It’s Time To Switch to Offense – Jason Storms

*This is an AI generated transcript, and may contain errors*

Mark Harrington (00:00):

What can we learn from the passage of these pro-abortion state ballot initiatives? Should the pro-life movement be on defense or offense? We’ll talk about it today on the program. Also, should we be criminalizing women, so to speak in our abortion laws? We’ll talk to an expert here on the program, so stick around.

(00:32):

Well, hello friends. Mark Harrington here, your radio activist and friends. We want to first upfront, I want to get everybody focused in like a laser, especially if you live here in Ohio for the upcoming day of action events that created Equal is sponsoring around the state. We’re going to be in several cities. These are regional outreach events that we are conducting. In the next month, we’re going to be in Cleveland, April 11 and 12. When I say it’s a day of action, actually two days we have a training and then the next day we take people out to the college campus and to an abortion center. So when I say two days, the evening is the training and then the next day is the outreach. So Cleveland, April 11 and 12, Cincinnati, April 14 and 15, and Toledo, April 18 and 19. And you can register.

(01:32):

It’s free of charge. Just go to createdequal.org. That’s createdequal.org. Just click on that outreach icon and you can register right online. And what makes this different is we just don’t fill your head with a bunch of classroom knowledge, which it’s important to understand the issue obviously, but you learn by going out on the streets and defending your position in front of people that disagree with you. So that’s what we do. We take you to a college campus. That’s the marketplace of ideas. So that’s the way we work here at Created Equal, again, day of Action in Cleveland, Cincinnati, and Toledo. So today I’ve got my good friend Jason Storms, who’s the director of Operation Save America on the program. Jason, thanks for joining us today.

Jason Storms (02:20):

Pleasure to be with you, mark. And it looks like an awesome outreach. You guys are going to be doing

Mark Harrington (02:25):

Well after the issue one, not that we have changed a whole lot, but we realized, well, we got to take care of our own Jerusalem here. That is the state of Ohio. That’s where we were based. So we’re really focused like a laser on that this year. And we’ll see how it goes. Normally we only hold one of these events in the summer. We figure we’d better go out to the people instead of asking them come to us. That’s our plan this year. So anyway, I wanted to have you on the program, Jason, because you’re coming to Ohio as well, and you were involved in the issue one battle here in 2023. So many others were involved in this, whether they came to Ohio or not. It was the battle in 2023. It was the only constitutional amendment that was on the ballot in 2023, which made Ohio the battleground.

(03:16):

And you brought your team here and I appreciate that. And we obviously that you were willing to invest your resources, time, effort, money, bringing people here, but we fell short and we’ve been looking back now trying to figure out what went wrong. I want to talk to you about that. And just to set things up real quick, Mr. Producer pop up my blog. I wrote a lessons learned. I call it Why Ohio Fell, why Ohio Fell. It’s a real quick kind of just summary of the things that I saw happen here. As someone who is an insider, if you will, I was in the coalition, I was there every day involved in the process. And so I wrote up what I call the Why Ohio fs basically a lessons learned or takeaways from Ohio. And I think that’ll be helpful. I’ve been spreading as far wide as I can for those who will listen. Not everybody will. I realize that, but there’s been a lot of takers so far and we’re just trying to prevent this from happening again. Oh, for seven, we’re looking at, I don’t know, anywhere from six to a dozen of these this year. So we got to turn back this trend of these defeats. So let’s start there. Jason, if you would give me your two biggest takeaways from the Ohio loss.

Jason Storms (04:44):

Boy, that was rough. That was a difficult defeat. We tried hard to sound the alarm, and as you know, we didn’t get a lot of help. A lot of the national groups just simply, they fundraised off of it. They fundraised after the defeat, but they didn’t get on the ground and hit the ground. And that was one of the things that I think was mostly disappointing is so many groups engage in a lot of talk. And you’re one of the few groups out there as you know, and OSA as well that we try to get on the streets, really engaged the culture in tangible ways. The other big takeaway to me is I’ll just quote you. I read your why Ohio fell and it was good. You had a lot of good things to say and you said this that I think was really the big thing that stood out to me.

(05:22):

You said the Ohio campaign made removal of parental rights a main argument that wasn’t enough. If we don’t make this debate about babies, we’re going to keep losing. We need to prove to the American people that abortion is an act of violence that kills a baby. And I think that’s one of the big problems we saw. And this is reflective, I think, of the Republican political strategy that so many pro-life organizations capitulate to. And so whether that’s the influence of the dollars that are dangled in front of groups by big Republican donors or just the political pressure that’s exerted by the Republican party on pro-life groups in red states. But at the end of the day, pro-life organizations need to stand up to the Republican leadership and say, no, we’re not going to allow you to distance yourselves from this issue. We’re not going to allow you to skirt it and to make prayer arguments that are not central to the issue.

(06:15):

And as you point out, it’s about the babies. Every voter that voted, it’s about the voted yes in Ohio, should have had to walk past a gauntlet of babies, and it should have been brought before their face that if you’re going to vote yes to firmness in the constitution of Ohio, you need to walk past and understand very clearly and see visually these little human beings and what takes place in abortion clinics, the dismembering of their bodies, destruction of these little precious human lives. And people need to see the precious development of little babies in the womb and embryonic technology and pastors need to preach that. I mean, how important is that if you’re going to be executing texts for pastors to expound upon the development of life in the womb, all the biblical passages and all the biblical texts that speak to life in the womb and invariably speak of it as a child, a boy or a girl. And that needs to be exed for our congregations in a way that the average person that sits in the pew in our churches understands very clearly and it comes forward very strongly from the pulpit. Embryonic technology can bring this beautiful lens into the womb that we have that we’ve never had before and human history to look and see even the earliest stages of development, the miracle of life, the beauty of little precious life in the womb. And we need to be educated on that and then take appropriate action.

Mark Harrington (07:40):

The argument from the coalition was that we don’t have enough time, Jason, see to make our case against abortion alone because we won’t move enough of the needle to get it under 50%. And I was all along, I said, listen, if you don’t make it about abortion, I’m out. I didn’t get into this to protect women. I love women, but the women are not the primary victim. Correct? And I understand 10 months or whatever it was is not enough time to move the needle entirely. Eight, 10 points maybe on abortion alone. I get that. There’s other arguments we can make. And I was like, okay, make the parental rights out. It’s fine, but if you don’t make this about abortion, we’re going to lose. And I think the mentality here is we haven’t made it about abortion for 50 years. The reason why we’re losing is because we haven’t done it and now we’re up against a year referendum where we got to get our act together.

(08:46):

And yeah, it’s going to be hard to move the needle. But bottom line is this, we’re against abortion. And the other side made it about abortion day in, day out. And our people were saying, well, what’s not about abortion? Let’s talk about this issue or that issue. Finally, towards the end of the campaign, thankfully, and finally, the coalition actually at least made it about late term abortion, which makes some sense. But I’ve been advising organizations as you know, who are facing these in 2024. And I’ve said, you got to make it about abortion now, all about abortion all the time. And if you don’t, you’re going to lose. And even if you don’t lose, I mean if you eek out a win for the long term, you’re not going to be a better off. So I a hundred percent agree with you. Amen. That’s why we were with you a hundred percent on that one. Any other thoughts from Ohio?

Jason Storms (09:46):

Obviously there’s a lot of things that we could say that are

Mark Harrington (09:49):

A lot of things

Jason Storms (09:50):

Indicative of where we’re headed. So I think some of the lessons learned is we have states now, Missouri, Arkansas, Florida, Arizona, and maybe more states where they’re collecting signatures as we speak, and we expect those to be on the ballot in November. And simultaneous to the parole boards pushing massive amounts of money and resources into those states, into trying to flip a red state, another red state, and especially of course, they want to get a crown jewel in the south, if they can turn a Bible belt state and enshrine abortion into the state constitution and one of those states will be massive victory for them. And while simultaneous to that, what we see is Republican leadership again is saying we need to distance ourselves from abortion coming out with a new standard of a 15 week ban. I mean, how despicable is that? And what we see, of course, is I would say in some ways Republican Party kind of threw the game in Ohio.

(10:44):

And I think there’s a lot of Republicans that want to lose. They want this issue to go away. They don’t want to have to fight and defend and make the arguments and engage in this fight. And so the resources are woefully lacking, of course in Ohio, outspent significantly. And you make the point that we can’t blame it on a lack of money. But certainly that’s a factor in what we’re seeing in many states. And the numbers have been crunched 20 22, 20 23, the amount of dollars that Democrats spent making arguments, making campaign commercials about abortion versus what Republicans spent. I mean, it’s 10 to one, 10 to one. The Democrats are making the arguments, they’re presenting their case, and the Republicans, by and large are silent. And then the Republicans are saying, oh, look, we lose an abortion. We lose an abortion. You’re not saying anything. You’re not losing because the issue’s not winnable. And because we can’t make a persuasive case, you lose because you’re not attempting to make the persuasive case. If you don’t stand up and fight, of course you’re going to lose. And so shame on those Republicans.

Mark Harrington (11:46):

I agree. I juxtaposed last show, I juxtaposed the two vice presidents, one Kamala Harris and one Mike Pence. Kamala Harris visits a Planned Parenthood. She says it’s about abortion in 2024, and we’re going to make it about that. I’m going to visit for the first time a sitting vice president visits a Planned Parenthood. And what does Mike Pence do? He throws Donald Trump under the bus, the nominee for the Republican party. Now you can say what you want about Donald Trump, but he is the Republican party dominee period. And it just shows you the timidity of the Republican party. They’re all in on abortion, and we’re trying to hedge our bets here. And you’re right. I mean, I just don’t think it’s a core value. I think the Republican party’s going to pay dearly if they throw the babies under the bus, they are going to pay dearly politically and they will become a non-existent party because the pro-life movement’s just going to bolt. And they should.

Jason Storms (12:50):

And they should. Yeah. And that’s right in the pro-life movement, pro-life organizations, pro-life leaders need to make a decision. And as you know, there is this sort of internal civil war going on within the pro-life movement. And folks like us are sounding this alarm and we are saying this is absolutely ahor. Now, in the RO era, of course, we were pointing out, we could see this cowardice at the state level and interacting with Republican leaders at the state level. We could see that so many of these guys, this wasn’t a conviction to them. They didn’t really care about the murder of pre-born children in the womb in this country. They weren’t grieved about it. They would speak about it like any other issue, like we’re talking about lowering tax rates. So no, we’re talking about the destruction of innocent human life, the murdering of children and the desecrating of one of the core principles of our nation, multiple core principles, the value of human life, parental responsibility, the duties of mothers and fathers to love their children, sacrifice for their children, the beauty and centrality of the family. And I mean, all these things are what are at stake here. It is the very conscious and soul of our nation here. This isn’t just a peripheral issue. And this is why of course it doesn’t go away to many of us. We’re not going to allow it to go away, and we’re not going to allow the status quo to be maintained while they’re murdering babies. And if that’s not politically expedient, then so be it. But also what I would argue, and I think it’s

Mark Harrington (14:16):

Fundamental, I mean it’s the reason why it’s listed, number one, the right to life and the declaration. It’s fundamental to all rights.

Jason Storms (14:22):

And I think what that follows from that then is actually regardless of how pragmatic or politically expedient you want to be, which I try to be a realist and a pragmatic person is the most pragmatic thing to do is to stand on your principles. When we just give up the game right from the very beginning, then that’s not pragmatic. That’s a guaranteed recipe to loss and to disaster. And that’s why what we’ve seen for the last a hundred years with the conservative is all they really conserve is the previous liberal victories. They trail five to 10 years behind the liberals and every moral issue. You and I are old enough to remember when the debate about homosexuality was, whether it was even okay to be out of the closet as a homosexual in the workplace, or whether it was still okay to say that’s sinful and it should be kept in the closet.

(15:12):

If you’re going to do that, don’t do that publicly. That was just 30, 25, 30 years ago. That was the debate then it was, can gays adopt children or is there this thing of civil unions? And it’s just moved down the pike now to where we’re literally mutilating the genitals of children with taxpayer money. And it’s because conservatives just wouldn’t stand. And so when we don’t have principle and we don’t stand firm on our principle fight for those principles, when we’re always thinking so pragmatically that well, we’re willing to give up half the game from the start and then another quarter of the game in compromise and the debates, then it’s like the liberal side doesn’t do that. The leftists are radical, they’re aggressive, they push their policies and they might want two steps. They call for two steps, but that’s too much. So they only get one step, but then they get that one step, and then that one step is where the conservatives move to.

(15:58):

And that’s the step that now that becomes the new conservative position. And the conservatives then defend that liberal victory. And then the liberals go on and they get their second step. And this has been this march. And so of course, as you know, it’s really indicative of what we have as a uni party, Republicans and Democrats. Really, it’s left foot right foot of the same governmental beast that just continues to trample on our freedoms and marches towards tyranny. And so at some point, our Republican representatives have to stand up against that and fight the hard fights and as pro-life leaders.

Mark Harrington (16:31):

So let’s talk about that. Sorry to interrupt, but let’s talk about what you’re going to be doing here in Ohio because that’s coming up soon. Friends, operations, save America, Mr. Producer, if you pop up that on the screen there, operations Save America is conducting a regional event here in Ohio, and that is going to be April 24 and 27 through 24 through 27 in the Cincinnati area, Dayton, Cincinnati area. And you can tell more about this if you want, Jason, but basically my understanding is you guys are going to be going to university campuses. That’s a good place to go. Yes sir. Abortion centers obviously, and also to high school campuses as well, and lobbying the state legislature. So friends, if you want to get involved, go to Operation save america.org, operation save america.org. Whether you live in Ohio or not, you can come to this event and be part of it, and we’re thankful that you’re coming and coming into Ohio and help out.

(17:38):

But what I want to jump to here because we have a limited time, Jason, is the position you guys take on equal protection. You’re going to be lobbying the state legislature. I assume you’re going to have a bill that you’re going to try to get people to sign up onto, and that bill will include language of equal protection if you explain that. Now, a lot of people say, well, that has to do with punishing women. If you would explain what you mean by equal protection when it comes to abortion and including that in the language of an abortion ban.

Jason Storms (18:12):

Yeah, good questions. So yeah, we’re looking forward to coming and helping out again in Ohio. We will be at the legislature and we have bills of equal protection with a coalition of organizations we work with around the country. And what equal protection simply is, I would say, is a consistent affirmation of what should be the pro-life position. When we say that we’re, what I think that should mean is that we believe that babies in the womb are in fact babies, and therefore they should be protected. They’re made in the image of God, they’re valuable. And so we simply want to have laws that recognize that from the moment of fertilization as our embryonic textbooks tell us, these are human beings deserving of our love and protection. And so they should have the same equal protection as are applied, the same equal protections that are applied to born children. So all our bills attempt to do is to move in the legal codes, protections for preborn children that preborn children become included. The same laws that protect born children, protect preborn children. There’s no exclusions. So that’s all it does. It brings preborn children under the same protections. And so the same criminal sanctions against harming born person would also apply to a preborn person. And so that’s all it does, right?

Mark Harrington (19:27):

Listen, I want people to understand this. This is really important because what we have out here, and you’ll speak to this I’m sure, Jason, and that as organizations, pro-life groups, they’ll carve out exceptions in the laws that exempt women. Now I’m like, hello. Now when I’m on a college campus, I make the case for equal protection born or equal to the unborn, obviously. But when it comes to, and a lot of pro-lifers will make that case, right? But when it comes to advancing legislation that restricts or bans abortion, they want to throw in these exemptions and like, well, hello, that doesn’t match your rhetoric. If you’re saying that they’re equal, you got to treat ’em equally a hundred percent. And that’s where I have to part ways when they carve these exceptions out. I’m like, well, why bother? Why go there?

Jason Storms (20:26):

Yeah. Well,

Mark Harrington (20:26):

It’s let the prosecutors decide this stuff. Go ahead.

Jason Storms (20:29):

Exactly. You’re right. There’s discretion with prosecutors to grant leniency and all those sorts of things. And of course, none of this is retroactive. If we pass an equal protection bill, we’re not going to be going after mothers. People say, we’ve got a lot of women who’ve had abortions in our church and they’re repented and they’ve been forgiven. You’re going to go it say, no, no, no, no. I have abortion in my past. If there had been a law that I would’ve been held accountable as a dad consenting to the murder of my child, probably would not have done it. It would’ve been a great deterrent. And that’s one of the things people don’t realize. So it’s not retroactive. We’re not saying we should go after woman who’ve done this in the past. The state can’t penalize people for things that the state at the time was itself sanctioning.

(21:09):

So it would be from the moment that that law passes forward. So there’s two big things here that are part of the function of the law. One is the law has a deterring function. The goal here, people say, oh, you want to put women in prison? I don’t want to put any women in prison, although there are women in prison. If women commit crimes, we all agree women should go to prison. If a wife kills her husband, we would all agree, put that woman to prison, right? I mean, so the idea, well, you shouldn’t put any woman in prison, but we don’t want to put any women in prison because we don’t want any women to kill their babies. The purpose of this law is to deter crime, and it will have a huge deterring effect. Many women will not pursue an abortion, and many fathers and men, if they know they’re going to be held accountable as well, legally, they’re going to man up and they’re going to say, okay, I’m going to love you, care for you, provide for you. Put a ring on your finger. We’re going to get married. We’re going to have this baby. We’re going to make the sacrifices. I’m going to man up. So there’s a deterring function, the second huge

Mark Harrington (22:02):

Function. Hey, let me make a real quick point here. Go

Jason Storms (22:04):

For it. Yeah.

Mark Harrington (22:05):

People reason, listen, I mean, I’m on college campuses, so are you. When something’s legal, they think it’s permissible. A lot of people reason to that conclusion. And the reverse is true. When something’s unlawful, then they think it’s something they shouldn’t do. Correct. So a lot of people equate legality with whether it’s moral or not,

Jason Storms (22:28):

And that’s the second

Mark Harrington (22:29):

Part. It has a deterring effect.

Jason Storms (22:31):

Yeah, there’s a deterring effect. And the second part is that goes along with it is the didactic function of the law, right? The law of the Bible says the law is a teacher, a school master, and so the law has a teaching function. This is why in the pulpit, in our churches, of course, Charles Spurgeon said, if you lower the law, you dim the light by which men see their sin and thus their need for the savior. And so we must lift high the law of God, not in the legalistic fashion, but to show men their sins, to show us the perfect standard of God’s righteousness so that we recognize our failure to live up to it, and we have a standard to strive to with it. There is a didactic function in the law. The law teaches. So the law has an educating effect, a leveling effect upon society that teaches, and what we’ve been teaching culture for years, and the pro-life movement has contributed to this by blurring the line. When we put forth bills that say, a 15 week banner or a 20 week ban, we’re passing laws that are helping to instruct the population. Tost instruct to miseducate the population about the fundamental value of every preborn child. And this is the downside and the dark side of a lot of the pro-life movements, legislative straight,

Mark Harrington (23:39):

Right? It’s worse than that in that, and this is that much of the movement just says women are victims, period. And don’t give any kind of nuance to it. Now, you and I have both met women that are victims that have been victimized, been forced to coerced, all that, but this notion that women are victims is just not accurate to begin with, and we do it because we want to avoid the conversational. I say, we, much of the movement just wants to avoid this conversation altogether. You want it to just go away because we’re unwilling or unable maybe to make the case correct. It’s a hard one to make. It is. It takes a little bit of intellectual fortitude to walk through people. Yeah, it needs to happen.

Jason Storms (24:28):

Go ahead. Yeah. And so yeah, I think that’s exactly what it’s, it’s a capitulation. It’s taken the path of least resistance. We saw this with the same arguments about the rape and incest exceptions in South Dakota. If you remember many years ago, referendum was put in the ballot to ban all abortion, I think 10, 12 years ago in South Dakota, and it lost 55, 45, and they said, it’s because you didn’t put rape and incest exception. The number one argument we heard was, what about rape? What about rape? So they brought that back two years later with rape and incest exceptions. Guess what? It lost 55, 45. It didn’t change anybody’s votes. So we think if we give these exceptions for women, or if we exempt women from punishments, and make no mistake, every single ban on abortion in our state right now, which there’s 14 states that have banned abortion.

(25:13):

Every single one of those states, every single law women, mothers are exempted, explicitly exempted from any punishment, which means they’re still allowed to kill their children. Take Texas, for example, the numbers are out, the abortion rate in Texas has dropped from about 55,000 pre dobs to maybe just under 50,000 now, 48, 40 9,000 abortions. So tens of thousands of women are still aborting their babies legally in Texas, Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, Tennessee, all these states. And that blood is on the hands of our pro-life leaders in every one of those states and pro-life organizations that are fueling the narrative that these states have banned abortion and sadly, pro-life, organizations that I like, pro-life leaders that I like are saying, oh, Texas is an abortion free state. No, it’s not. The abortion rate has declined minimally. Minimally, and that needs to be exposed. If we can’t say that truth, we’re not going to fix that. But that’s the low hanging fruit. If we can’t go into Texas and Alabama and Mississippi and tighten that up, remove that exemption from mothers and just simply say, no, if a mom kills her child, her the dad, they’re going to be held accountable here, jury and judge and prosecutors will have discretion to grant leniency when it’s necessary or

Mark Harrington (26:33):

Important, which they’ve always had. They’ve always had. Let me read a couple quotes here real quick. Clark Forsyth, I don’t know if you know who he is, but he’s with Americans United for Life now. He’s one of these that believes that there should be exemptions in the laws, and he makes the case that there’s been no documented case since 1922 where a woman’s been charged with abortion in the United States. And the reason is for this is that as you see, they had prosecutorial discretion, and they often gave immunity to the woman in order to get the abortionist. That’s the reason up until 1973. And they treated the women not as the principal, but the abortionist. So we are in agreement that the abortionist needs to be held accountable. That’s without saying for sure, and we should go after them, and we will, but we can’t just exempt the women out of this.

(27:36):

Now, again, it’s nuanced. You got to be able to work with people and help them to understand that there are levels of knowledge and culpability. Mike Adams, I don’t know if you know Mike Criminologist. He’s not with us anymore. God bless Mike and his family. He said, if there’s a media in the minds or the abortionist and the woman get together and they know exactly, we know the abortionist knows what he’s doing. He’s assembling the instruments, obviously the woman at certain levels. That’s what the process of the courtroom’s for to figure out that. And we need to allow them to make that correct. But our laws need to be clear. I know it’s a hard one. Listen, I mean, you pass one of these in a state and the other side’s going to go ballistic in the pro-life movement will too, but they already do, but it’s got to be made.

Jason Storms (28:33):

Yeah, they already do, right? Yeah. You take a guard state, Wisconsin, we just lost a huge governor’s race, a huge state supreme Court race. You probably saw the state Supreme Court fight was a big national thing. The most money ever spent on a Supreme Court race in the nation’s history by far, we lost that. I saw

Mark Harrington (28:47):

It.

Jason Storms (28:48):

And the Democrat candidate was very open. I’m going to repeal Wisconsin’s 1849 abortion law. But the thing is, is the Democrats in prior elections, because after Dobbs, our 1849 homicide law went into effect Republicans in 2011 when they got power in 2010 with the rise of the Tea Party movement, one of the first things they did in 2011 as Republicans went in and stripped out the penalties for mothers that was in our homicide law. So our homicide statute from 1849 did criminalize mothers. Mothers were held accountable, and Republicans stripped that out of there. So the Dobbs decision comes forth, and our abortion clinic’s close Planned Parenthood affiliated medical services, they shut down. They all go to Illinois, and everybody’s driving to Illinois for abortions, of course. But because mothers were exempted from punishment, mothers can still get self-managed abortions here. Planned parent is still able to distribute abortion pills, so you don’t need a doctor.

(29:43):

And I think the chemical abortion thing has caught people by surprise here in some ways, and people need to catch up to that, especially the older pro-lifers who are thinking of it in terms of a doctor and a surgical abortion facility. But the majority of abortions now, especially in pro-life, states that have banned abortion, they’re getting self-managed abortion ship rate to home. But the point I wanted to make there was even in our state where women, no mother’s even being held accountable, women are getting self-managed abortions, or they’re driving to Illinois getting abortions. The advertising campaigns of Democrats is still, oh my goodness, this guy, 14-year-old women that are raped, can’t get an abortion, and 14-year-old girls are going to die. And so they’re already saying that even though we’ve exempted mothers from punishment, the Democrats are still making that argument still, and they’re doing that in every pro-life state. So we’re saying, oh my goodness, if we hold mothers accountable, they’re going to beat us over the head with that. Well, they’re already beating us over the head with that. They’re already, they’re

Mark Harrington (30:41):

Doing it.

Jason Storms (30:42):

And so we can’t be

Mark Harrington (30:43):

Afraid. Well, they did it in Ohio. I mean, they did it in Ohio. They said women would go to jail even though that wasn’t the case, because the heartbeat law here in the state did not, wasn’t an equal protection law. But you brought up a really good point, and I want to finish with this, and that is the abortion pill. Okay? I dunno if you saw the numbers, but the Aaker Institute, which used to be completely affiliated to Planned Parent, it’s on its own, but still a pro-abortion think tank. And it’s an organization that puts out stats. I mean, you can take ’em for what they’re worth, but they reported over the last three years, these numbers are staggering. Friends

(31:23):

20 20, 50 3% of all abortions were pill abortions, chemical abortions that went up to 63%, 10% increase over three years. So let’s just play this out. Women, they’re not going to a brick and mortar facility. They’re not having this creepy, sketchy figure who they never meet, kill their baby. That’s not happening as much. They’re getting these pills either by Zoom or over the mail or whatever at their local pharmacy now at the CVS, and they’re self aborting in their apartments, their homes into the toilet. And we’re saying we should exempt them now. So the abortion pill has changed. I mean, we should have been on this side a long time ago, but tell us how that has changed everything

Jason Storms (32:14):

Massive. It’s massive. And so in all these states, women now it’s getting easier and easier to engage in a self-managed abortion. The doctor is not necessary. And so mothers are seeking this, and there has to be a way to stop this. There has to be the first and simple step is to simply take out of all these states, 14 states that have banned abortion are ultra red states, pro-life leaders dominate these states. And yet we’ve seen the abortion rate has barely gone down, and in some cases actually gone up as you mentioned. And as these numbers are indicating, the abortion rate has gone up post dobs. And that should be a punch in the gut to every pro-lifer. And at the end of the day, what I think that really means is simply this abortion doesn’t exist in a vacuum. We have this broader cultural and spiritual war going on in our culture, and there has been a gross negligence of our leaders to speak plainly, courageously and forthrightly.

(33:18):

We are so meanly mouthed. We are to blame oftentimes for why the average person doesn’t understand our position. Because as we started the broadcast talking about, we’re not boldly and persuasively and passionately making the arguments and stating our principles. The way you win a tug of war is not by giving ground. You win a tug of war as everybody’s got to be pulling, and you need people on that far end pulling. The way that we are going to move the Overton window is by continuing to say the hard things and hold people’s feet to the fire standing firmly on principles. These are preborn children. We will not consent to the murder of a single one of them. We will not consent to the dehumanization of a single one of them. They’re all human beings made in God’s image. And that’s a very simple and straightforward argument to make.

(34:04):

These are all precious children. We’re a hundred percent pro-life firmly, principally for the full abolition of abortion because we believe every human life matters. Every human life is valuable, and we will not budge from that. And as we pull, we pull the Overton window and the spectrum, our direction. Now, will we get everything we want immediately? Are we going to get a bill of equal protection passed in 2024? No, we’re not. But the getting the best we can get is only going to happen if we stand on that far end pulling it, demanding our principles, holding people accountable, that’s going to force the whole thing to come our direction. And that will be a process of moving it slowly, our direction. We got to be making the arguments and standing firm and saying the hard things.

Mark Harrington (34:45):

I agree. You are on college campuses as I am, and people ask me, should women be criminalized? Or what do you think about women who have abortion? Should they be put in jail? Of course, I don’t automatically just say they should go to jail. I’ll explain. I mean, it will take a little bit of time. I’ll say, well, let me unpack this. Correct. They’ll say, well, do you think abortion’s murder say yes? Well, then you think that women should go to jail. And so I’ll go through the process of which we’ve talked about today, and whether they’re pro-choice, pro-abortion, what have you, at the end of it all, they’ll at least say, well, at least you’re consistent in your position. I understand. Correct. And that’s the thing that in order to be consistent, in order to make the case that abortion kills an unborn baby, we have to say that there’s going to be penalties for that.

(35:36):

And we can’t accept women, especially now with the abortion pill. There are ways to get at the abortion pill other than just as you say, including equal protection in the laws. There are other ways as far as interstate commerce and things like that, and I think we should try everything we can correct. But as we see these numbers go up, and I predict we’re going to get up to 80% before long, and they’re going to raise this thing from 11 weeks up to 14 to 15, planned Parenthood doesn’t care. They would give the abortion pill to a 20 week a woman who’s 20 week, they don’t care about any of that.

(36:16):

We have to be making the case. And I’m just exhorting our friends who are listening who might not agree with me on this, who are watching us, may not agree on this, make the case, be civil. Understand it’s a tough, this isn’t easy, friends. We’re asking people to do very hard things, not the easy things, but women, like anyone else, need to be held accountable to our laws. They have to be equal. Amen. And I know politically speaking, people are maybe a loser, but right now, look at what’s happening. We’re not winning as it is. We have to have the long view fans. We’ve got to make the case over time to bring things back because just giving, I’ll just leave you with the final words. Jason, appreciate you coming on. Yeah, thank you. Mark, if you would exhort our friends and colleagues here following us, give us a good call to action if you

Jason Storms (37:26):

Would, man. Yeah, we’ll get out on the streets. The package. We’ve got to engage Ohio. Part of our theme in Ohio is overcoming defeat. How does Ohio overcome that defeat? It can be overcome. Let’s not get discouraged. It should be a wake up call to pastor. It should be a wake up call to pro-life leaders. Let’s get engaged. Let’s get on the street. I love what you’re doing on the street. If every single person that voted against that bill, if every pro-lifer in the state just converts one person this year, if every Christian just commits to converting one person on this issue this year, you flip that state back. And we have overwhelming pro-life majority there. So we just got to get busy and get active. And the thing is, is people are coming around and when we state the argument plainly and succinctly, it is persuasive. And I think we don’t need to even get caught in the nuances. We’re simply saying, these are precious babies. When a mother gets pregnant, that’s a precious human life. And we believe every human life should be protected. It’s as simple as that. And the good thing is, and on this note is that a lot of the younger generation of pro-life leaders are coming our direction. I think if you look at like Lila Rose has come out recently and said she believes mothers need to be held accountable.

Mark Harrington (38:34):

Abby Johnson of all people.

Jason Storms (38:35):

So the tide is burning on this. The younger generation of pro-life leaders are seeing, especially post Dobbs has exposed that the emperor has no clothes on the pro-life establishment. A lot of these Republican leaders in these states, they’re not not committed to this on principle. And now it’s exposed. So now we have a better lay of the land and we know where to target. We need to get on the ground running campaigns in states, the state Republican leaders, they need to get primary. These guys, they need to get on board with equal protection, or we need to go into their district, roll up our sleeves, find a good candidate who cares about this issue, wants to protect life. We’ll work hard, hit the ground. We need to run good primary candidates, and we need just get on the ground and do the tough work. And that’s local, local pastors, local churches and organizations working in their community to bring change. And we can do it. We can see the church. The church, and be the light.

Mark Harrington (39:29):

Yeah, you and I both we’re kindred spirits in that. Friends, you can go to Operation Rescues web rescue. Well, that’s used to be kind of true. Operation Save america.org. That’s operation save america.org and be part of their events here in Ohio. They’re going to be in Cincinnati, April, what are the dates again? I lost my note on that.

Jason Storms (39:53):

April 24th through the 27th, so April 24th.

Mark Harrington (39:55):

Okay. April. Okay. April 24th through 27th in the Cincinnati, Dayton area. They’ll be going to the University of Cincinnati to the Planned Parenthood down there. Also Women’s Med Center, which is in Dayton, some of the high schools as well. And they’ll be at our State house here in Columbus. So friends, again, operation save america.org. Jason Storms, the Director of Operation Save America, has been my guest. Jason, thanks for being on the show.

Jason Storms (40:23):

Thank you, mark. Bless you, brother.

Mark Harrington (40:27):

Well, friends, I hope you enjoyed the interview with Jason Storms, my good friend from the organization, operation Save America. Jason’s a kindred spirit when it comes to the views that he holds on abortion and especially on tactics and strategy. He understands what I understand, and that is we need to change hearts and minds in order to change public policy. We have some differences of opinion on certain things, but a lot of things we agree with, and we are in mind on much of it. But I want to also emphasize our day of action events. Once again, these will be taking place in the city of Cleveland, Cincinnati, and Toledo coming up. We will be in Cleveland April 11th through 12, Cincinnati, April 14th through 15, and Toledo, April 18 and 19. And what this is involved in is that it’ll be an evening of training on apologetics and sidewalk counseling tactics.

(41:30):

Then the next morning, everybody will meet and we’ll go either to a college campus or to an abortion facility, and then afterwards we’ll get together and debrief. We call it the Day of Action. There are three of ’em coming up in the state of Ohio. Whether you live here or not, you can come and be part of these efforts to change hearts and minds and save some lives. So go to create equal.org that’s created equal.org to sign up for free. We’ll love to see you there. You’ll hear some great teaching on apologetics and sidewalk counseling. Get to meet some of us. We’re trying to put you in the game, friends. That’s what it’s about. You got to get people out on the streets, make the case in the public square. That’s how it gets done, and we’re at the forefront of that. And so friends, we’re looking forward to this coming up again, the day of action coming up in Cleveland, Cincinnati, and Toledo. You can find out more by going to created equal.org. We’ll see you next time. God bless you. God bless America. And remember America. Bless God.

Outro (42:32):

You’ve been listening to Mark Harrington, your radio activist. For more information on how to make a difference for the cause of life, liberty and justice, go to created equal.org.org. To follow mark, go to Mark Harrington show.com. Be sure to tune in next time for your marching orders in the Culture War.