45:53.340 So how is the decision finally landed upon by the court

00:45:56.580 and then handed down to the public?

00:45:59.200 The court then, after oral argument, will meet,

00:46:02.340 and they will take essentially a straw vote

00:46:05.240 that will determine who will write a majority, for example,

00:46:08.440 and if there's going to be a dissent, who will take the lead in the dissent.

00:46:11.640 Those decisions will be written.

00:46:13.500 They will be circulated confidentially,

00:46:16.180 or it's supposed to be confidentially,

00:46:18.480 among the nine justices.

00:46:20.680 And then eventually, they will sign on to a decision

00:46:24.680 or write their own decision, and that will be published.

00:46:27.860 You never know when the Supreme Court specifically is going to rule.

00:46:32.080 Even the lawyers and the clients do not get advance notice.

00:46:35.560 But you do know that the end of the term is usually the last week of June.

00:46:40.620 And so for the most controversial decisions that will be heard between September

00:46:45.340 and, I would say, April or so,

00:46:49.280 those most controversial decisions will likely come out in June.

00:46:53.640 But sometimes there are exceptions to that as well.

00:46:56.560 And what were the facts of the case?

00:46:58.400 Mississippi passed a law that essentially was a pro-life law

00:47:02.940 affirming the right to life

00:47:04.340 and insisted in terms of the legislators that were involved in the law.

00:47:09.940 One of the lead legislators was a nurse, actually. 1.00

00:47:13.560 She took the lead in passing this law in the Mississippi legislature 0.99

00:47:16.880 that essentially said after 15 weeks,

00:47:19.880 there would be abortion limitations,

00:47:21.560 except in the case of fetal abnormalities or, you know, medical emergencies,

00:47:26.080 which every state has an exception for a medical emergency.

00:47:30.420 That law was challenged by an abortion group,

00:47:34.420 and that eventually resulted in a Supreme Court decision.

00:47:38.240 So what does this decision do to abortion in a legal sense in the United States?

00:47:42.220 Because abortion isn't actually illegal across all the states.

00:47:45.460 You're absolutely right.

00:47:46.560 There's been a lot of misinformation about what the Dobbs decision did.

00:47:50.880 And I think it's important that we understand Dobbs said

00:47:55.820 that there's no constitutional right to abortion.

00:47:59.220 There's no right in the Constitution itself to an abortion.

00:48:03.420 It's not in our text of our Constitution, nor is it reflected in our history.

00:48:07.680 In fact, the opposite is true when you look at the history of abortion.

00:48:12.260 Up until the court's decision in Roe v. Wade,

00:48:15.720 the vast majority of states had pro-life laws and limitations on abortion.

00:48:22.320 So essentially, the court said,

00:48:24.140 it's not our role to engage in this kind of decision-making.

00:48:28.120 We don't have the authority under the Constitution to do so.

00:48:31.180 And then that allows the states now to step back in

00:48:34.500 and to have conversations about whether abortion should be legal.

00:48:38.500 And we are hopeful and doing all we can

00:48:40.980 to ensure that those states end up on the right end of that discussion,

00:48:43.660 which is to protect human life and to empower women in the process. 1.00

00:48:47.720 So is it the right decision to say this is a state issue

00:48:50.720 and the states should just decide what to do about abortion? 1.00

00:48:53.700 Well, I would not necessarily agree that it's purely a state's issue.

00:48:58.260 I think it's a complicated issue under the Constitution

00:49:00.400 in terms of what role Congress might have.

00:49:05.380 But what the issue was that was before the court

00:49:08.040 is whether the court itself had the right to take the issue

00:49:11.480 away from every other branch of government,

00:49:14.240 both at the federal and the state level,

00:49:16.160 and impose its own policy preference.

00:49:18.840 And when we're looking at what rights the Constitution bestows,

00:49:22.280 it shouldn't be based on what five justices or six justices think,

00:49:27.320 but it should be on what's actually written in the Constitution.

00:49:30.540 And when we're looking at those types of rights,

00:49:33.000 the court has said,

00:49:33.680 and if it's not spelled out in the Constitution, in our text,

00:49:36.640 then we look to our nation's history to look at what rights are fundamental.

00:49:41.860 And we can see from our nation's history that abortion is not something

00:49:45.460 that we have historically permitted because of the issue of its unique

00:49:51.560 and taking unborn life.

00:49:53.560 And I think it has really paralyzed our public policy over the last 50 years

00:49:57.520 in providing real support for families and for women.

00:50:02.100 Just a moment ago, you mentioned something called a fundamental right.

00:50:04.440 Can you explain what a fundamental right is

00:50:06.860 and what other sorts of rights there might be that aren't fundamental rights?

00:50:10.940 There are rights in the Constitution that are explicitly enunciated.

00:50:15.380 They're spelled out in the text itself.

00:50:18.080 We can think of the freedom of the press.

00:50:20.360 We can think of the right to free speech,

00:50:21.980 which we have a case coming up this term on the right to free speech.

00:50:25.960 We can think of other rights,

00:50:28.080 like the right to not have unreasonable search and seizure.

00:50:30.740 These are things that are written into our Constitution itself.

00:50:33.680 The court has also created a doctrine, so to speak,

00:50:38.440 that says there may be other rights that are fundamental in nature,

00:50:43.760 fundamental to ordered liberty.

00:50:45.240 And those primarily arise under the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment.

00:50:50.680 In terms of determining what rights are fundamental to ordered liberty,

00:50:55.420 the court has said we need to be grounded in the nation's history

00:51:00.520 and the text of the Constitution to determine that.

00:51:03.640 Otherwise, it's just up to the whims of whoever is sitting on the bench at the time.

00:51:08.460 And that is what has happened in Roe versus Wade.

00:51:12.800 Rather than grounding our laws and our positions on what's in the Constitution,

00:51:17.780 like, for example, the separation of powers, right?

00:51:20.460 Each of the different government branches, they have their role,

00:51:23.940 and each needs to stay within that role.

00:51:26.840 Instead, we have had justices who essentially were engaging in a power grab.

00:51:32.000 And the court finally stepped back from that and said,

00:51:34.820 no, we cannot do that.

00:51:36.140 That's not our proper role on this issue.

00:51:39.280 I'd love to dive deeper into that last statement you made,

00:51:41.580 that back in 1973, in the Roe v. Wade decision,

00:51:44.980 the court wasn't actually basing its decision in good legal analysis or historic facts,

00:51:50.060 because this was something that Sarah Perry of the Heritage Foundation brought up just a little while ago.

00:51:55.500 Can you tell me more about that?

00:51:57.200 What made the Roe decision different from, say, a standard Supreme Court decision?

00:52:02.820 Roe v. Wade was a results-oriented, essentially, piece of legislation.

00:52:07.560 It came up with a decision that said, for the first time in our nation's history,

00:52:13.480 and in 1972, it was decided in 73, heard in 72,

00:52:18.380 the court essentially said there's a trimester framework,

00:52:21.680 and we're going to judge, you know, the state's abilities to enact pro-life laws

00:52:28.240 and to support women based on what trimester those women are in.

00:52:30.980 Well, that's nowhere in the Constitution.

00:52:32.880 That's completely made up by judges who wanted to find a right that wasn't otherwise there.

00:52:39.380 It was poorly reasoned, and scholars on the left as well as the right

00:52:44.100 have regularly, consistently recognized that it was a poorly reasoned decision.

00:52:49.760 Even Justice Ginsburg essentially said that.

00:52:52.560 And I think it's worth pointing out, it's a decision written by seven men.

00:52:57.120 And in that decision, it literally says that motherhood would be

00:53:01.300 force upon women a bleak and distressful future. 1.00

00:53:05.000 And those of us who are women know that that's absolutely not true.

00:53:09.540 And we resent the fact that in a decision written by seven men,

00:53:13.240 they literally say that it's essentially up to the physician,

00:53:16.920 describing him as a male, to make that decision for the woman.

00:53:20.740 Justice Ginsburg pointed that out after the Roe decision as well.

00:53:24.660 So how would you discuss this topic with a pro-choice friend or family member?

00:53:29.180 You know, the type of person whose only real exposure to the topic of abortion

00:53:32.080 is through social media, conversations in school, or, you know, over a meal with friends.

00:53:37.860 For those people who think, yeah, I support women and therefore I'm pro-choice,

00:53:42.520 you know, how do you begin a conversation with them?

00:53:45.280 And what do you say to start that off?

00:53:48.640 I think I would begin with the legal issue in the sense of saying what was actually decided in Dobbs.

00:53:55.360 Abortion wasn't outlawed in Dobbs.

00:53:57.860 We have returned to a place where the court rightly recognized it's not their role.

00:54:02.740 The Constitution itself does not confer a right to abortion.

00:54:06.440 It allows us to have those discussions in the states and to look at the interests of the unborn and of women.

00:54:14.760 And that was taken away from the people.

00:54:17.160 It was taken away from the states by the Supreme Court.

00:54:21.400 And that was wrong.

00:54:22.200 In addition, I would then move to talking about what does it mean for women to be equal? 1.00

00:54:28.340 And what does family-friendly policies, what do they look like?

00:54:32.560 When you look at the studies, what they actually tell you is that when most women have abortion,

00:54:36.720 they're uncertain about that decision at the time they're making it.

00:54:39.700 And the vast majority of women tell you that they would have chosen to be mothers.

00:54:43.360 They would have chosen life if they felt they had the resources to do so.

00:54:46.920 So why don't we work on providing those resources?

00:54:51.440 And what you'll find from the abortion industry is that they are more inclined to continue to make a profit off of women

00:54:59.940 rather than even allow the resources that are currently there to be known.

00:55:05.200 And I think that tells us a whole lot about what's going on.

00:55:08.560 The last thing I would do is I would bring out what other nations are even doing.

00:55:13.500 We are an extreme outlier in our abortion policy, even among nations that you wouldn't expect.

00:55:20.860 We are among the company of China and North Korea up until Dobbs was decided,

00:55:26.160 where we would be allowing abortion up until not just past viability, but up until a baby is born.

00:55:33.080 And talking about the science and what we know about the child's development is critical to any discussion on the life issue.

00:55:40.880 These are children. We know that now.

00:55:43.780 They experience pain, and we can provide family-friendly policies and resources to assist both women in having the children.

00:55:52.140 And if they choose to give the child up for adoption, there are over a million parents right now that are waiting to be able to adopt.

00:56:00.100 We just have a lot more resources now than we did in 1972.

00:56:03.200 How would you describe the nationwide response to the Dobbs decision?

00:56:08.400 Has it been a roughly 50-50 split in terms of people who are celebrating and those who are bemoaning the decision?

00:56:16.960 Or now that we're a few months past, what are we seeing in terms of the kind of cultural response to the decision?

00:56:24.200 I think those that understand what the decision did largely support it, and we can see that in polls.

00:56:31.680 When you explain what the court's ruling actually was, people support that ruling.

00:56:37.620 The same thing is true when you explain what Roe v. Wade meant and that it did place us as an extreme outlier in abortion policy

00:56:47.140 and that most people don't support abortion in the way that Planned Parenthood is advocating for it.

00:56:53.380 In fact, they support pro-life laws, including in the first trimester of pregnancy and even more so.

00:57:00.480 So I've been encouraged when we get the information out there at the response that is there,

00:57:04.860 and I've been extremely encouraged to see the Pregnancy Resource Centers step up,

00:57:10.500 the states that are stepping up not only to pass pro-life laws but laws that support women with tax credits and other aids as well.

00:57:19.620 What have been some of the effective ways that you've seen

00:57:21.580 for people to spread the word about the facts of abortion and its history?

00:57:26.160 Are there effective tools that people can use to talk with friends or family members

00:57:31.060 who might not initially agree with them about the issue?

00:57:33.860 Absolutely.

00:57:34.800 Our website, adflegal.org, has resources that explain the scientific development.

00:57:40.480 We've provided congressional testimony that goes deep into that.

00:57:44.380 That's also on our website, footnote studies and things like that.

00:57:48.440 The SBA List, which is a pro-life organization, they have entire websites that are devoted to providing resources for women

00:57:56.820 and to talking about life as well as the Charlotte Logere Institute, which is affiliated with SBA List.

00:58:03.740 There are so many resources that you can find that not only talk about fetal development

00:58:10.120 and what a child is experiencing at even the young age of 8 and 10 weeks, 6 weeks with a heartbeat,

00:58:17.520 8 weeks with, you know, fingers and toes, 10 weeks with actual fingerprints,

00:58:21.860 but also the resources that women have at their fingertips and ways that you can support them in your own personal capacity. 0.82

00:58:30.600 To that point about supporting women, what have some of the impacts really been for women across the country?

00:58:36.100 Now that some time has elapsed between the Dobbs decision and now,

00:58:39.080 we, I think, can begin starting to see the actual effects as they roll out across the country.

00:58:43.760 Have any of the doomsday predictions from the abortion lobby come true, or has the impact been fairly positive? 0.59

00:58:49.680 I think the facts on the ground would show it's been overwhelmingly positive,

00:58:54.640 and that states are having these discussions.

00:58:57.380 They are passing pro-life affirming laws.

00:59:00.120 And I think what excites me the most about this opportunity is that we have the chance to restore a culture

00:59:06.780 that values families, that values women, and, again, values motherhood.

00:59:13.080 We have a number of state entities that are stepping up.

00:59:16.880 We have a number of private entities that are stepping up to provide resources to women. 0.96

00:59:21.140 And I really think it's important for people to understand that the developments that we've had in the law,

00:59:26.840 where a woman can't get fired anymore because she's pregnant, where we see what's happening in the womb, 0.99

00:59:32.580 where we have more medical care that's available,

00:59:34.880 there are just so many more resources now that those resources are the things that we need to help women understand 1.00

00:59:41.260 that they should be able to use and employ.

00:59:45.020 And instead, we're seeing the abortion industry try to silence those voices.

00:59:49.340 And I think that's what's been most disappointing to me, but also reveals their motives quite clearly.

00:59:54.740 What you just mentioned really strikes a chord with me,

00:59:56.760 because since Roe v. Wade, medical advancements have shown the humanity of the unborn child.

01:00:01.720 They've allowed children to reach viability earlier in the pregnancy than ever before.

01:00:07.000 Workforces have begun to treat motherhood and pregnancy in some ways with a sense of respect that largely didn't exist,

01:00:14.260 or at least didn't exist as strongly in previous decades.

01:00:17.760 And interestingly, there almost seems to have been a culture of life that's evolved outside of a legal framework,

01:00:23.460 just at a societal level, and that perhaps it's only really been in the last year or so

01:00:29.000 that the law has begun to catch up with the reality that society has already begun realizing and moving toward on its own.

01:00:35.140 Absolutely.

01:00:36.180 Alliance Defending Freedom in the United States is largely known for its work in the courtrooms.

01:00:40.840 We also work in the legislatures, and we were able to help Mississippi draft this 15-week bill

01:00:47.020 and to get it to the United States Supreme Court.

01:00:50.240 But I don't think the solution at this point is in the law necessarily.

01:00:55.160 Now, we're busier than we've ever been, to be candid, you know, defending, helping states to defend their pro-life laws.

01:01:02.160 We're in over a dozen states already in litigation since Dobbs.

01:01:05.900 Helping states, we're also helping states pass life-affirming laws.

01:01:09.780 But this is now a cultural issue largely, and we need to be able to persuade the culture that pro-life people are there.

01:01:17.960 We're there for those mothers that, again, the vast majority of mothers who are considering abortion are doing so not because they don't want to parent,

01:01:27.000 but because they're afraid.

01:01:28.540 And we shouldn't be making decisions out of fear.

01:01:31.940 We have lots of policy options and private options that we can provide, and we should be voting pro-life as well and speaking up on it, as you've already referenced.

01:01:41.460 I think we want to be a voice not only for the unborn, absolutely that's critical because it's their very life that is at issue, but a voice for women as well.

01:01:51.820 So what sort of practical impacts have we seen since the Dobbs decision on a state-by-state level?

01:01:57.220 Different states have approached the issue differently.

01:02:00.280 I think your decision is driving at the resources as opposed to pro-life laws that would touch on abortion specifically.

01:02:07.300 So when we're looking at resources, we've seen more and more pregnancy resources be able to expand the services that they're providing.

01:02:16.380 It can be anything from pre-counseling to post-counseling to providing resources in diapers and tangible supplies to counseling to job training, you name it.

01:02:30.820 There are a number of private solutions.

01:02:32.620 There are over almost 3,000 pregnancy resource centers nationwide that are standing in the gap.

01:02:38.540 One of the things that the states can do is to help direct funding to those resource centers that are offering the choice of life and that are then supporting that choice in very practical ways.

01:02:51.300 And we've seen states do that.

01:02:52.740 Mississippi is actually a great example where they are helping to shift funds to provide funds to women who are in need.

01:03:00.760 And there are a number of state programs that can be adjusted to provide additional health care, to help women in these instances, and federal solutions as well.

01:03:11.840 We just need some courageous legislators and some courageous individuals to put pressure on those legislators to say, let's do this.

01:03:19.400 Let's do it right and actually create a family-friendly state and family-friendly public policy.

01:03:25.140 And what's the statistical breakdown currently between pro-life versus pro-abortion states?

01:03:31.360 How many states either have pro-life legislation on the books or are in the process of passing those laws versus states that have begun pushing for even more extreme pro-abortion laws?

01:03:42.240 It's evenly divided.

01:03:43.300 We have about 25 states that have pro-life legislation on the books, and that is a variety of measures, I would say.

01:03:54.400 Some are heartbeat pieces of legislation.

01:03:57.740 Others have to do with eugenics, meaning that you can't abort a child because of the child's race or gender or because of a disability.

01:04:06.120 So these protections vary in terms of their scope, but there are about half of the states that have them.

01:04:13.580 And many of those states are involved in litigation right now because the abortion industry is fighting so hard to be able to continue to make a profit.

01:04:21.220 We also are litigating against the Biden administration because they also are trying to take this right away from communities and states and allow the abortion industry to keep making a profit off of women.

01:04:34.000 So I ask this a little tongue-in-cheek.

01:04:36.320 Is the battle over?

01:04:37.660 Because many of us celebrated with the release of the Dobbs decision, but does that mean that the pro-life movement can rest on its laurels, or is there still work to be done?

01:04:47.420 Alliance Defending Freedom has a concept called generational wins, and we pursue generational wins because we believe it's up to each generation to protect freedom.

01:04:58.140 We have not accomplished the generational win of protecting life.

01:05:02.920 We are at the beginning of that.

01:05:04.980 But one major milestone in that beginning was reversing Roe versus Wade and Casey.

01:05:11.660 It is the decision of a generation and should give us all hope and faith that nothing is impossible if we commit to it, if we show up, if we speak, and if we persist.

01:05:25.440 That tenacious spirit should see us through not only in this issue as we are returning to the states, but on the other issues that we're facing across this nation right now.

01:05:35.500 So in that vein of looking forward and preparing for the next battles or the next actions that we should be taking as people who are in the pro-life movement, what should your average pro-life American be thinking, doing, and preparing for?

01:05:49.420 They should be ensuring that they are knowledgeable about these issues, that they learn about the humanity of the unborn, the science behind it, because the science is on our side.

01:06:01.780 They should be volunteering or giving to pregnancy centers. 0.98

01:06:06.340 They should be urging their state legislators and their federal members of Congress to ensure that funds are being directed to community health centers, not to the abortion industry, which requires also that we be knowledgeable about who we're voting for, that we vote pro-life.

01:06:23.980 And I think more than anything else, I mean, all of these things are important, but what I think about in my own family is we have to have these conversations at our dinner tables with our own children so that we are helping to create a culture of life and that they are understanding the importance of these issues for purposes of protecting life and freedom for the next generation.

01:06:47.720 Yeah. Building a culture of life really doesn't start and end with the current generation of adults. It really starts with how we're talking about it with our children and preparing them to think about and discuss these issues with their peers when the issue comes up. It's really powerful.

01:07:03.840 Well, we need to realize other people are doing that from the other side. So we can't sit that out. We have to have those discussions with our kids.

01:07:12.200 And in order to have those discussions and to help them understand, we have to understand it ourselves. And I'm hopeful about the next generation. I'm hopeful that we're at this stage that I think is something that two generations have worked for in all different areas of life.

01:07:28.340 If you think about it, we are defending students on campuses, their right to be able to speak freely about life. We defend sidewalk counselors who have literally saved lives for two generations outside of abortion clinics. If you think about legislators like the nurse that I spoke about who passed the Mississippi law, we all have a role to play wherever we have been placed in protecting life.

01:07:51.740 So how can people learn more? How can we learn more about the various battles that are beginning to appear post the Dobbs decision? And how can people become more involved?

01:08:00.400 They can go to our website at adflegal.org. We have an entire litigation team and a legislative team that are focused on life issues. I have to say they've never been busier. We have been able to prevail in 14 Supreme Court cases in the last 11 years with Dobbs being one of them.

01:08:17.320 And ultimately, I do need to say it was the Mississippi Attorney General's decision to go for the gold in terms of asking for Roe to be overturned. And that was a courageous decision, which again, I think underscores the role that we all play in wherever we've been placed.

01:08:33.340 So that's a place you can get resources is at our website. You can certainly call us. And like I said, it's important to protect free speech so that we can speak about this right to life so that pregnancy resource centers can ensure their message gets out so that women know they have resources.

01:08:49.260 It's important for sidewalk counselors. It's important for the church and just different religious organizations to be able to protect life.

01:08:57.980 And so we all, again, have a role to play. And that's an exciting thing, I think, to be at this point in our history.

01:09:03.760 It really is an incredibly exciting moment in our history. I'll be honest.

01:09:07.720 I never really expected that I would get to experience the overturning of such a disastrous ruling as Roe v. Wade, something that I kind of in the back of my mind thought would probably exist my entire life.

01:09:17.620 And I would just like to thank you, Kristen, for the incredible work that you and Alliance Defending Freedom did, both in the Dobbs case, working with Mississippi to craft a winning case, and for the work that you have undertaken over the last couple decades fighting for freedom across our country.

01:09:34.200 So thank you so much. And thank you so much for this incredible conversation.

01:09:37.440 It was a privilege.

01:09:47.620 Thank you so much.

01:10:17.620 Thank you so much.

01:10:47.620 Thank you so much.

01:11:17.620 And I feel like we've been very positive and served those across our state on so many different levels.

01:11:25.260 Amazing. Thank you so much for serving the people of Mississippi.

01:11:28.700 And I think there's a segue here because you've been able to, by serving the people of Mississippi, end up creating legal changes that now are in turn serving the people of the entire country.

01:11:40.280 Can you tell us a little bit about the Dobbs decision and what your objectives were?

01:11:44.960 Absolutely. This is an opportunity for Mississippi to lead on this case.

01:11:50.420 We were selected, of course, by the United States Supreme Court.

01:11:57.260 We were so excited because we knew this was a truly a journey for people across our state and across our country who had prayed for this, who had waited for the option to get in front of the United States Supreme Court.

01:12:11.020 And so we embraced this. And as we prepared, again, an amazing team, writing the brief, preparing for the oral argument, and then making the argument.

01:12:22.360 Again, we looked at it from a holistic perspective in the sense that we should talk about empowering women and promoting life, that this wasn't an either-or situation, that for 50 years it had been wrongly decided.

01:12:39.800 And so when we got the question, then we turned around and put in our brief, the very hard question, overturn Roe v. Wade.

01:12:48.000 We felt like that was important. And as we did that and we posted it up, certainly our friends, our partners, the coalitions, everyone came on board.

01:12:58.420 And it, of course, proved to be very successful.

01:13:00.940 I think in a world often prone to hyperbole, I can say with zero hyperbole that very successful might actually be the understatement of the decade in terms of the long-term impact and the protection of life that this decision leads to.

01:13:14.720 Can you explain for audiences in more detail how you built this case?

01:13:19.280 What were the arguments you and your team were making and how did that tie into overturning Roe v. Wade?

01:13:24.600 Right. This was an appellate decision that we moved forward that involved a 15-week abortion law here in the state of Mississippi.

01:13:34.780 That case was already here and we opted to petition for a surge in the United States Supreme Court.

01:13:42.740 And so that was the real question.

01:13:44.680 We embraced on how we would write this on all the levels, including asking the hard question to overturn Roe v. Wade.

01:13:52.680 We felt like it was an important time to bring this forward.

01:13:57.300 And as we got there, certainly the justices, we made the argument that this was a rule of law case that should always be decided by the people.

01:14:07.760 It was important to look at it from the perspective that Roe was never a good decision, legally or morally.

01:14:16.620 It had certainly stunted the political debate on the vital issue of life.

01:14:21.300 And quite frankly, on how we serve women when they're most vulnerable.

01:14:26.120 And so they were in great need.

01:14:28.620 And so how would we step up?

01:14:30.040 How would we change?

01:14:31.480 And that was part of our argument.

01:14:34.660 Roe had really locked up abortion policymaking behind the bench. 0.97

01:14:37.960 So now the people of each state should have the opportunity to make decisions about abortion policies that they want to pass.

01:14:47.400 Certainly it will look different in every state as we've seen.

01:14:50.820 Some states have already essentially codified Roe v. Wade.

01:14:54.240 Some states like mine in Mississippi, we have very strong laws to protect life that have finally taken effect.

01:15:02.000 And so we're now enacting new laws to support women and their children.

01:15:07.760 You just mentioned that Roe was not just a bad moral decision, but just plain bad lawmaking as well, which both of our previous interviewees also touched upon.

01:15:17.800 Can you unpack that and explain it in more detail?

01:15:20.800 Well, that's exactly correct.

01:15:23.780 So for 50 years, it had been determined the other way and was based on the Constitution, when in fact there was nothing in the Constitution, in the text, that would provide that this was a true constitutional right.

01:15:39.680 So if you look all the way through, even back to Justice Ginsburg, she thought so too.

01:15:47.780 We included that in our brief.

01:15:49.820 And we felt like that was critical to make that argument because there is nothing in the text, in the Constitution, to support that.

01:15:58.760 And in doing so, it gave us the opportunity to further peel that back and talk about, you know, in 1973,

01:16:07.120 the Supreme Court took this very controversial debate when they should have looked at it as a neutral arbitrator.

01:16:15.380 They did not, which was truly their role under the Constitution.

01:16:20.520 And so what were the consequences?

01:16:22.440 Well, it did great damage to the court.

01:16:25.000 It stunted a debate that the American people needed to have.

01:16:29.080 And so the Dobbs decision, the Mississippi Dobbs case, set things right.

01:16:33.280 So if the court that decided Roe wasn't using history or good legal reasoning to arrive at their decision, how did they arrive at a decision?

01:16:41.480 Well, at that point, you can see it became fairly political.

01:16:44.900 They had a stretch on how they tied it in what they thought was a constitutional connection, when, in fact, as we've just discussed, it's not.

01:16:56.680 So this, again, allowed us to lay it out completely, to talk about the arguments of a rule of law and how a rule of law question should be returned to the people.

01:17:08.320 Because the people should always be able to elect their legislators, their governors, and then if you don't like the policy and the decisions they're making,

01:17:16.740 then you can certainly choose to have them replaced by someone else who supports your policies and your decision making.

01:17:24.860 What the original case did, it created this right back in 1973 in the Roe case that was truly never supported by the Constitution.

01:17:34.320 Right. And I'd like to go back to a slogan you just brought up a moment ago.

01:17:38.540 Your slogan has been, empower women and promote life.

01:17:42.700 And I love that because so many people in the pro-choice movement often claim that Dobbs strips women of their rights.

01:17:48.600 Can you talk about your slogan and why it directly contends with the pro-abortion lobby?

01:17:53.500 And how does Dobbs empower women? 1.00

01:17:56.420 Well, I have always, and with my team, always been a champion for women, and then thus their children.

01:18:02.340 And so my argument to that is, you know, Roe was decided wrongly 50 years ago.

01:18:10.240 So it was a true fallacy.

01:18:13.340 And back then it pitted women against their children. 0.77

01:18:16.880 It pitted women against women. 0.98

01:18:18.900 And it created this real false choice that you either had to empower women or you could promote life. 0.99

01:18:25.020 The truth is that that hasn't succeeded because of abortion, but women have succeeded in spite of abortion.

01:18:33.360 You think about the past five decades.

01:18:35.700 There have been tremendous advances in society, in our culture, in our law, in our medicine.

01:18:42.720 And that gave women even more opportunities to pursue their professional dreams and also be the mothers that they wanted to be. 0.73

01:18:50.080 And I think that's so significant.

01:18:52.580 It wasn't an either or anymore that you could embrace empowering women and promoting life and look at the great benefits to have both of those opportunities.

01:19:03.680 And if I understand correctly, this isn't just some abstract concept that you pulled out of a textbook or out of thin air, but one that you've personally lived, right?

01:19:12.720 Oh, absolutely.

01:19:14.780 Single mom, three children, feel very blessed.

01:19:19.100 But I truly believe in, you know, empowering others, assisting, being a champion for women and their children.

01:19:28.440 And vulnerable women certainly need support and help.

01:19:32.060 And we've always treated them with love and respect.

01:19:34.700 But this has given us a platform to even further support women and to help them on their journey.

01:19:41.300 So what would you say is the biggest impact you hope the Dobbs decision will have, both for women and for our society?

01:19:48.840 Well, certainly to get that decision, it allowed us to change the narrative.

01:19:55.780 This is a change in history, an opportunity to rewrite the script.

01:20:02.340 And here's how we do it.

01:20:03.480 We have to really be focused on what women need. 1.00

01:20:07.960 You know, we have to be engaged in how we move forward.

01:20:12.520 How do we help these women that are most vulnerable? 0.97

01:20:14.680 Certainly we are supportive of our pregnancy centers.

01:20:18.160 We need to be assisting them, encouraging people to give of their time, their treasures, their talent.

01:20:24.100 But we need to be talking about some other hard issues that are important to women and their children. 0.86

01:20:29.120 Because now we're in a post-Rowe world.

01:20:31.080 So we need to talk about how we do things a little differently in the sense in how do we support these women and their children.

01:20:39.300 I think there's some serious conversations and some action items that need to be held on child care.

01:20:45.280 Making child care, quality child care, affordable and available for women.

01:20:51.520 We need to look at workplace flexibility options.

01:20:55.260 Again, we need to give women options as they raise their children and as they pursue their professional dreams. 1.00

01:21:01.840 We need to have the fathers be equally responsible financially for their children. 0.89

01:21:08.980 Because the women for too long have borne the burden of economic and financial hardship. 1.00

01:21:15.460 And again, if we're going to empower these women, help them, they certainly shouldn't be penalized and the fathers should be invested. 0.99

01:21:22.140 And there's a really good part if the fathers are invested with the child support, then odds are they're going to be invested in their child's life.

01:21:28.520 And that is significant.

01:21:30.640 We certainly need to be looking at how we streamline adoption and foster care.

01:21:35.580 Because it's important to get these children into loving, thriving families as quickly as possible.

01:21:42.880 That should always be our goal, again, as we look to empower women and to help their children along the way.

01:21:49.140 You know, living on the margins, we should always be looking to uplift the entire family, the whole family, which includes the mothers and the children.

01:21:59.420 Well, you've just laid out a list of important things that sound like the next steps now that this massive victory has been achieved in the courts.

01:22:06.040 Now that it levels the playing field and returns us to a place where the people can decide what they believe is moral and can make their laws on a state-by-state basis.

01:22:15.260 What are the next steps for a pro-life listener who wants to learn the next steps for how to support the movement practically?

01:22:20.960 Well, there are so many good opportunities for people to serve.

01:22:25.020 You know, we have to channel our energy, just like we did for the last 50 years, for overturning Roe v. Wade and look at ways we can certainly support these women and their children.

01:22:36.680 Certainly, I would say assist your local pregnancy centers.

01:22:40.460 Work with your churches to support women in your community who need help and their children.

01:22:45.380 This can be anything from making donations for diapers and car seats or money to help a young mother with tutoring, help her to get her GED.

01:22:55.220 Because we certainly want to see mothers upskilled to their best level. 1.00

01:23:00.980 Again, they deserve that and we should be ready to help them.

01:23:05.040 Second, I think we have to advocate for the laws that will support these women and their children. 0.97

01:23:09.080 As we've talked about, you know, the child care, we've talked about flexible options, child support, adoption, and foster care system.

01:23:18.060 Those are some hard topics, but we're ready.

01:23:20.840 We're ready for this.

01:23:22.460 Our job should be being able, willing to step in, strengthen these laws, you know, ask all of our respective states to pass them,

01:23:30.860 and look to the big strategic vision on how we truly do empower them.

01:23:35.640 Because our laws should reflect our compassion, just like our compassion for the last 50 years has been to overturn Roe v. Wade.

01:23:43.960 Well, we're here now.

01:23:45.160 So let's take that same compassion and love and energy and make it a difference as we change the laws to truly empower women and their children. 1.00

01:23:54.440 And finally, as you're well aware, our nation is divided.

01:23:57.800 A lot of people celebrate the Dobbs decision, a lot of people oppose it, but I think there are a lot of people in the middle who just don't quite know what to make of it.

01:24:06.860 What do you say to that woman who's facing an unplanned pregnancy, perhaps is scared and perhaps doesn't know where to go or where to turn?

01:24:15.640 What do you say to that woman? 1.00

01:24:17.600 Absolutely.

01:24:18.760 The common theme should always be, we're here for you.

01:24:21.140 Our goal, our mission is to continue to serve these women and their children.

01:24:28.200 And so certainly we have respect for all those making those decisions, but knowing that we're here for them, that we believe in them, we're here to uplift them, to serve them.

01:24:40.160 And as I said earlier, you know, the way we serve the women and children now has got to be changed.

01:24:46.580 We've got to look at these avenues on how we support them on every step of their journey.

01:24:51.680 And so that involves changing hearts and minds and understanding that these are new opportunities for us to follow.

01:25:00.300 And we certainly all believe in the dignity of women and children in all life.

01:25:05.740 Yeah, like we've talked about both on this show before and in the documentary we released earlier this year, a massive victory was achieved for life in the Dobbs decision.

01:25:16.060 But in a deeper, more fundamental way, the work for most of us is just beginning.

01:25:22.380 The work to support women, their families, their children, both born and unborn, not just from the highest court in the land, but throughout all levels of our society and in our communities.

01:25:37.080 So thank you so much, Attorney General Fitch.

01:25:39.340 Thank you for your bravery in taking a stand on this issue.

01:25:42.580 Thank you for the fight that you brought to the courts and for the work that you've done to protect life.

01:25:47.040 And we really appreciate your time in this conversation today.

01:25:50.280 Thank you so much.

01:25:50.980 It has been an honor, and I appreciate the opportunity to visit with you today.

01:26:06.380 For the last 10 weeks, we've gone on a journey together.

01:26:11.420 Considering the subject, it hasn't always been easy.

01:26:14.660 But we do think it's been necessary.

01:26:16.420 Like Attorney General Fitch and all of our interviewees on this series have said, in a way, we have to live in a state of tension.

01:26:25.060 On the one hand, we can celebrate.

01:26:27.440 We have to celebrate the victories.

01:26:30.140 One of the most ground-shaking, life-protecting decisions in our country's history was just recently handed down by the court.

01:26:36.580 But on the other hand, our work in the pro-life movement is just now beginning.

01:26:41.020 Because the truth is that now, more than ever, is the time that we, the average pro-life Americans, are most needed.

01:26:49.160 The bravery, legal expertise, and strategy of people like Attorney General Fitch, Kristen Wagner, and the countless individuals we've interviewed for this series.

01:26:59.440 Their expertise has brought us to the point where now we, the people, can advocate for and protect life in our communities, our churches, and in our states.

01:27:10.360 And we have to do it.

01:27:12.140 We have to advocate for life.

01:27:13.960 Not only in our conversations with friends and family, but we have to vote for life as well at the polls.

01:27:20.960 But before we can do any of that, we have to educate ourselves.

01:27:25.060 We have to learn what's true so that we can be sure we're actually advocating for eternal, unchanging principles.

01:27:30.940 And that's, that's precisely what you have done.

01:27:35.920 So thank you.

01:27:37.920 Thank you for listening and for joining us in this special limited series.

01:27:42.960 Though this is the final episode of Choosing Life, we hope it's only the beginning of your journey.

01:27:48.580 A journey to learn about and to work with us.

01:27:51.720 To build a culture of life across this country.

01:27:56.140 I'm Ian Reid, and this has been the Choosing Life Podcast.

01:27:59.640 Thanks so much for listening.

01:28:29.640 I'm Ian Reid, and this has been the Choosing Life Podcast.

The Michael Knowles Show - October 08, 2022

Choosing Life： The Legacy of Dobbs

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