Pro-life movement to shake up messaging with big investment from these key players

FIRST ON FOX: In a second Donald Trump administration, the pro-life movement is trying to nail down its cultural messaging to adapt to a post-Dobbs era. It may get the boost it needs as a $30 million investment is being made through a membership-only organization, dubbed the Pro-Life Venture Fund, Fox News Digital has learned.

Key figures in the pro-life movement, including Leonard Leo, Ray Ruddy and Princeton Professor Robert George, sent a letter Tuesday morning to major pro-life organizations about the new venture fund, which is being chaired by David Bereit, the founder of the pro-life organization 40 Days for Life. 

"We need to build more capacity and help meet the needs of those who are facing an unexpected pregnancy," Bereit told Fox News Digital in an interview. "If we want to say to them, ‘You can do better than abortion,’ we need to say, ‘We will help you,’ and we need to provide the support, the resources and the tangible organizations that will walk with them."

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As the executive vice president of the Federalist Society, Leo helped vet and recommend conservative judicial nominees, including those who later contributed to the overturning of Roe v. Wade in 2022. 

Ruddy co-founded the conservative news outlet Newsmax and has been deeply involved in financially supporting pro-life political action committees and candidates. 

George is a conservative philosopher and legal scholar at Princeton University who co-founded the American Principles Project. Rising as an influential voice in the pro-life movement, George has written extensively on the moral and philosophical arguments for opposing abortion.

The group also announced the creation of the Life Leadership Conference, a members-only coalition featuring influencers and philanthropists "who know how to achieve genuine victories."

The memo states that while the Supreme Court has reversed the ruling of Roe v. Wade, "today a whole new set of challenges" faces the pro-life movement, which will require strong messaging to combat. Some of those challenges include combating the push to enshrine abortion into state constitutions.

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Voters in Arizona, Colorado, Maryland, Missouri, Montana, Nevada and New York all approved state-level abortion referendums last year. 

"It should come as no surprise that, with the passage of time and changes in circumstance, old strategies for building public support and advancing the pro-life cause in legislatures and courts need to be rethought and, in some cases, revised," the memo states. "Some groups have adapted and are charting winning strategies. Some are posting more losses than gains and are redefining what it means to win in ways that risk making the movement weaker and less effective."

"What’s more, the battle over abortion never was, and must never be allowed to become, simply about making sure the issue is delegated to the right government actors," the memo continued in part. "The Life Leadership Conference is setting the bar higher. Our coalition will work tirelessly to provide genuine protection to unborn babies and practical assistance to pregnant women in need."

As such, Beirut added the group's goal is to usher in "a new era of life-saving action and culture-shaping innovation."

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Abortion emerged as a key issue in the 2024 election, with former Vice President Kamala Harris and the Democratic Party advocating for expanding federal abortion access. In contrast, President Donald Trump supported state-level restrictions, arguing for a more localized approach to the issue, including a ban on most abortions after 15 weeks.

In one of his first executive actions, Trump pardoned 23 pro-life protesters – several of whom were elderly – imprisoned for violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act under the Biden administration's Department of Justice.