CV NEWS FEED // In his 2023 State of the Union address, President Joe Biden again signaled his full commitment to abortion-on-demand.
“Congress must restore the right the Supreme Court took away last year and codify Roe v. Wade to protect every woman’s constitutional right to choose,” the president said:
The Vice President and I are doing everything we can to protect access to reproductive health care and safeguard patient privacy. But already, more than a dozen states are enforcing extreme abortion bans. Make no mistake; if Congress passes a national abortion ban, I will veto it.
Catholic and other pro-life leaders decried the remarks.
“Don’t call yourself Catholic and be so adamantly pro-abortion, Mr. President,” wrote Catholic columnist Kathryn Jean Lopez.
“The ‘state of the union’ is fatally flawed if we are committed to supporting, promoting, and paying for abortion,” tweeted Bishop Thomas Tobin of the Diocese of Providence. “A nation that destroys its own children has no future.”
“Amen,” added Bishop Joseph Strickland of the Diocese of Tyler. “We must embrace the Sanctity of Life…”
Ahead of the State of the Union Address, CatholicVote President Brian Burch denounced what he called the “baseless, condescending, and divisive abortion euphemisms dressed up as efforts to empower women” that have characterized Biden’s recent comments about abortion.
“The fact is, this kind of provocative rhetoric has only served to fuel the spread of violent attacks on churches and pregnancy help centers since Biden took office,” Burch said.
CatholicVote has tracked at least 81 attacks on pro-life pregnancy resource centers and other pro-life groups since the Supreme Court decision overturning Roe vs. Wade was leaked in May 2022. During the same span of time, CatholicVote has tracked 127 attacks on Catholic churches.
“While ignoring these attacks and their victims, the Biden administration has openly weaponized the federal government against pro-life Americans like Mark Houck and his family,” Burch said:
The true state of our union is one in which corrupt government agencies are targeting innocent Americans over their political beliefs. Many Americans long for the days when the President of the United States had something more hopeful to offer the nation than how committed he is to helping abort our children.
Mark Houck, a pro-life Catholic husband and father of seven, was dramatically arrested at gunpoint in front of his wife and small children at home last September. The Biden Department of Justice sent what many called a “SWAT-style” FBI contingent to make the arrest.
In a rebuke to the Biden administration, a court later found Houck not guilty of violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act. On the invitation of Congressman Scott Perry, R-PA, Houck attended Tuesday night’s State of the Union Address.