For Marjorie Dannenfelser, 10:10 will ever be etched in her memory.
On June 24, 2022, the president of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, the political arm of the pro-life movement, was gathered with her staff awaiting the U.S. Supreme Court’s last decision on the late day of its term.
“Finally, the good news arrived at 10:10 in the morning,” Dannenfelser on Friday told attendees of The Family Leadership Summit, the annual gathering of faith, family, and freedom leaders — and voters — in Des Moines, Iowa.
Dannenfelser, the event’s keynote speaker, called the high court’s landmark ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade and nearly 50 years of nationalized abortion, a “God wink.” Or perhaps a bright neon sign. She couldn’t help but thinking of the Gospel’s John 10:10, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it to the full.”
“By God’s grace,” Dannenfelser said, Roe v. Wade was no longer the court-imposed law of the land.
“It wouldn’t have happened without a president who understood the importance of confirming judges at all levels who would uphold the Constitution and the right to life, and who didn’t shy away from that fight,” she said of President Donald Trump, who nominated three justices committed to originalism and textualism. That is to say, jurists who read the Constitution as it was written, not how some activists and politicians want it to be.
‘Profound Truth of This Cause’
Dannenfelser said it took a lot of praying, marching, and tireless work by the pro-life movement, including religious right Iowans who have long played a critical role in vetting presidential candidates through the state’s first-in-the-nation caucuses.
“Everyone who said Roe was indestructible missed the story. They underestimated the profound truth of this cause and the strength of the pro-life movement,” she said.
Her organization lays claim to the largest pro-life voter contact program in the nation, turning out many millions of pro-life voters since it launched in 1992. SBA Pro-Life America invested $92 million in the 2024 election cycle, funding a Voter Contact Program that reached more than 10 million persuadable and low-turnout voters, according to the nonprofit. That included north of 4 million visits to voters’ homes across battleground states like Michigan, Pennsylvania and Iowa neighbor, Wisconsin.
Three years after the Dobbs ruling, nearly half of the states have strong pro-life laws limiting abortion. Dannenfelser thanked Iowa’s Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds, who signed the Hawkeye State’s heartbeat law, which prohibits abortion after the unborn’s heartbeat is detected — as soon as six weeks into pregnancy. The law is responsible for saving more than 2,000 unborn lives, according to SBA Pro-Life America. Reynolds and Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders were among the summit’s featured speakers.
‘Two Very Different Americans’
But the abortion industry continues to claim hundreds of thousands of unborn lives each year. In fact, Planned Parenthood performed a record 402,230 abortions in the 2022-23 fiscal year — a 2 percent increase from the previous year, according to the Charlotte Lozier Institute. Total abortions have topped 1.1 million annually, according to the institute, meaning there are more abortions after Dobbs than before.
“Why? Because abortion activists don’t respect the law or state sovereignty. And they’re working relentlessly to undermine everything the pro-life movement and President Trump have achieved,” Dannenfelser said. She describes it as “the reality of two very different Americas.”
Nine states and the District of Columbia have no limits on late-term abortions up to full term. Deep blue Illinois recently opened an “all-trimester” abortion facility.
“Hope Clinic is now open in Chicago, IL, expanding our care through all trimesters! (And OMG we couldn’t be more excited),” the clinic declared on Instagram. It is curious that the clinic invokes God in its message of expanded abortion-on-demand.
And “abortion tourism” has popped up in states with few restrictions on terminating the lives of the unborn. In California, far-left Gov. Gavin Newsom launched a billboard campaign in red states advertising the Golden State as an “abortion sanctuary.”
“Need an abortion? California is ready to help,” one of the billboard messages states. It also audaciously — and erroneously — quotes the Gospel’s Mark 12:31: “Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no greater commandment than these.”
Meanwhile a wave of dangerous mail-order abortion drugs has been flooding states with tighter abortion restrictions. “These drugs are arriving without medical safeguards or oversight,” Dannenfelser told the Family Leadership Summit attendees.
“Not only can they get into the hands of minors, but also abusers – angry boyfriends and ex-husbands who slip them into the drink of a mother who never even considered having an abortion,” she said.
‘Most Significant Pro-Life Victory Since Dobbs’
But there’s good news boding well for the pro-life movement, Dannenfelser noted. Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill, recently signed into law, defunds “Big Abortion,” including its largest death factory, Planned Parenthood. The BBB blocks Medicaid funding — taxpayer money — from subsidizing Planned Parenthood’s “health centers.”
The U.S. Supreme Court recently ruled that states may block Medicaid payments to the nation’s largest abortion provider.
“Planned Parenthood’s taxpayer-funded gravy train is coming to an end. This is our most significant pro-life victory since Dobbs,” Dannenfelser said.
The abortion industry is suing to try to recapture the taxpayer money, claiming defunding violates the Constitution’s equal protection clause. And an Obama-nominated federal judge this week slapped a restraining order on the provision in the Big Beautiful Bill, blocking the funding cuts from taking effect — a move constitutional law experts called an extraordinary abuse of judicial power.
“What you have here is Congress exercising its explicit constitutional authority to make spending decisions, and you have a district judge arguably trying to exercise power she doesn’t have to force Congress to change,” Tom Jipping, a senior legal fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told Fox News Digital.
‘Live Up to the Promise’
Meanwhile, the battle for hearts and minds goes on, and Dannenfelser said the pro-life movement is collecting some solid wins. She noted a Gallup poll found that, post-Dobbs, pro-life identification is up 11 percent while support for abortion being “legal in all circumstances” dropped 19 percent.
Dannenfelser also noted Iowa’s “crucial role” in shaping the future direction of the nation. In a couple of years, the eyes of the nation will be back on Iowa as it hosts the quadrennial parade of presidential contenders and pretenders.
Christian conservative activist Bob Vander Plaats, president and CEO of The Family Leader, has played an influential role in the presidential vetting process for years. His annual Leadership Summit is one of the major events of the pre-caucus season, giving Iowans a chance to hear from the brunt of the GOP presidential candidates. Vander Plaats took a fair amount of heat for endorsing Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis in 2024’s Republican presidential nomination chase.
“We must demand that anyone seeking our vote live up to the promise the party has made in platform after platform to protect unborn children nationally,” SBA Pro-Life America’s president told the Des Moines gathering. “Today I am calling on all voters to send that clear message at this pivotal moment in the greatest human rights battle of our time.”
Listen to The Federalist Radio Hour podcast with Marjorie Dannenfelser here.
Matt Kittle is a senior elections correspondent for The Federalist. An award-winning investigative reporter and 30-year veteran of print, broadcast, and online journalism, Kittle previously served as the executive director of Empower Wisconsin.
