by Richard A. Viguerie
Three months before the Supreme Court overturned Roe V. Wade in June 2022, I wrote an article saying pro-life leaders were not ready to win.
Unfortunately, I was right then, and since then it’s got nothing but worse.
America is about 60% pro-choice and 40% pro-life.
You don’t believe me?
How about in Ohio’s Tuesday August 8th vote when 57% voted to make it easy for Democrats to pass pro-abortion legislation in the state constitution? Look for the pro-abortion people to pass an amendment to the constitution this November to put the right to an abortion in the Ohio Constitution.
In 2022 Democrat leaders knowing that America is about 60% pro-choice decided to give the voters two tunes to whistle when they voted in the 2022 primaries and the November general election.
1st Tune – Democracy is on the Ballot (January 6th at the U.S. Capitol)
2nd Tune – A Woman’s Right to Choose is on the Ballot
What was the tune pro-life/conservative leaders gave to the voters to whistle? —crickets/nothing/nada.
Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe V. Wade, pro-life leaders have taken lots of victory laps (well deserved) and expended lots of resources changing laws in red states.
How is that working out? Spending most of pro-life time, energy, treasure, changing laws, when in a few years the Democrats will overturn all of them if conservatives/Republicans lose the U.S. House, Senate, and White House because of the pro-abortion majority.
A major reason Republican candidates massively underperformed in 2022 is because Democrat leaders are far more effective than pro-life leaders.
The left has world-class strategic thinkers, mega donors, massive numbers of high-energy grassroots supporters, and a total, complete commitment to winning and crushing conservatives.
Do you see anything like that on the pro-life/conservative side? Do you see effective national leadership from pro-life leaders, Catholic Clergy, Protestant Ministers, or Orthodox Rabbis that will convert into a 60%+ pro-life country? Me neither.
Margaret Thatcher Famously Said, “First You Win the Argument, Then You Win the Vote.”
Pro-life leaders/activists—how about first we change the hearts and minds of Americans, then we can spend time passing legislation that won’t be repealed.
Almost all conservative energy is spent cussing Democrats. This includes consecutive radio and TV commentators, radio talk show hosts, syndicated columnists, articles, candidates, national, state and local conservative leaders, conservative social media, etc., etc.
Maybe we could govern America if instead of spending 99% of our time, energy, and resources on attacking the left, we spent half of our time focused on learning how to win.
“You owe it to your philosophy to study how to win. You have a moral obligation to study how to win.” – Morton Blackwell
Below, the full text of my original column “Pro-Life Leaders Aren’t Ready to Win”
Pro-Life Leaders Aren’t Ready to Win
March 23, 2022
Conservatives surveying today’s political battlefield seem convinced that victory is in their hands and that all they have to do is keep doing what they’ve been doing for the past thirty years, and a big victory in the 2022 midterms will be handed to them on a silver platter.
This kind of overconfidence has been the bane of conservatives and Republicans for as long as I’ve been involved in politics, now over 60-years. My good friend Morton Blackwell calls it succumbing to the Sir Galahad theory of politics – we will win because we are self-evidently right.
However, as the Bible tells us in 1 Samuel 4:2-11, the overconfidence of the Israelites, brought on by having the Ark of the Covenant in their camp before a great battle with the Philistines, was their undoing. When the Ark arrived, the Israelites raised a great shout and the Philistines hearing it resolved to fight all that much harder, or as the Bible says:
Be strong and quit yourselves like men, O ye Philistines, that ye be not servants unto the Hebrews, as they have been to you: quit yourselves like men, and fight. And the Philistines fought, and Israel was smitten, and they fled every man into his tent: and there was a very great slaughter…
We conservatives are about to face such a situation come the end of this year’s term of the Supreme Court, when, if court watchers are correct, the Supreme Court will overrule or severely limit the Roe v. Wade decision that made abortion a constitutional right.
No doubt there will be a great shout raised in the conservative and pro-life camp, but it will also without doubt cause our political enemies to resolve themselves to fight with a ferocity never before seen in American politics.
And we conservatives are not ready for that coming onslaught.
When Donald Trump was elected President in November 2016, Planned Parenthood had 400,000 supporters—12 months later they had 1,600,000. In addition to Planned Parenthood, there are many other Leftwing groups promoting abortion until birth and beyond, which results in killing of over 1,000,000 babies a year, including:
* Planned Parenthood 2019 Income — $1,641,400,000
* Guttmacher Institute 2019 Income — $24,255,758
* NARAL Pro-Choice America 2019 Income — $12,400,056
* National Network of Abortion Funds 2020 Income — $20,343,642
(National and 27 affiliates)
* Center for Reproductive Rights 2020 Income — $38,755,766
* Plus, many other groups
In 2020, 188 pro-abortion groups had income of $3.4 billion.
No need to wonder why Planned Parenthood and their allies are continuing to win the public relations battle.
The Left also has dozens of billionaires who routinely spend tens or hundreds of millions of dollars on Leftwing politics, causes, and projects, but there is not one conservative major donor who comes close to being a Mark Zuckerberg, who contributed 417 million dollars in 2020 to dozens of liberal organizations to increase the Democrat vote. In addition to Zuckerberg, Democrats have many others including George Soros, Jeff Bezos, McKenzie Scott (Jeff Bezos’ former wife), Warren Buffett, Mike Bloomberg, Tom Steyer, and Bill Gates.
Quite frankly the problem is not at the grassroots level; it’s complacency and the “prevent defense” mentality among the leaders of the Republican establishment, and the lack of a risk-taking, entrepreneurial spirit on the part of those who run conservative organizations.
Too many conservative leaders are comfortable running an organization with 10,000-20,000-40,000 mostly high-dollar donors and they don’t want the risk, extra work, and stress that comes with major growth and running a massive grassroots-based organization.
When the size of a nonprofit organization goes from 10,000 donors to 200,000, the leader’s income does not increase 20-fold, but their stress, responsibilities, pressure, and workload goes way up.
Grassroots conservatives are worried, frustrated, and angry. They fear for America’s future and want and need leadership—but it’s in short supply these days.
Bold, high-energy, entrepreneurial leadership is what will be needed to turn today’s favorable political outlook into victory. The Left will have billions of dollars at their disposal and will be energized like nothing we’ve seen before should Roe be overturned. And, like the Biblical Philistines, our opponents realize that this is not just another election, they are fighting for their political lives – and they have no intention of losing. Time is short, but it’s not too late for bold, high-energy, entrepreneurial conservative leaders to come to the fore and get our movement ready to win.
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Roe v. Wade overturned
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Pro-life leaders
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abortion laws
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Ohio
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conservative political organizing
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Democrats
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Joe Biden administration
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Supreme Court
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Roe v. Wade
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Conservative justices
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2022 elections
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Democrat billionaire donors
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abortion on demand
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Planned Parenthood
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conservative grassroots
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Brett Kavanaugh
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Richard A. Viguerie is the chairman of Conservative HQ.
Photo “Abortion Supporters” by Becker1999. CC BY 2.0.
I’ll be blunt. Pro-Life Leaders DO NOT want to win. Their position and prestige, their funding, depends on the controversy. In a pro-life nation, they have nothing.
Think I’m wrong? How many people did the “Pro-Life Leaders” turn out on the street to door knock in Ohio? That’s both the cheapest and most effective campaign strategy there is, and the “Pro-Life Leaders” didn’t use it. They didn’t WANT a win in Ohio.
To be clear, I’m speaking as someone who has tried to get “Pro-Life Leaders” to at least point out to their members that I had a pro-life candidate who needed support. They explained that their organization was “non-partisan”.