immigration children protest cages

Surprising No One, “Pro-Life” Groups Refuse to Comment on Caged Immigrant Children

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Imagine if anti-abortion groups cared about children as much as they care about a fetus.

If they did, one can imagine the outcry we’d be seeing now at the horrors happening at the border, where thousands of young children are being taken from their parents and kept in chain-link cages, often with the U.S. government showing little to no ability to reunite those families, let alone interest in doing so. You would think that the slogan “Families Belong Together” is one that these groups would rally behind, but it will come as a surprise to no one, I’m sure, to hear that’s not the case.

In response to a New York Times article titled “You Can’t Be Pro-Life and Against Immigrant Children,” anti-abortion group The Susan B. Anthony List released a statement that essentially boils down to “Wanna bet?”

“From its inception Susan B. Anthony List has been completely dedicated to protecting the first right without which no other rights matter: the right to life,” the statement reads. “Our sole mission is to restore that profound right. Therefore, we refrain from public comment on immigration and many other topics, including other policies that impact families.  It is not in our purview to speak on behalf of our members on other issues.”

Except the group has commented on immigration issues before, when it suits them. In a Spanish-language attack ad on Barbara Boxer in 2010, the group criticized not just her pro-choice and pro-LGBT stances, but also made some specious claims that she was anti-immigration. Because that’s apparently a useful talking point when trying to appeal to a Hispanic voter base, but not when actual children are in need.

This group says their objective is protecting the “right to life,” yet their Twitter bio states that they are “working to save babies and their moms.” There are a lot of babies and moms that could use a mobilized force like SBA List, if only they were dedicated to protecting “babies” beyond the first nine months of gestation. As adamant as they are that life begins at conception, it also seems for them to end at birth.

(via Jezebel, image: Mario Tama/Getty Images)

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Vivian Kane
Vivian Kane (she/her) is the Senior News Editor at The Mary Sue, where she's been writing about politics and entertainment (and all the ways in which the two overlap) since the dark days of late 2016. Born in San Francisco and radicalized in Los Angeles, she now lives in Kansas City, Missouri, where she gets to put her MFA to use covering the local theatre scene. She is the co-owner of The Pitch, Kansas City’s alt news and culture magazine, alongside her husband, Brock Wilbur, with whom she also shares many cats.