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NRL News
Page 11
January 2010
Volume 37
Issue 1

2010 Elections: Pro-Life Increments, Prospects, and Opportunities

By Karen Cross

The nature of politics requires that you always must juggle multiple balls at once. Even as we are digging in to fend off this Congress’s health care “reform” initiative, we must simultaneously look ahead to the composition of the next Congress. Valuable advice given to children growing up takes on renewed meaning in this important election year: an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure; a stitch in time saves nine; and, most of all, be prepared.

As National Right to Life Political Action Committee (NRL PAC) looks to 2010, one thing is certain in a very volatile political situation. Just as the 2008 elections had serious consequences for the pro-life movement, so will the congressional midterm elections in 2010. The next Congress will consider important issues pro-life people everywhere hold dear.

It’s almost impossible to overstate how much the political landscape has changed in the last few months, and continues to change even today. Each week, more congressional races move into the “toss-up” category. This means there are more pro-life seats to protect and more opportunities to unseat pro-abortion members of Congress.

NRL PAC, although vastly outspent by pro-abortion organizations, has an impressive track record. For example, in 2008, NRL PAC actively supported nearly 90 pro-life candidates.

Of those, 12 candidates were in highly competitive races against candidates who were actively supported by EMILY’s List. For those who aren’t familiar with it, EMILY’s List is a political action committee that supports Democratic women who support abortion on demand, partial-birth abortion, and tax funding of abortion. EMILY’s List raised and spent about $43 million dollars in 2008.

Even in the very difficult political climate of 2008, the pro-life candidate supported by National Right to Life PAC won 8 of the 12 head-to-head contests.

According to a post-election poll conducted by the Polling CompanyTM Inc. in November 2008, pro-life candidates enjoyed a definite advantage in the 2008 elections. The advantage was very large among those who said abortion “affected” their vote.

Moreover, 5% of all voters across the nation said that abortion was the most important issue affecting their vote. In the presidential contest, specifically, 90% of these (4.5% of the entire population) voted for the pro-life candidate while only 10% (one-half of 1% of the entire population) voted for Obama. This means “single-issue” abortion voters provided a net gain (or “increment”) of 4%.

This advantage is nothing new. In every major election since 1980, pro-life candidates have fared better than have pro-abortion candidates among those voters who base their vote on the abortion issue. In close races, having an educated, registered electorate that remembers to vote is crucial.

We need to grow that “hard increment”—those people who say their first issue when they vote is abortion. And that can be done because the majority of the country is opposed to the reasons the vast majority of abortions are performed.

So how can one prepare for the 2010 elections? For starters, some people still don’t know that Obama is the most pro-abortion President in the history of the United States! Education is important.

  • Help our friends, our family and our co-workers stay up-to-date on the issues. Tell them about pro-life web sites: www.stoptheabortionagenda.com and www.nrlpac.org.

  • Give gift subscriptions to NRL News (see page 10) and encourage them to have Today’s News and Views—an invaluable daily blog that discusses current pro-life events—sent directly to their inboxes (go to www.nrlc.org/news_and_views/).

  • Network with your local chapter and state right to life affiliate; use social networking tools like Facebook, Twitter, and e-mail. (See story, page 10.)

  • Recruit volunteers.

  • Talk to those who support our cause and remind them of their responsibility to vote. Astonishingly, more than four million regular church attenders who voted in 2004 did not vote in 2008. It should not be difficult to convince them to vote in 2010.

  • Be encouraged. In the 2009 gubernatorial races in Virginia and New Jersey, pro-life candidates Bob McDonnell and Chris Christie won against solid pro-abortion candidates in states that voted for Obama in 2008.

The 2010 elections give NRL PAC another opportunity to strengthen pro-life support in the U.S. House and Senate against the Obama abortion agenda, so that we can continue protecting the most vulnerable.

Since 1973 more than 50 million defenseless babies have been aborted—nearly 3,500 each day, 365 days a year.

They’re depending on us to win—their lives stand in the balance. We must continue working until every unborn child is protected.

There are 10 months until the November 2010 general election.

Let us remember the lessons learned from our youth, and “be prepared.”