President Obama Names Head of Fake Catholic Pro-Life Group to Top HHS Post
by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
June 5, 2009
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) — President Barack Obama has rewarded the head of a fake pro-life Catholic group that was responsible for misleading voters about his abortion position to a top Health and Human Services post. The nomination is seen as political payback for Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good (CACG).
Obama named former CACG executive director Alexia Kelley to head the Center for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships at the Department of Health and Human Services.
Kelley is also a former advisor to the John Kerry presidential campaign and Kerry is a strong abortion advocate.
CACG came under fire from pro-life groups for supporting Obama’s presidential candidacy his pro-abortion policies that are at odds with Catholic pro-life teaching. it recently ran an advertisement defending Notre Dame’s decision to award Obama and allow him to speak to graduates.
Kelley has also called for weakening pro-life laws on abortion, claiming they aren’t sufficient to protect unborn children.
In A Nation for All, she said, "legal status doesn’t always realize the goal that we desire" and called pro-life advocates "culture warriors."
Despite the selection, CACG’s claim to be pro-life is enough for the pick to draw opposition from abortion advocates.
"Catholics for Choice" has released a statement in response saying Kelley is wrong for the position because she doesn’t fully support the pro-abortion view.
"We need them to believe in men’s and women’s capacity to make moral decisions about their own lives. Unfortunately, as seen from her work at CACG, Ms. Kelley does not fit the bill," Jon O’Brien, president of the group, added.
Jennifer Goff, a spokeswoman for CACG, responded to the criticism by criticizing pro-life advocates.
She told Salon that CACG is a group that, supposedly unlike pro-life organizations, isn’t "resorting to spurious attacks launched by those who are more concerned with inflaming the culture wars than effecting positive change."
Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good has also been criticized for releasing the results of a study falsely claiming that pro-life laws like informed consent and parental notification do little to reduce abortions. Political science professor Michael New has taken the group to task.
CACG also released a voter guide in 2006 that was condemned by pro-life groups for misleading Catholics on abortion.
The CACG booklet argued “we often must vote for candidates who hold the ‘wrong’ Catholic positions on some issues in order to maximize the good our vote achieves in other areas.”
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