Christian Smith
Hayden Laye joined protesters outside the Supreme Court last month as the justices weighed a case that could change access to abortion pills. An LGBTQ advocate and proud Democrat, he wore a blue shirt and waved a small rainbow flag.
Laye was there as part of the effort to end abortion in America.
“We stand up for those less fortunate than us and those most vulnerable,” Laye said of like-minded Democrats. “We defend those who are affected by climate change. We defend single mothers and we also need to defend pre-born children, because they don’t have a voice.”
Laye said he has heard many people tell him that his positions are incompatible. “Unfortunately, when people tell me I can’t do something, I usually go and do it,” he told The Hill.
Laye, a recent high school graduate in South Carolina, is the development coordinator for Democrats for Life of America and serves on the board of the Rainbow Pro Life Alliance. He’s part of an often-overlooked coalition of young voters who are pushing the anti-abortion movement to expand its tent and tap into the growing political power of Gen Z.
Younger anti-abortion activists are delivering a more positive message focused on supporting pregnant women and discussing how to make room for a more diverse and less religious generation in a movement that has long been dominated by Christians.
“Of all the pro-lifers I know, I know very few pro-lifers who are straight, white, conservative men, and that’s what pro-lifers are always told to be,” Laye said. “Most of the people I know are queer, non-religious – or at least non-Christian – a woman, a person of color.”
Kristan Hawkins, president of Students for Life of America, said young people are the most likely to have unwanted — or at least unexpected — pregnancies, which makes them the best leaders in the fight against abortion access.
“Furthermore, young people are the drivers of our culture,” Hawkins said. “You know, I think it’s lost on a lot of people that today we may see a legislative or political victory, but if we can’t persuade and educate the younger generation, all of their work will be or will be erased. 10, 20, 30 years.”
But this reality is not always evident in anti-abortion campaigns. William Reynolds, a high school student who identifies as a Democratic Socialist, said some young people who oppose abortion are deterred by the movement’s outdated messages and lack of inclusivity.
He works with the Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising, an anti-abortion group made up mostly of young people who “don’t fit the traditional pro-life mold.” He said the group is sometimes rejected for being too radical.
“We got into ‘trouble,’ with a lot of, you know, traditional pro-life people,” Reynolds said. “The bumper sticker on the megaphone says ‘f-abortion,’ right, like we’re willing to say and do things that a lot of traditional pro-life people wouldn’t do.”
Reynolds said the main reason abortion rights were defeated at the polls in places like Ohio and Kansas is because organizations that oppose abortion are not being inclusive or making compromises on issues like access to contraception.
“We wonder why we keep losing on all these ballot measures,” Reynolds said. “It’s because we all seemed like inarticulate idiots and we really need to fix that.”
“Gen Z is overwhelmingly progressive and increasingly secular, and there is simply no one holding space for that in the pro-life movement,” Reynolds added. “And that’s a real problem, and they’re going to vote that way. They will continue to vote this way unless we change something.”
Kenzi Bustamante, a senior at the University of Chicago, is president of her university’s Students for Life organization. She said the anti-abortion movement is making a mistake when it unnecessarily closes the door on certain communities.
She gave the example of an anti-abortion group that published a story condemning a gay couple for using surrogacy to have a child. Surrogacy is criticized by some abortion opponents for its use of in vitro fertilization (IVF), which often requires the destruction of some embryos.
“It seems like the message was, ‘We condemn gay couples for raising children.’ That’s how it was perceived,” Bustamante said. “Whereas what they were really saying is that IVF and surrogacy are life-destroying, but they didn’t focus on that enough.”
Bustamante sees significant overlap between the anti-abortion effort and progressive movements, such as the focus on human rights, equality and treating people with dignity. She said the anti-abortion movement has also begun to attract a wider variety of people and students, supporting policies such as making birth free.
She said part of that strategy is to emphasize that the movement “cares equally about women and babies.”
“Because that’s a common misconception: We don’t care about women at all,” Bustamante said. “I think they’re doing a better job of implementing these ‘make birth free’ initiatives, having more resources, free resources available to pregnant women than they have in the past.”
However, Bustamante said some differences are difficult to overcome. She remembered a person involved in the Right to Life group at the University of Chicago who cared deeply about transgender rights and ending abortion.
“It’s just uncomfortable for anyone on either side to try to get to the middle,” Bustamante said.
But she said the movement at its core should be accessible to anyone.
“It’s kind of a single-issue movement,” Bustamante said. “The main thing is to reduce abortions.”
Kylie Gallegos is a senior at the University of Notre Dame and runs Notre Dame Right to Life, a group she specifically said is not considered Republican or Democrat and does not use Catholic labels like “traditional.”
“Our goal is simply to spread the message that everyone — Catholic, Protestant, atheist, LGBTQ+, young, old, rich and poor — is called to be pro-life,” Gallegos said in an email to The Hill. “Our message about the dignity of every human person leaves no one out. It’s a shame that being pro-life has become something that people don’t understand should extend to everyone. Being pro-life is not just a political identity, it is a way of life.”
Gallegos said the club takes a different approach than the “Grim Reaper-type” abortion opponents who preach on street corners or people who show graphic photos of aborted babies.
“We believe that life is good and should be valued and protected; Acting in a way that merely shows hatred towards another group of people will not give us the results we are working towards,” she said.
She said Notre Dame Right to Life prioritizes creating a low entry level for more people to participate in its programming, and the club promotes a “positive outlook on life and human life and when the value of human life begins ”.
Reynolds said he has seen a “significant movement” in the number of young people with progressive ideas who are finding a place in anti-abortion organizations. He said the full impact on the anti-abortion movement will come as these students gain more influence.
“Because ultimately, one day, especially if I have something to say about it, we are going to completely change the way people think about pro-life people in this country,” Reynolds said.
