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Just as Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has reinvigorated a national conversation about taxpayer funding to abortion businesses like Planned Parenthood, today the South Carolina Supreme Court hears arguments in Planned Parenthood South Atlantic v. South Carolina. It’s the latest battle by the abortion industry to use the courts to expand abortion in states with protections for unborn babies and their mothers on the books.

The backstory

South Carolina enacted its Fetal Heartbeat and Protection From Abortion Act in May 2023 when Governor Henry McMaster signed it into law. It was the legislature’s and McMaster’s second effort to act on the will of the people after a pre-Dobbs heartbeat law was permanently blocked. Planned Parenthood has gone to the courts several times in unsuccessful attempts to overturn or water down the law.

South Carolina is one of four states with a heartbeat protection law. There’s no question these laws save lives. South Carolina’s is estimated to protect more than 4,800 unborn babies with beating hearts annually, as well as providing for women to be able to receive child support from the time of conception.

How do pro-life protections affect abortion rates?

Guess which month South Carolina’s heartbeat law was first enforced ⬇️

(Full report: https://t.co/Q5SYftcHkf) pic.twitter.com/R9iihn6ynt

— Charlotte Lozier Institute (@LozierInstitute) August 3, 2024

In upholding the heartbeat law in 2023, the state Supreme Court found in its majority opinion that “the State has a compelling interest in protecting the lives of unborn children” and that “It would be a rogue imposition of will by the judiciary for us to say that the legislature’s determination is unreasonable as a matter of law.”

Planned Parenthood’s science denial

At the heart (pun intended) of Planned Parenthood’s case is its denial of scientific consensus and its unconvincing efforts to rewrite history.

For years, the abortion giant acknowledged the human heartbeat at six weeks.

Then in 2022, after the Dobbs decision, something odd happened. Stacey Abrams, a Democratic rising star at the time, infamously claimed the heartbeat is the figment of a male conspiracy: “There is no such thing as a heartbeat at six weeks. It is a manufactured sound designed to convince people that men have the right to take control of a woman’s body.”

In reality, scientists have captured the clearly identifiable beating heart on video (note: with different systems of measuring pregnancy length, four weeks post-fertilization equates to six weeks’ gestation):

Not long after the Abrams debacle, people took notice that Planned Parenthood had quietly scrubbed the “beating heart” phrasing off its website.

The science didn’t change – the politics of the moment did. One pediatrician slammed Planned Parenthood’s stealth-editing:

The problem here is that every American that’s had…that miraculous experience, where you go in for that first visit, and you see that tiny flutter, and you see it on the screen, you know there’s a real life there. There’s a real heartbeat there.

Planned Parenthood has been all over the map on the science that shows when a baby’s heartbeat begins. In 2023, in a petition the court rejected, they argued it should be redefined as “when the four chambers of the heart are formed, which is usually around 17-20 weeks.” (ACOG, the pro-abortion ob-gyns association, said the same.) They later tried to walk back their inaccurate statements, admitting “a heart forms earlier than that.” Now in their latest lawsuit, they claim the law should be rewritten to set it at nine weeks instead. They openly contend that about 65% more abortions would happen if it were.

Both are unscientific and misleading. Dr. Cortney Draper, an emergency medical specialist who practices in Moncks Corner, SC, knows that well. At The Post and Courier, she writes that the heartbeat is “the most fundamental sign of life from a clinical perspective – for every person at every stage of life”:

A human baby’s heart starts to beat 22 days after conception. In fact, the term “fetal heart rate” is used from the earliest stages of embryo development in clinical medicine and often in scientific research. By six weeks’ gestation, the baby’s heart beats about 110 times per minute, clearly seen by ultrasound imaging. Science also shows that a baby’s earliest heartbeats are rhythmic contractions that generate blood flow crucial to the young baby’s growth and survival. This early “cardiac activity” — seen at both six and nine weeks — is nothing less than a functioning, pumping heartbeat.

As an emergency medicine physician with more than a decade of experience, I can personally confirm these facts about human life in the womb. I frequently use an ultrasound imaging machine to date pregnancies and rule out miscarriages and other early pregnancy complications. Finding a heartbeat is part of this process. A baby with a heart rate greater than 100 beats per minute is likely to have a good outcome, allowing me to assure the mother that her baby is alive and well, something I can usually confirm around the sixth week of pregnancy. In fact, once a heartbeat is detected, a baby has more than a 90% chance of surviving to birth.

Fact Sheet: The Science Behind Embryonic Heartbeats

South Carolina has strong pro-life leaders

The South Carolina GOP, spearheaded by Chairman Drew McKissick with National Committeemen Glenn McCall and Cindy Costa, set an example with a strong letter to Republicans statewide supporting the heartbeat law and calling out Planned Parenthood and its Democratic Party backers. The letter opens:

South Carolina proudly upholds the sanctity of life and the rights of the unborn and their mothers. Our stance is clearly written in our Party’s Platform: we believe the right to life is the first inalienable right, without which there can be no other rights.

It closes:

South Carolina voters have made their stance clear by electing pro-life leadership. Yet, organizations like Planned Parenthood persist in using the judicial system to bypass the democratic process and impose their will. South Carolina is a leader for Life and the South Carolina Republican Party has been a bulwark of the pro-life movement in our state. We continue to remain steadfast in our commitment to upholding the values of our voters and defending the sanctity of life every step of the way.

Read it all here.

South Carolina has resources for women

Her PLAN’s directory includes nearly 200 life-affirming care providers in South Carolina, ranging from pregnancy centers to domestic violence and addiction recovery to free medical clinics and more. In 2022, based on available data, South Carolina pregnancy centers provided over $3.1 million worth of services – more than half of which was medical services – to more than 13,700 women, men and youth. That includes women like Nia, who spoke to the value of having support and being able to see her child amid difficult circumstances:

“Seeing my son for the first time on the ultrasound, it was just one of those moments. It’s like, wow, I have life in me right now. Makes you feel like, okay, I’m ready to have this kid. I can’t wait to see them. I can’t wait to see what they laugh about or how they smile. And then when I saw him when he was kicking and stuff, it was just amazing for me.”

What a shame Planned Parenthood won’t spend the effort they put into lawfare instead finding their own hearts and living up to their name.