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Anti-abortion advocates bring fight to Colorado

MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:

People who have been organizing for decades against abortion rights are cheering yesterday's decision overturning Roe v. Wade, and they are ready to continue the fight. As Dan Boyce from Colorado Public Radio reports, that includes places where abortion remains legal under state law.

DAN BOYCE, BYLINE: The Colorado Springs-based Focus on the Family has long been one of the most prominent national voices opposing abortion rights and arguing Roe v. Wade was wrongly decided in the first place. Organization president Jim Daly.

JIM DALY: Well, you know, we've always thought these kinds of social issues need to be dealt with in the legislative branch, not the judicial branch. And so we've always supported that. We think it's right for the Supreme Court to throw it back to the legislative branch.

BOYCE: And throw it back to the states, where Focus on the Family is eager to fight it out.

DALY: Now it's a 50-front battle zone for ideas and hopefully solutions. And we think we have a great solution to help women keep their child - or allow their child to be put up for adoption, we think, is the better option.

BOYCE: Daly says this new landscape gives his organization a chance to show themselves as not just fighting for the unborn but also providing resources to low-income and single parents as well.

DALY: Job training, job placement, lots of resourcing, cribs, diapers, formula, along with budget training, household training, all kinds of things - so I think people are far more engaged and ready to take on that role of helping women in this moment of hardship.

BOYCE: The Colorado legislature passed a progressive abortion rights law earlier this year, allowing the procedure at any point during pregnancy. Denver Post conservative columnist Krista Kafer is against abortion and still does not think it's a settled issue, even in Colorado.

KRISTA KAFER: Oh, not at all.

BOYCE: She says anti-abortion advocates can now work to find limits Colorado politicians and voters will support.

KAFER: Can we, at some point, do another late-term abortion ban and protect those lives of children who would be viable outside of the womb? Can we protect children with disabilities from being aborted? I think those are doable in this state.

BOYCE: However, Kafer does not think Colorado is anywhere near a place politically where an outright abortion ban could pass. There is a potential state ballot measure gathering signatures for that right now. It's one of many ways the abortion debate could play out across the nation this November. For NPR News, I'm Dan Boyce in Colorado Springs. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

Dan Boyce moved to the Inside Energy team at Rocky Mountain PBS in 2014, after five years of television and radio reporting in his home state of Montana. In his most recent role as Montana Public Radio’s Capitol Bureau Chief, Dan produced daily stories on state politics and government.