Josh Hawley’s New Pro-Life Group Will Fight Radical Abortions Up to Birth Agenda

A Republican senator’s new pro-life initiative is generating blowback within President Donald Trump’s administration, according to a new report. Senator Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and his wife Erin, a constitutional attorney affiliated with Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), announced last week that they are launching a new political action committee (PAC) to promote pro-life measures across the U.S.

The new PAC, called the Love Life Initiative, is intended “to be a voice, strong voice, advocating for life, and not just in the narrow political sense … but also advocating culturally,” Hawley explained in an Axios interview. On Monday morning, however, Axios reported that Trump administration officials are “furious” over the Hawleys’ PAC. Axios cited an unnamed “close Trump advisor” saying, “Clearly, Senator Hawley and his political team learned nothing from the 2022 elections, when the SCOTUS abortion ruling [overturning Roe v. Wade] resuscitated the Democrats in the midterms.” Another unnamed advisor was quoted saying that economic issues “alone will be the driving force behind the next election.” The unnamed advisor added, “Picking a fight on an issue like abortion in a midterm is the height of asinine stupidity.”

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In early 2024, as he was campaigning to reclaim the White House, Trump distanced himself from the abortion issue, classifying it as a states’ right issue after the three justices he placed on the U.S. Supreme Court during his first term joined Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas in overturning Roe. Then-Senators J.D. Vance (now Trump’s vice president) and Marco Rubio (now Trump’s secretary of State) followed Trump’s lead and dismissed calls to protect the unborn at the federal level. The Trump-Vance ticket later led the way in slashing the Republican Party’s longstanding commitment to advancing pro-life principles from the GOP’s 2024 platform and ruled out endorsing pro-life legislation at the federal level. Hawley, meanwhile, was one of the few Republicans who bucked the trend and continued to champion pro-life principles after Trump’s shift on the issue.

According to Axios, the president views abortion as a losing issue for Republicans in the 2026 midterms, believing that a strong pro-life stance will alienate Independent and undecided voters, despite handily winning the 2016 presidential election while embracing pro-life principles and earning over 12 million votes more in 2020 on a similar platform. “Trump privately views abortion through an electoral lens. He is more pragmatic than ideological, and believes stringent abortion laws turn off independent voters whose support the GOP needs to win elections — particularly suburban women,” Axios suggested.

The president has also reportedly “told aides that swing district Republicans who advocate for anti-abortion measures will have a hard time winning midterm races.” Axios claimed that Trump administration officials view the launch of the Love Life Initiative as a means for the senator to “position himself to challenge Vice President Vance for the presidency in 2028.”

Despite the Trump administration’s concerns over abortion as an electoral deadweight for Republicans, the Hawleys released polling data collected by the OnMessage firm, which is also advising the GOP’s House campaigns, showing a substantial share of Americans support pro-life measures and alternatives to abortion. According to The Daily Signal, OnMessage’s survey found that 84% of Americans agree that “many pregnant mothers face difficult economic circumstances, but as a society we should focus on providing them with better options than abortion,” 80% agreed that “there needs to be at least some point during pregnancy when we can all agree that a baby cannot be aborted, unless the life of the mother is at risk,” and 77% agreed that “as a society, we should be working towards having as few abortions as possible.”

Additionally, 64% of respondents opposed the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA’s) 2021 decision to remove regulations surrounding the prescription and distribution of the abortion drug mifepristone, 54% said that health and safety need to be prioritized over accessibility of the drug, and a plurality (42%) said that the drug is unsafe, while only 37% said that mifepristone is safe under the current regulations.

A Gallup poll this summer also found that young men are increasingly trending against abortion. The number of Americans identifying as “pro-choice” has also fallen from 55% prior to the Supreme Court’s Roe reversal to 51% earlier this year.

The Washington Stand reached out to Hawley’s representatives but has not yet received a response.

In comments to TWS, Family Research Council Policy Analyst Joy Stockbauer remarked, “I am encouraged by Senator Hawley’s leadership and willingness to champion the protection of the unborn in the public square. As we see each election cycle, the pro-life movement is consistently outspent by the deep pockets of the abortion lobby. The formation of a pro-life PAC is a step in the right direction to even the playing field and ensure Americans are hearing the pro-life message rather than just pro-abortion lies.”

“The abortion issue is not just a political matter — the killing of infants in the womb is the greatest human rights injustice of our time,” Stockbauer added. “I encourage the Trump administration to lean into its record of defending life and remind Americans that supporting moms and babies should be normal — not dehumanizing and killing them.”

LifeNews Note: S.A. McCarthy serves as a news writer at The Washington Stand.