Importance of abortion issue demands ongoing attention

I’m sure that regular readers of this column think that all I ever talk about, write about, ruminate on and care about is abortion. At least 50% of my written work revolves around Roe v. Wade.

Those who think I write too often about abortion tend to think that women should have access to the procedure with relatively few limitations, and that my continued harping on the essential inhumanity of the act is just wrong, self-defeating, offensive and my favorite recent critique, “misogynistic.”

I might even concede that I spend far too much time focusing on this violation of the right to life when there is so much else going on around the world. My profession as an immigration attorney actually does give me time to focus on those crises, so it’s not like I’m unaware of what’s happening.

Yet I can’t ignore abortion. There are women who keep prattling on about how one entire gender is enslaved when they are unable to “control” their bodies. In fact, Gov. Tim Walz just signed a bill in Minnesota that would essentially make abortion a right that no court could overturn.

You know who else won’t let me ignore abortion? The U.S. Justice Department. The Biden administration came down hard against pro-life activist Mark Houck, making a literal federal case out of a sidewalk skirmish.

It was so obvious that this was a political prosecution that the presiding judge, Gerald Pappert, observed that the U.S. attorney’s office might have stretched the law a bit far in bringing the case.

Fortunately, jurors agreed with the judge and acquitted Houck of all charges.

As I wrote on Facebook: “I think the most important takeaway from this victory is that Americans can detect when a prosecution is being waged for political reasons, and not because there is a legitimate cause of action. The Biden administration has been sent a very clear message: stop trying to crush the prolife movement under the guise of protecting women’s access to health care.”

The attempt by the Department of Justice to intimidate a vocal pro-life activist is chilling, but simply one of many efforts waged by those who are shocked that their monopoly on the abortion message has been hijacked by another reality.

They can no longer write the narrative that most Americans are OK with demonizing people of faith, with silencing uncomfortable voices, with vilifying those who pose no threat but who are attempting to do what civil rights activists have always done: follow the arc of justice.

And while I was angered by the Houck prosecution and gratified by his acquittal, what troubles me is not the attacks against adults but, rather, the continued crusade against young people.

A few years ago, it was Catholic high school student Nick Sandman who was defamed for having the temerity to attend a pro-life rally wearing a MAGA hat.

While much of the ire seemed focused on the hat, it was clear that most of the teen’s critics were more upset that he was attending the March For Life. How dare he, this embryonic sexual abuser a la Brett Kavanaugh, protest a woman’s right to do whatever she wanted with her unborn child? We shall make him pay. Ironically, they were the ones who ended up paying directly into his savings account.

It never ends. This month, a group of students from Our Lady of the Rosary School in South Carolina were attending this year’s March for Life and decided to visit the Smithsonian Institution.

They were wearing pro-life hats. The students were mocked mercilessly and then kicked out of the museum — funded by our tax dollars — when they wouldn’t take off their hats.

First Amendment, meet civil rights lawsuit.

So those who wonder why I keep writing about abortion only need to take their heads out of the sand and look around.

Being pro-life is still a big news item.