The Daily Signal - The Left's War on Pregnancy Centers

Episode Date: June 20, 2024

Today, we speak to Teresa Larkin, vice chairman of Pregnancy Care Alliance of Massachusetts. We discuss the left's war on pregnancy centers, the state of Massachusetts starting a so-called education campaign against pro-life workers, the violence committed by pro-abortion attackers, and more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Feeling festive. Catch classic holiday favorites like Home Alone, the Santa Claus and Die Hard, along with holiday episodes from Family Guy, Abbott Elementary, and more with Hulu on Disney Plus. From festive Disney Flicks to binge-worthy Hulu originals, Hulu on Disney Plus is your home for the holidays. Celebrate the season with Hulu, available on Disney Plus in Canada. This is the Daily Signal podcast for Thursday, June 20th. I'm Mary Margaret O'Lahan and I sat down with Teresa Larkin,

vice chairman of pregnancy care alliance of Massachusetts. We'll discuss the left's war on pregnancy centers, the state of Massachusetts starting a so-called education campaign against pro-life workers, the violence committed by pro-abortion attackers, and more. Now stay tuned for my conversation with Teresa Larkin. So what is going on with Ukraine? What is this deal with the border? How do you feel about school choice?

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Teresa Larkin, thank you so much for joining us today. Thank you for having me. So Teresa, tell us, you are the vice chairman of Pregnancy Care Alliance of Massachusetts. What is this organization and what does it do? So the Pregnancy Care Alliance is a group of pregnancy resource centers in the state of Massachusetts that have elected to come together. to better serve the women and families in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. And give us a picture, you know, let's say we're not familiar with pregnancy centers.

Give us a picture of what it's like if you're a pregnant mother that walks through the door of one of these pregnancy centers. Well, if you're a pregnant mother walks through the doors from one of our centers, the first thing you're going to feel is love and care and compassion and no judgment. And people that are there to hear your story, to focus on you as an individual, and to hear what is going on in your life. Different pregnancy centers offer different services, but they all offer that same caring, compassionate opportunity for women to just know that they're in a safe place to receive help and support.

Now, I've reported on a number of pregnancy centers in the area. One of the ones that I've really focused in on is Capitol Hill Pregnancy Center here in D.C. and I noticed when I went in there and got a little tour that the basement is absolutely overflowing with diapers and clothing. Is that standard in pregnancy centers? Absolutely. Absolutely. It's the same thing for all of our centers. We have the same, we probably have a very similar basement in one of our offices just full of baby clothes and diapers and toilet trees and clothing, everything that you can think a mom would need. And where does that come from? It comes from donations. So again, all the services that are provided through pregnancy centers are offered to our clients and to the woman and families at no cost to them. So everything that they receive from us doesn't cost them anything and is supported and supplied by multitudes of people, citizens and family, you know, people in the Commonwealth who love what we do and want to support moms in need.

And so they're all donated. They're all donated. That's amazing. So this is just houses full of donations for babies and moms. Correct. What about dads? Do you guys ever help dads at all? Absolutely.

Absolutely. You know, that's what we said, women and families, you know, dads are a pivotal part of the picture. And so, you know, they're always welcome to join the, who actually encourage them to be part of the whole process. Absolutely. So tell me about the kind of people that work at pregnancy centers, because I would really like to give our listeners a good picture of, you know, not just what is going on in these centers, but who is running them and what these types of people are like? Well, most of the people that are running the centers, you know, really are full of compassion. Many of them have walked where some of our patients have

walked. You know, many of them have struggled themselves and understand. Many of them just have a huge heart to help and, you know, at the same time provide a professional opportunity for women to be heard and not, I think one of the differences between like a state-run social agency and the women that work at pregnancy centers is that we don't make them feel ashamed or embarrassed that they're coming for help. You know, we encourage them. The things that we give them are designed to bless them and encourage them and help them. And I think that's a huge difference is that's often overlooked. That's that's the attitude and the mindset of a pregnancy center. worker. And you say women, it sounds like a lot of the women, or a lot of the people that are running

these organizations are women. Yes, yes, it is. There are men, but for the most part, I would say most pregnancy centers are staffed with women. It's something that we often hear, and, you know, as a reporter that I often see from left-wing groups and pro-abortion advocates is this messaging that pregnancy centers exist to shame and deter women from getting abortions? What would your response to that be? Well, I think the difference is that we believe that women deserve to know and to have true options, you know, and to know the answers. Women really in non-planned pregnancies, they're seeking answers. They're seeking information. They're seeking help. And so the help and the information, they need is designed to equip them to make a good decision, to make an informed decision,

not to shame them. As I shared, you know, our goal in helping people is not to make them feel ashamed that they may have needs or they may have concerns, but that they're worthy and deserve all the information that they need. So how many women would you say this pregnancy center alliance has served? Do you have an idea of how many women and babies? Well, we just formed. So our data is from 2022. We're working on the 2023 data now, but only out of 13 centers, we have 13 centers that are represented

by P-Cal right now. And we served over 4,000 women just in 2022 alone. We provided a million point two of free medical services, which would have been pregnancy testing, ultrasounds, STI testing, vitamins,

consultations with medical professionals, and then over $700,000 dollars of diapers and clothing. And we think probably those estimates are on the low side as well. Wow. Yes. That's just one year. Now that's a lot of services. How have your efforts been met by the state? The state has tried to damage the reputation of our centers by accusing us of exactly what you had said earlier of shaming women into not having an abortion. But the reality is that we really believe that women do have a choice, and having no choice but abortion is not a choice. And so the radical, you know, it's kind of interesting.

We used to be called pro-life centers and then, you know, kind of crisis pregnancy centers. And now we're anti-abortion centers. So there's something going on where they're just sort of digging in their heels and trying to highlight what we don't do as opposed to what we actually do do. Right. And there doesn't seem to be a lot of focus on what you do do. Exactly. Exactly. Why do you think that is? That's a good question. I know that we have invited our governor, our attorney general, our senators to come and see for themselves what we do. Unfortunately, they have not taken us up on that opportunity, but we're going to still ask. It seems to be driven, frankly, by a radical pro-abortion

rights groups that just want to continue to promote abortion as the only option for women in unplanned pregnancy. And so there's just a one message that they're trying to deliver as opposed to focusing on if they really were pro-women and they really trusted women, they would trust them to get the information they need to make the best decision for them. Right. Now, I've been learning recently, I believe there's a network of around 3,000 pregnancy centers around the United States. I don't know if that figure is accurate. But we've seen a lot of rather hateful and targeted rhetoric directed towards these pregnancy centers lately. What impact do you think that has on your work? We were also attacked. We right after the Dobbs decision, a few centers in our state. You know,

we were tagged with the famous Jane's revenge. If abortions aren't safe, neither are you. So we've had, you know, people, you know, come after us in our centers. We're determined. I'm going to interrupt you there, too. When you say we were attacked, can you explain for our listeners what type of attack? Because I believe you're talking about a physical attack on these. I'm sorry.

Our buildings were attacked. You know, we were spray painted. One of the building, one of our centers had windows broken. one of our PICAL members, threats with, again, like graffiti, so not physical threats to people, but certainly physical threats to the building. Buildings were destroyed. And again, you know, a message like if abortions aren't safe, neither are you. Wow.

It's very threatening. And so, you know, that's the type of attitude that many of them have. And again, not focusing on what we do do, but on the fact that we don't provide. abortions. That seems to be their big problem. So the animosity towards you, as you're saying, is not because you help women in need, but because you will not help them to abort their babies. Correct. Now, when you face these attacks, I'm curious, how many of your centers were physically attacked and graffitied with this type of rhetoric? I believe about five or six. Five or six. So for the women that are running these centers, does that scare them? It gave us a little pause, I will admit.

However, no, we're determined, you know, most of us again, you know, we're Christians. Most of us are believers and, you know, we trust God to protect us. And so we, you know, we basically said, we're not going to be deterred. We're not going to be scared off. You know, women need us, women need men. I don't want to keep forgetting about the men, but women and men and women and men and children and babies need us. And so we're going to keep going. Now, one of the latest developments in this war on pregnancy centers that we've been talking about, because I think it's two-pronged, right? We're talking about activist efforts to actually physically hurt the centers and then more state-level efforts to shut you down. One of the latest developments

is this new education campaign against pregnancy centers that's being run by the Massachusetts Department of Health and these activists. Can you share? a little bit with us about what this education campaign is? The education campaign really exists about warnings against, again, anti-abortion clinics that do not go to these centers. So they've named us all on government websites and saying, you need to avoid these places, these centers, you know, will lie to you, deceive you. We've called it the million-dollar smear campaign because it's being funded with the million

dollars of taxpayer funding in Massachusetts to attack pregnancy centers by using billboards, sandwich boards, social media, YouTube, TikTok, a pretty widespread campaign that is being funded, again, mostly just warning women to not go to any of our centers. Wow. Now, this is a million dollar smear campaign, as you say. Do you think, that that plays into it all the attacks on pregnancy centers we've seen. You know, when we see this rhetoric saying that you're deterring women and lying to women, does that escalate the attacks on these centers? This mayor campaign was just announced, I believe, two weeks ago or a week ago. So it's yet to obscene, but clearly it opens the door, obviously. If we were attacked

two years ago when the dog's decision came down, we're preparing. for the possibility of future attacks, absolutely. Especially around the anniversary of the Dobbs decision, which is on June 24th, I believe. Yes, yes. All our centers had to put in security cameras. You know, we, one of our main clinics has existed. You know, I've been there for over 20 years. Never, ever had to do anything like that.

But, you know, we've all had to put in security cameras and increase our security, you know, measures just to be prepared. And what has the response been from state and local authorities to these new dangers presented to pregnancy centers? Silence. Silence. Silence. Silence.

No, no, no concern. No, again, we've invited, you know, to come and see and address the governor. when she was Attorney General, put a consumer advisory warning on the government website about pregnancy centers accusing, you know, of us of deceptive advertising, lying to women, all sorts of things that remains up there to this day. And we've made numerous attempts over these two years to meet with them and dialogue because these accusations really are unwarranted. We did a freedom of information request to find out, you know, gee, women coming out in droves against pregnancy centers and found over a 40-year period just in

Massachusetts, there were only three complaints against a pregnancy center. And two of them were by abortion. They weren't even in the state. So you're talking about 40 years of a clean record of helping women with no issues, nothing that has precipitated this attack. And I don't know what other industry could have a claim to that as well as a 97% approval rating from our patients, you know, and our clients that we serve. That's national overall. Like you said, the 3,000 pregnancy centers is, you know, a 97% or higher satisfaction rate from the women themselves that have been served. Have you ever had a woman come back and say, I wish that you all didn't help me to save my baby? Never.

What kind of things do they say when they do come? back. They're so grateful. I mean, that is one of the most joyful. I have to tell you experiences is when someone comes back with their baby. I'll just give you a quick story. I was walking out of the office one day, you know, going to my car and a woman came up to me and said, do you work in that pregnancy center? Now, this was sort of right after Dobbs. I was a little nervous about how to respond. And I said, yes. And she said, oh, my gosh, do you have a minute? I want you to meet my daughter. She's a preschool teacher at the program right next door to us. And I'm so grateful because I came to your center and I had her. And she brought me to meet her daughter, who was 17,

a beautiful girl. And she was telling the daughter, she was the first person that saw you on the ultrasound machine. So we hear stories like that all the time. And that's the stories that aren't told, you know, to the government officials that aren't told, you know, the countless women that and men that come in so grateful, so proud, so happy with their children. Wow. So if, let's just say people like New York's governor, Kathy Hochel, or, you know, Andrew Cuomo, I know was part of these efforts to shut down pregnancy centers or the governor of Massachusetts, let's say they got their way and all of these pregnancy centers were shut down. what would that landscape look like?

That would be very unfortunate because the women, as again, you heard our numbers, so you're cutting off thousands of dollars of support for women and families. You're cutting off an opportunity for them. Like I said, many of the women that are served, you know, may not even be thinking about abortion, but they feel that they might have to

because of their circumstances. So if you shut these centers down off, You're denying a person that just would have her baby if she had support, if she knew that resources were available, if she had someone to talk to, you know, and to safety. We serve women a lot that are being, you know, not a ton of women, but, you know, 20%, 20% of the women we serve in our centers are trying to escape sex trafficking, are trying to escape domestic violence, are trying to escape drug addiction. We just had a girl in yesterday. You know, we were able to get her into a drug program because we have connections. You know, we have connections with all people. We know women that run safe houses.

We know women that run addiction homes, domestic violence support. So all of those things that are often a driver to abortion are gone for these women. They're gone. Wow. So, you know, if you had the opportunity to speak with the governor of Massachusetts and to make a case for pregnancy centers, what would you say? I would say pretty much what I just said is that if you truly support women and you believe women deserve good care, information, support, resources, encouragement,

then you would support pregnancy centers. I mean, the governor, Elizabeth Warren, all these, and they should support the work that we do because we're benefiting and helping the citizens of our state. that they are representing. And in the same way that these leftist activists are kind of grouping up to help to help each other to direct more vitriol at pregnancy centers, do you see any kind of national support from pro-lifers or pro-life politicians in supporting pregnancy centers? And if not, why?

Not in general. I think, you know, you have the pro-life states, you know, you'll hear senators is coming out and supporting, but on a national level, not really. And that is hard for us because, you know, we are in a place where we don't have any support from the mainstream media, from our elected officials, from obviously now the Department of Public Health. You know, we don't have any support. And so it would be wonderful if we could get more of a national understanding for people to realize that, you know, some states are doing great. They're helping women. They have abortion restrictions. They're offering, but some of us are really going through the fire. And I do want to circle back before we conclude

to the conversation we had a little earlier about how this rhetoric might be escalating attacks on pregnancy centers. When you hear Elizabeth Warren, for example, saying that pregnancy centers are dangerous and are hurting women, does that direct more vicious? Does that direct more vicious? towards you and your colleagues who were trying to help women in pregnancy centers. Absolutely. You know, even in the Department of Public Health statement, he called our centers a public health threat. So, again, you know, what is that going to do for radical, you know, pro-abortion extremists?

Of course, it's going to give them a license to attack. You know, right now it's, you know, maybe bad Google reviews or things like that. but it just certainly emboldens them. And the doctors, you know, the doctors and nurses that, you know, their reputations, their licenses are on the line in their lives that, you know, between their colleagues, you know, possibly, you know, or where they work, you know, telling them they don't want them to work there anymore if they're pro-like, you know, it just, it opens the door to things that, you know, it's like that loose thread,

you pull that thread and now you've got this big mess of yarn, right? And that's sort of what we're seeing is the ramifications are so, you know, not only we will not be able to help women, but the safety of our doctors and nurses, the safety of our staff. You know, those things are all very real. They're very real. They're very real. And it's so important that all of you are able to remain safe as you do such important work. Well, do you have any concluding message for people who might be watching this that are trying to think of ways that they can support pregnancy centers or get the word out that these centers are actually doing very important. really important work. Right. Contact legislators, you know, that's one of the big things that, you know, and we hear it too from even the pro-life legislators in our state that say, you know, we just don't hear from people enough. We don't hear from people enough. You know, the other side

is constantly delivering their message and, you know, pro-life people tend to be, you know, less engaged. And that's what we need. Like they need to let their voices be heard. We actually do have a petition, you know, going that, you know, to send to our, that says, please, you know, show your support for pregnancy centers, you know, that's, they need to, that would be the most important thing, I think, is for people to communicate with their state and local legislators and government officials, write op-eds into the newspapers to, you know, to try to correct the record. And, you know, we're doing a lot of that now, trying to get our, our clients to speak. for us because that's their voice is undeniable you know when you take a woman that's sitting there

with her child and what she's accomplished because she came to a pregnancy center um that's you know that's undeniable proof of the support it is it really is well teresa thank you so much for joining us we're so grateful to you for the work that you do and for sharing your story thank you so much and that'll do it for today's episode if you haven't gotten a chance be sure to check out our evening show right here in this podcast feed where we bring you the top news of the day. Also, make sure you subscribe to The Daily Signal wherever you get your podcast and help us reach more listeners by leaving a five-star rating and review. We read all your feedback. Thanks again for listening.

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