Exposing the abortion industry connections behind Yahoo! Finance’s pregnancy center hit piece

A recent Yahoo! Finance hit piece attacking Heartbeat International and pro-life pregnancy help centers (PRCs) generally, conveniently failed to mention the pro-abortion bias of Equity Forward, cited by the media outlet as the source of the information provided about PRCs. The choice to exclude such important information appeared a deliberate move by Yahoo! Finance’s Senior Editor and article author Sandra Salathe.

In her article, entitled, “America is facing a diaper crisis, and the anti-abortion movement is making it worse,” Salathe’s bias was evident immediately, referring to Heartbeat International (which oversees over 3,000 pro-life pregnancy help center affiliates worldwide) as “anti-abortion centers (AACs),” or as she put it, “an AAC giant.”

The fact is that Salathe’s own pro-abortion bias has been openly displayed in her social media accounts online.

Salathe, however, chose not to provide certain information on the pro-abortion group Equity Forward.

What is Equity Forward?

Equity Forward (EF) was founded in 2017 and launched in 2018 with little fanfare, yet managed to warrant a mention by The Hill.  The organization’s website “about us” page says, “Equity Forward is an accountability organization that produces investigative research on domestic and global human rights, gender equity and sexual and reproductive health, rights, and justice.”

But EF is anything but “accountable” when it comes to disclosing its own pro-abortion bias.

Equity Forward operates the website “ProlifeLies.org,” a misleading name whose purpose seems to be to malign pro-life organizations such as Heartbeat International as well as Live Action, among others. The website’s “about us” page states, “Pro-Lies.org, a project of the accountability group Equity Forward, aims to expose the extremist anti-abortion organizations that wield influence over government and policy at the state, federal and international levels.”

Equity Forward itself is a project of Hopewell Fund, which has taken an interest in a non-profit media start-up and is also financially supporting abortion facilities through an “Abortion Delivery’s Business Sustainability Project,” financed in part by these abortion supporting organizations:

• William and Flora Hewlett Foundation

• Packard Foundation

 Hopewell Fund’s 2019 990 tax filings with the IRS reveals massive support for abortion organizations:

• A Woman’s Choice of Jacksonville 

• Abortion Access for All

• Allentown Women’s Center

• Carolina Abortion Fund

• Center for Reproductive Rights

• Family Planning Associates Medical Group

• Feminist Women’s Health Center, Inc.

• NARAL Pro-Choice America

• Preterm Cleveland

• Red River Women’s Clinic

• Regents of the University California San Francisco

• Trust Women Foundation

• Whole Woman’s Health Alliance

In 2017, the group funded:

• Desert Star Family Planning

• Boulder Valley Women’s Health Center

• Campaign for Accountability

• A Capital Women’s Health Clinic

• Emma Goldman Clinic

• Moms Rising Education Fund

• Red River Women’s Clinic

• Preterm

And Hopewell Fund‘s 2016 990 shows funding to multiple abortion facility chains and more:

• Hope Clinic for Women

• Trust Women Foundation

• Whole Women’s Surgical Center

Hopewell Fund grants to abortion clinics 2016

The Equity Forward “TEAM”

A previous review from Live Action News uncovered the fact that Equity Forward’s Senior Advisor is a abortion activist Mary Alice Carter. Her ties to abortion have since been scrubbed by the falsely dubbed “accountability organization.” But a 2019 archived page reveals that Carter “served as the interim vice president for communications at Planned Parenthood Federation of America. She has also worked for Physicians for Reproductive Health, the National Institute for Reproductive Health and NARAL Pro-Choice New York.”

Carter’s career trajectory on her LinkedIn page reveals that she left her position as Interim Vice President of Communications for Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) in 2017 when she joined Equity Forward in its earliest phase. Her LinkedIn page states that for nearly three years (2013-2016) she served as Senior Director of Communications for Physicians for Reproductive Health (PRH). In 2009, Carter defended “partial birth” (D&X) abortion (a violent abortion procedure during which a baby is partially delivered alive before its brain tissue is suctioned out) on Fox’s Bill O’Reilly show as the Director of NARAL Pro-Choice New York.

Watch that exchange below:

NARAL Pro-Choice New York on O'Reilly

In 2018, Carter told an audience that people need to “get comfortable using the word ‘abortion’,” and she also admitted, “I’ve had an abortion.”

Carter’s Twitter page (accessed 10/11/2022) states that she is currently the Sr. Advisor of Equity Forward; however, her LinkedIn page reveals that she has added the role of Vice President of ConwayStrategic, LLC to her resume. Her leadership role with Equity Forward appears to have been continued, according to a 10/11/2022 visit to Equity Forward ‘s “team” page where none of Carter’s previously mentioned pro-abortion bias is disclosed.

EF’s website now simply reads, “Mary Alice Carter is senior advisor to Equity Forward. She has more than two decades of experience in the reproductive rights and health movements designing and managing effective earned and paid media campaigns.”

So much for accountability.

EF’s former Communications Assistant Alexa Barrett previously worked for the ACLU as well as Planned Parenthood of Southern New England. Former EF Senior Researcher Kayla Hancock previously worked for the Democratic National Committee and Hillary for America. Former Equity Forward director Molly Bangs once stated on her blog that she has “held internships at the Rockefeller Foundation and the Aspen Institute.”

On April 30, Bangs stepped down from EF and has been replaced by Ashley Underwood, whose previous employment included NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio, according to LinkedIn and the Equity Forward website.

Research Assistant Julia Bourkland also has ties to the pro-abortion organization, having worked as a phone canvasser for NARAL Pro-Choice America, according to her LinkedIn Page. However, EF seems to be intentionally covering up Bourkland’s ties to NARAL — which was founded by racist eugenicists like Planned Parenthood — by failing to disclose her two-year NARAL employment on their website. 

In 2019, EF’s Senior Advisor Mary Alice Carter described EF as being “founded as a opposition research reproductive rights organization,” later claiming that Equity Forward looks “solely at the background” of pro-life groups.

Equity Forward's Alice Mary Carter On Attacks On Abortion Rights

Equity Forward has been less than the accountable organization they portray themselves to be — and instead, as Carter described them, EF is functioning and was founded as an opposition research arm for the abortion lobby.

As such, it was not responsible journalism but instead abortion propaganda for Yahoo! Finance (or any media outlet) to cite Equity Forward without full disclosure of the organization’s clear pro-abortion bias.