WASHINGTON, D.C. (LifeSiteNews) — Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America (SBA) has announced that all signatures on a Democrat discharge petition to extend federal Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) subsidies will count against the pro-life records of officeholders, due to the taxpayer funding of abortion such a move would perpetuate.

As previously covered by LifeSiteNews, certain health insurance tax credits that were extended under ACA during the COVID-19 era are slated to expire at the end of the year. There are bipartisan calls to extend them, but there is disagreement over the details, such as the duration of the extension and whether to pair it with other spending cuts. Pro-lifers have warned that Obamacare allows health insurance subsidies to fund most abortions, meaning that any extension would also extend abortion funding unless amended by Congress.

The subsidies were one of the key sticking points behind the 43-day government shutdown that ended last month, though agreement was not reached on that particular issue, and observers do not expect a compromise to be reached by the end of the year.

Democrat House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries is currently asking for a “handful of Republicans” to cross the aisle and sign a discharge petition that would force an up-or-down vote on extending the subsidies for three years.

“Cosignatures will be scored negatively and reflected on each member’s profile on SBA Pro-Life America’s National Pro-Life Scorecard,” warns a letter signed by SBA President Marjorie Dannenfelser. “Prior to and since the enactment of Obamacare in 2010, Republicans and leading pro-life organizations have been firm in their opposition to abortion coverage in the program. Now is not the time to change course.”

“Obamacare was intentionally drafted to avoid application of the Hyde amendment, and any efforts to extend the subsidies further expands Obamacares’s [sic] violation of the longstanding Hyde principle that taxpayers should not fund abortion,” the letter explains. “Instead of stopping funding for health insurance plans that cover elective abortion consistent with Hyde, Obamacare expressly permits subsidies for health insurance plans that cover elective abortion, provided an abortion surcharge is paid and certain accounting gimmicks are followed. This approach was and continues to be a radical departure from the Hyde amendment.”

The Trump White House has floated a number of alternative healthcare proposals, from its own short-term Obamacare subsidy extension to moving the money from the current system to health savings accounts. Neither got far enough to fully map out specific details such as abortion funding, but the administration has consistently opposed giving tax dollars to the industry.

Within weeks of returning to office, President Donald Trump began enforcing the Hyde amendment against direct funding of most abortions, reinstated the Mexico City Policy, which forbids non-governmental organizations from using taxpayer dollars for most abortions abroad, and cut millions in pro-abortion subsidies by freezing U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) spending. 

In March, the Trump administration froze Title X “family planning” grants to nonprofits it said violated its executive orders on immigration and diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives, including Planned Parenthood affiliates in nine states.

In July, Trump signed into law his controversial “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” (BBB), a wide-ranging policy package that includes a one-year ban on federal tax dollars going through Medicaid to entities that commit abortions for reasons other than rape, incest, or supposed threats to the mother’s life. 

Other Republicans have proposed standalone measures to fully cut off Planned Parenthood’s government funding: the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion and Abortion Insurance Full Disclosure Act, which permanently bans federal funds from being used for abortion; and the Defund Planned Parenthood Act, which disqualifies Planned Parenthood and its affiliates specifically. 

However, they would require 60 votes to make it through the Senate. President Trump has recently started demanding that Senate Republicans eliminate the filibuster so they can pass a wider range of legislation with their narrow majority, but so far GOP leaders have resisted, fearful of the transformative policies Democrats could push through as a result the next time they regain power.