A competing pair of billboards on I-40 and I-27 in Amarillo, Texas, has caught the eye of local residents in recent weeks.
One of the billboards, funded by the extremist “Shout Your Abortion” campaign, aims to tell women they still have “options” if they are pregnant in a pro-life state like Texas — but the only option they mean is abortion. In response, pro-life Project Destiny has put up its own billboards, urging people to protect preborn babies and to turn up to vote this November.
“I think this is a perfect time for Amarillo citizens to get out and speak, and speak their convictions and speak what they’re about and speak up for the little ones that didn’t get a chance to speak,” Cassie Greene of Project Destiny told KFDA.
While the war of the billboards promotes differing views on abortion, they’re also persuading voters about a new ballot measure. This November, Amarillo voters will decide whether the city should become a Sanctuary City for the Unborn.
The proposal was brought before the mayor and Amarillo City Council earlier this year but, in a stunning reversal of promises, the mayor and council rejected the ordinance. Council member Tom Scherlen expressed concern that the ordinance may affect the local economy, deterring business development in the area and hurting businesses that provide abortion travel, according to the Statesman.
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Despite this, the ordinance appears to have wide citizen support as a citizen initiative petition of over 10,000 signatures — nearly twice the required amount — forced the ordinance onto the November ballot, Live Action News has reported.
The proposed measure would declare Amarillo a Sanctuary City for the Unborn, which would prohibit the manufacture, possession, or distribution of abortion-causing drugs. In addition, it prohibits assisting anyone in obtaining an abortion, the transportation or disposal of the remains of aborted children, and abortion trafficking — that is, traveling in or through the city to obtain an abortion anywhere. Like Texas’ heartbeat law, the ordinance is intended to be enforced via private civil action while excluding the mothers of aborted babies as potential targets.
According to Project Destiny’s website, the proposed ordinance “[does] something that current law in Texas does not and would make Amarillo one of the safest cities in Texas for pregnant mothers and their unborn children.”
Abortion supporters responding to robust pro-life laws and ordinances want to push back against a “culture of fear and secrecy and shame” that surrounds taking the life of a preborn baby. As such, Lindsay London of the Amarillo Reproductive Freedom Alliance is pushing back on efforts to protect preborn babies in the town with efforts like the organization’s billboard declaring “Pregnancy is optional.”
“This is an ordinance that seeks to penalize anyone who helps another person obtain an abortion, including a state where the procedure is legal, so our hope is that all voters educate themselves about Proposition A learn about the harmful impacts of it,” she said.
Yet as Mark Lee Dickson, founder of Sanctuary Cities for the Unborn, told KFDA, “Unborn human beings are made in the image of God and their lives have worth and value. They’re worthy of being protected and right now we have some very strong laws in the state of Texas, but there’s still work to be done.”
If Amarillo passes the measure, it would become the 70th city in the country to do so.
