Ralph Z. Hallow of The Washington Times reports on the “unprecedented” move:
In an unprecedented show of opposition to abortion, Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus is delaying the start of the party’s annual winter meeting so he and other committee members can join the March for Life on the National Mall, The Washington Times has learned.
Mr. Preibus, a plain-spoken Greek Orthodox attorney from Wisconsin, will join members of his party’s national committee and thousands of other abortion opponents in the annual right-to-life march scheduled for Jan. 22.
“I saw that there was a real interest among a significant portion of our members to attend and support the Rally for Life,” Mr. Priebus said in an email to The Times. “This is a core principle of our party. It was natural for me to support our members and our principles.”
[…]
Mr. Priebus also decided the RNC will charter a bus to and from the march for those among the RNC’s 168 members who wish to attend, he said.
“I will attend the March for Life and am making a few simple modifications of the schedule and ensuring that the members have safe and adequate transportation to and from the rally,” he explained in his email.
In an email circulated among other members, Alaska RNC memberDebbie Joslin said, “I have served under a number of chairmen and not one of them ever made any opportunity for us to attend the March for Life, and they always scheduled critical meetings for the same time as the March for Life. Big thanks to Reince for standing up for the unborn!”
The chairman’s action is an example of the increasingly bottom-up instead of top-down way the RNC functions.
“When Reince got wind of what members were planning on their own, he e-mailed that he would shift our RNC schedule so we could attend, and he offered that the RNC would get transportation for us,” Missouri GOPChairman Ed Martin said.
This is a real surprise. In the past (before Priebus), pro-lifers often just got lip service from the party and something like this would have been unthinkable. The party coalitions staff in the past often wanted to use pro-lifers to their benefit and not reciprocate.
CLICK LIKE IF YOU’RE PRO-LIFE!
I am probably participating in the March for Life this year and it will be the first time I’ve attended as just a participant since I was busy doing things for work every time I’ve attended since 2010.
For more information: MarchForLife.org
LifeNews Note: Jeff Quinton is the author of the Quinton Report, based in Maryland, where this originally appeared.
