Facing a state-led smear campaign in Massachusetts targeting pregnancy help centers, one pro-life organization is pushing back.
Last summer, Gov. Maura Healey launched a first-in-the-nation campaign highlighting what she called the “dangers and potential harm” of pregnancy help centers, backed by a $1 million investment approved by the state legislature. The initiative included digital ads, radio commercials, billboards and public transit messaging that critics said mischaracterized the work of these life-affirming organizations.
The ads implored the public to “Avoid Anti-Abortion Centers,” while more detailed ones declared that “crisis pregnancy centers may look like medical clinics but don’t offer comprehensive reproductive care.” They were created by the Massachusetts Department of Public Health in collaboration with the pro-abortion non-profit Reproductive Equity Now Foundation.
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The involvement of a state-led and underwritten disinformation campaign in targeting private pro-life organizations drew sharp criticism and alarm from pro-life advocates.
Now, a national pro-life organization is fighting back with its own multimedia counter campaign.
In early March, the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) launched its “Choice Begins Here” campaign, blanketing the state with print, television, and digital advertising to “combat the blatant lies” of the state-backed ads by explaining what pregnancy help centers actually do, ACLJ said.
ACLJ labeled the initiative its “biggest multimedia campaign” yet in defending “unborn babies, mothers, and pro-life healthcare professionals.”
Olivia Summers, senior litigation counsel with ACLJ, said the campaign is essential because pregnancy help centers have seen a 30 percent decrease in visits since the state-led campaign began.
“We wanted to get to these women who are hearing negative ads about pregnancy centers,” Summers told Pregnancy Help News. “We wanted to right that wrong -- draw them in and show them what they really are and what they really do.”
The pro-life Choice Begins Here campaign was the brainchild of ACLJ Director of Media Logan Sekulow, who was shocked by the number of anti-pregnancy center ads he encountered while visiting Massachusetts, Summers said.
The pro-life campaign includes video ads featuring clients of pregnancy centers who express gratitude for the compassionate support and practical resources they received.
One ad features a smiling woman who says, “Everything I heard about those places was wrong.”
“They gave me options. They gave me resources,” she continues.
At the end of the ad, her young son appears on screen as she adds with a smile, “As it turns out, you can have it all.”
Digital print ads include such messages as, “No Shame. No Cost. Just Care.,” “One Choice Is Not a Choice,” and “Be the Hero in Another Family’s Story.”
Tweet This: New pro-life ad campaign in Massachusetts "rights the wrong" of a state-led campaign disparaging pregnancy centers.
If pro-life advocates don’t successfully counter the anti-pregnancy center campaign in Massachusetts, Summers warned, it will spread to other states.
Last August, ACLJ sued the commonwealth of Massachusetts, claiming the state engaged in an unconstitutional viewpoint-based discrimination campaign against pregnancy centers that included harassment, suppression, and threats.
“What the pro-abortion industry tries to do is have a test run [and] see how it goes in a very friendly area -- and then use that same strategy across the states, and eventually even moving into areas that might be pro-life,” Summers told Pregnancy Help News. “This is just one little strategy that they're employing here that they're getting ready to launch across the states.”
“It seems to be a very strategic attack targeting these pregnancy resource centers,” she said. “We need to stop this.”
Since the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision, the pro-life community has faced a growing wave of legal and political attacks on pregnancy help centers, Summers said. In abortion states, “the only thing that's standing in the way of abortion are these pregnancy resource centers,” she said.
Summers hopes similar pro-pregnancy center campaigns can be run nationwide. In total, the campaign includes five video ads and 30 print pieces.
“These ads are very powerful,” she said. “The first time I saw the ad, I cried.”
The intent of the campaign is to be positive and empowering, she added.
“We want to empower women to make life-affirming choices,” said Summers, “and the way to do that is by being very positive.”
