Pro-life activists expressed optimism at the March for Life on Friday in Washington, D.C., maintaining that the end of the landmark abortion case Roe v. Wade would just be the beginning of another stage in protecting life.
Friday's event is the 49th for pro-life activists, who started marching the same year that Roe v. Wade was decided. The recent Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization case, which was argued before the Supreme Court in December, has been viewed as the movement's best chance in years to overturn the decision that prompted their demonstrations.
"There's kind of an excitement in the air this year, which is a wonderful thing," Fr. David Pivonka, who says he's been coming to the march for about 30 years, told Fox News Digital. Pivonka currently serves as President of Franciscan University of Steubenville. He estimates that 700-800 students came with him to the March.
Anti-abortion activist pass out signs during a protest outside a Planned Parenthood clinic on Jan. 20, 2022 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
Zeta Barton, a 20-year-old student at Liberty University, told Fox News Digital that she was studying pre-law and wanted to fight abortion after graduating. She said she thought conservative justices like Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett would "stand up for the lives that haven't had a future yet."
"We can only hope and pray that they [the justices] overturn Roe v. Wade," said Niklas Koehler, a 20-year-old Steubenville student.
Overturning Roe would return the issue to the states, potentially intensifying political debates but also providing opportunities for pro-life activists to focus more on their communities.
March for Life stage and activists on Jan. 21, 2022. (Ophelie Jacobson)
"You can never really read the tea leaves and how these justices are going to [decide] … but gauging by the questions that were asked, it looks very positive," March for Life President Jeanne Mancini told Fox News Digital. Her comments echoed those of conservatives who suggested that the oral arguments looked good for pro-lifers.
"A lot of times, [the other side thinks] we are women haters," said Lucia Hunt, an 18-year-old student at Steubenville, "And that we're depriving women of the opportunity to have careers by not allowing them to have abortions – when in reality, abortions only limit a woman. They only give a woman hurt and pain to deal with for the rest of her life."
Demonstrators during the annual March For Life on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., on Friday, Jan. 21, 2022. (Stephanie Keith/Bloomberg)
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Koehler told Fox News Digital he came to the March to "defend life in all its stages … and to help promote that resources should be provided for women who are in need."
Both expressed concern that President Biden, who identifies as Catholic, has taken stances that conflict with the faith's teaching on abortion.
"He's not a Catholic in any way, shape, or form," former Planned Parenthood director Abby Johnson told Fox News Digital. "He may be a Catholic by baptism, but he's not acting like a Catholic."
She added that Biden was "leading people astray" and that "he's on a very dangerous road … his soul is in jeopardy, and he needs to seek wise council from a priest and repent." Johnson, an outspoken critic of Biden, spoke at the Republican National Committee in 2020.
March for Life sign reads "Love them Both," in Washington, D.C.
"I didn't think we would see it so quickly," she said, referring to the potential end of Roe. She added that we "definitely have President Trump to thank for that. I mean, if he wouldn't have done what he said he was going to do. If he had not put pro-life justices on the Supreme Court, we were not be where we are today."
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A long road ahead
Many in the pro-life movement acknowledge that the battle over abortion will continue raging even if the Supreme Court hands them a victory. Groups like EMILY's List and Planned Parenthood have fought for years to protect abortion access.
"The opportunity is that people are enraged," Planned Parenthood President Alexis McGill Johnson previously told Axios. "What we saw in Texas, and what people will walk away from [the Mississippi oral arguments with], is a level of rage that we could be living in a world six months from now — where our children have fewer rights than we have right now."
On Friday, her organization announced that the 225 organizations had signed onto a letter asking Congress to effectively codify Roe v. Wade. In doing so, the federal government would likely prompt additional legal battles over states rights on the issue.
March for Life sign at Supreme Court in Washington, D.C.
"Despite the Supreme Court’s decision in Roe v. Wade nearly fifty years ago, abortion access has continued to be under threat. Anti-abortion politicians and advocates have continued to undermine abortion access both at the federal and state levels. This is part of a nearly fifty-year strategy to make abortion wholly inaccessible for those who need it," read the letter, which was signed by groups like Abortion Access Front.
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"In September, and again in December, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to put an end to Texas’s S.B. 8, a six-week abortion ban, rendering Roe v. Wade’s protections meaningless for the majority of Texas abortion patients, and giving other states hostile to reproductive rights a green light to ban abortion outright in the near future. People with resources are being forced to flee the state to access abortion, while those who are unable to leave the state are being forced to continue their pregnancies against their wishes. Around the same time, the Supreme Court recently heard oral arguments in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, a case in which Mississippi has asked the Court to overturn Roe v. Wade. The Supreme Court could gut or wholly overturn the right to abortion by this summer."
That quick shift in abortion access would presumably leave a lot of women without an option that's been available for almost 50 years. Women would still, in some cases, be able to travel across state lines to obtain abortions or utilize the abortion pill if their state restricts the procedure.
Pro-life advocates, however, say they're interested in providing resources to women in crisis pregnancies.
"People have got to find their place in the movement now," said Johnson, whose organizations provide material and financial relief to pregnant women and help abortion workers leave clinics. "Don't wait until the [Supreme Court] decision in June. We've got to get ready."
She added that people need to "find their local pregnancy center, they need to get involved, they need to start donating, they need to start donating their time, their treasure."
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"Our mission at the March for Life is to create a culture where abortion is unthinkable," Mancini said, adding that there is potential for new legislation in states. "Our work is far from over."
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