Ahead of the November election, a South Dakota court has moved to expedite a case that would determine if pro-abortion groups used fraud to push a ballot measure to legalize abortion up through birth. The South Dakota Circuit Court determined that Life Defense Fund and Leslee Unruh vs. Dakotans for Health will be heard in the coming weeks.
The case centers around Amendment Gโa constitutional amendment that would legalize abortion under the guise of maternal healthโin South Dakota. Currently, abortion is illegal in the state, except to physically protect the life of the mother. South Dakota also mandates a 72-hour waiting period and counseling before an abortion is performed.
The pro-abortion Dakotans for Health has lobbied to add Amendment G to the ballot in November. But Life Defense Fund says the group has deceived South Dakotans and broken the law in their attempt to legalize abortion in the state. Improperly gathering signatures and leaving petitions unattended are among the claims.
โThe deception of Dakotans for Health will finally come to light,โ said Caroline Woods, spokesperson for Life Defense Fund, of the court case. โThese decisions from the court will finally give Life Defense Fund the opportunity to present our mounds of video evidence, showing Dakotans for Health clearly breaking election law and engaging in fraudulent activity. Putting Amendment G on the ballot this November would be unfair to voters since Dakotans for Health used bait-and-switch tactics, broke the law, and cheated their way to put abortion-up-to-birth up for a vote this fall.โ
Life Defense Fund says that Amendment G is one of the most extreme abortion laws in the country. Under the amendment, the state would also deny parents the right to know if their underage daughters sought an abortion, and would remove certain medical requirements for abortion providers.
โWe were pleased that the judge expedited our case so that if we win, each official county newspaper can publish the ballot on time, omitting Amendment G from the list of amendments, and indicating Amendment G has been disqualified,โ explained Sara Frankenstein, an attorney for Life Defense Fund. โNow, Dakotans for Health will finally have to respond to each and every allegation made in our Complaint with an โadmitโ or โdeny,โ and we are anxious to receive their answer this week.โ
Decision Magazine, founded by Billy Graham in 1960, works through its website and monthly magazine to communicate the Gospel, as well as inform and challenge readers about key cultural and Biblical issues.
Editor’s Note: Why Is This News Biblically Relevant?
Greg Laurie, Pastor of Harvest Riverside, recently explained “Why Pro-Life Is the Only Biblical Position.”
“Since the passing of Roe v. Wade in the early 1970s, an estimated 63 million+ babies have been aborted,” he described. The abortion industry creates revenue in excess of $4 billion in the United States alone. Despite the fact that Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022, many states have continued this practice, under the banner of ‘womanโs rights.’ The truth is that abortion takes the life of an innocent child in the womb. It is, plainly speaking, murder.”
“I think one of the reasons abortion has persisted is because we are so desensitized to murder. Our culture today is awash in violence,” Laurie continued.
“Our culture tries to dehumanize these babies with rewordings and euphemisms. They call murder ‘terminating a pregnancy’ and they label unborn babies as ‘fetuses,’ ’embryos,’ ‘globs of cells,’ ‘uterine contents,’ or ‘products of conception,'” he underscored. “But the reality is that they are innocent children, made in the image of God, and they have every right to live. If you donโt agree with that then, frankly, you disagree with the Bible.”
