Commentary: Big Tent Ideas

SANTORUM: Conservative Tax Dollars Are Being Burned On Abortion Ads Attacking Republican Candidates. Here’s How

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Social conservatives need a wakeup call about letting our taxpayer dollars subsidize Democratic attack ads on abortion in battleground states.

During this election cycle, our state attorney generals and treasurers are sending our taxpayer money from conservative states to left-of-center lawyers and financial institutions who then pipe money into radical abortion advertising.

It’s time we stopped letting our taxpayer funds be designated to left-of-center lawyers and financial institutions that don’t support our values.

As a proud social conservative, it pains me to see how the Left, which wants no limits on abortion up until birth, is savaging conservative candidates across the country who hold commonsense views on the issue that match those of most Americans.

It haunts me that the Left’s wild-eyed abortion ads are being supported by money from conservative states thanks to our public officials handing out lucrative contracts to left-of-center partisans.

Just consider a recent abortion ad in Arizona that Priorities USA Action and Senate Majority PAC put out against Blake Masters. The ad is perfectly on message with the current liberal abortion campaign. And that makes sense, because both the sponsoring groups are hubs of the progressive left.

Priorities USA Action engages in “consistent, long-term public opinion research focused on identifying and refining the most effective strategies Democrats can employ in their messaging to protect and expand Democratic majorities.” And Senate Majority PAC “was founded by experienced, aggressive Democratic strategists with one mission: to win Senate races.”

What should really alarm us, besides the message itself, is that both these left-wing messengers receive big money from left-of-center lawyers who have public contracts with Republican attorneys general in deeply conservative states, according to The Alliance For Consumers (AFC), a consumer advocacy group.

Priorities USA Action receives big money from AAJ PAC, the political operation that is affiliated with the American Association for Justice (formerly known as the Association of Trial Lawyers of America), according to AFC’s report. And Senate Majority PAC?  They receive big checks from AAJ PAC too, to the tune of over $2 million in recent years, the report found.

And the backers of AAJ PAC?  They include left-of-center lawyers at law firms like Motley Rice. Those lawyers sent 98% of their FEC-recorded donations to Democrats and their allies from 2017 through 2020, the AFC report said. Meanwhile the firm’s leader Joe Rice, has been in the running for an ambassadorship under Mr. Biden.

Where did Motley Rice get the money they poured into left-wing politics and sent to support abortion ads like the one hitting Blake Masters in Arizona? In part from contracts with Republican officials in deep red states, such as Attorney General Lynn Fitch in Mississippi, Attorney General Alan Wilson in South Carolina, and Attorney General Patrick Morrisey in West Virginia.

In each of these states, an otherwise principled conservative public official who has done a terrific job for their states made a careless decision — or delegated that decision to underlings —  who handed over big-money contracts to left-of-center lawyers instead of choosing law firms with less bare-knuckle political reputations or, dare it be said, a conservative law firm with values-aligned lawyers.

It’s not just Motley Rice and conservative public officials in places like West Virginia. AFC recently identified other major left-wing law firms that are feasting on state contracts in states across the country and sending 98% or more of their political giving to liberal campaigns and committees.

This is a wake-up-call type of moment right now; a crisis-level situation.

As social conservatives, we must start demanding that our public officials stop funding left-wing partisan lawyers who are dead set against our values.  Maybe we should have come to that realization sooner.

But after seeing the wall of abortion ads that our own public money is supporting during this midterm cycle, there’s no more excuse for sitting idly by and letting the left pick our pockets to serve their own ends.

It is hard enough to fight the Left without funding their efforts. This is a cause that grassroots conservatives can fight and win. Speak up now!

Rick Santorum served as a Republican United States Senator representing Pennsylvania from 1995-2007. 

The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.