Joint Open Letter to State Lawmakers: Criminalizing Women Who Have Abortions Is Not Pro-Life

§ 1 Key language

“we do not support any measure seeking to criminalize or punish women and we stand firmly opposed to include such penalties in legislation” National Right to Life Committee, May 12, 2022

§ 2 Scorecard

Composite 9 of 12 — explicit opposition to a tenet. Each dimension is scored 0 (none), 1 (implied) or 2 (explicit); the rationale column is the editor's one-line reason for every non-zero score.

Dimension	Score	Meaning at this score	Rationale
D1 Exceptions	0	None	—
D2 Immunity for the mother fault line	2	Explicitly opposes prosecuting or criminalizing women	Explicit blanket immunity for the mother, contra equal protection.
D3 Incrementalism	1	By implication — a funding, drug, research, Hyde or Title X letter that takes no abolition position	Endorses incremental measures.
D4 Opposition to abolition or equal-protection bills fault line	2	Explicitly opposes or lobbies against one	Deployed to defeat Louisiana HB 813 and later cited against ND and SC equal-protection measures.
D5 Framing	2	Explicit leave-it-to-the-states, court-viability or electoral-pragmatism framing	Frames Dobbs as returning policy to legislators; "durable" policy.
D6 Secular framing	2	Wholly secular, legal, fiscal, medical or political argument	Secular, coalition-of-organizations framing.

§ 3 Signatories

84 signature rows · 70+ orgs / 82 reps reported by the letter · Complete from letter text. Full signature block transcribed from the letter itself. Rows are transcribed as printed, in the order they appear; names link to the person, organizations to the organization.

#	Name as printed	Title as printed	Organization as printed
1	Carol Tobias	President	National Right to Life
2	Marjorie Dannenfelser	President	Susan B. Anthony List
3	Archbishop William E. Lori	Chairman, Committee on Pro-Life Activities	U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops
4	Eric J. Scheidler	Executive Director	Pro-Life Action League
5	Dr. Gregory P. Seltz	Executive Director	Lutheran Center for Religious Liberty
6	Ralph Reed	Founder and Chairman	Faith & Freedom Coalition
7	Timothy R. Head	Executive Director	Faith & Freedom Coalition
8	Aaron Lara	Presidente	Congreso Iberoamericano por la Vida y la Familia
9	José L. González	Founder and President	Semilla
10	Marie Ashby	Executive Director	National Association of Pro-Life Nurses
11	Destiny Herndon-De La Rosa	Founder and President	New Wave Feminists
12	Catherine Glenn Foster	President and CEO	Americans United for Life
13	Jeanne F. Mancini	President	March for Life Action
14	Brent Leatherwood	Acting President	Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, Southern Baptist Convention
15	Bradley Mattes	President	Life Issues Institute
16	Kelsey Hazzard	President	Secular Pro-Life
17	Kristen Day	Executive Director	Democrats for Life of America
18	O. Carter Snead, J.D.	Director	de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture, University of Notre Dame
19	Terrisa Bukovinac	Founder and Executive Director	Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising
20	Herb Geraghty	Executive Director	Rehumanize International
21	Joe Kral	President and Editor-in-Chief	Society of St. Sebastian
22	Cheryl Lewis	Director	Alabama Citizens for Life
23	Karen Lewis	Director	Pro-Life Alaska
24	Luis Howard	Director	Arizona State Right to Life
25	Rose Mimms	Executive Director	Arkansas Right to Life
26	Brian Johnston	Director	California Pro-Life Council
27	Chad Schnitger	President	Faith & Freedom Coalition of California
28	Steven Ertelt	Director	Colorado Citizens for Life
29	Steven Ertelt	Editor	LifeNews.com
30	Suzy Smith	President	Pro-Life Council of Connecticut
31	Rita Rinaldi	Director	Delaware Citizens for Life
32	Ross T. Gillfillan	National Director	DC Metro Life Alliance
33	Derrick Jones	President	DC Metro Life Alliance
34	Hon. Lynda Bell	President	Florida Right to Life
35	Martha Zoller	Executive Director	Georgia Life Alliance
36	Janet Hochberg	Director	Hawaii Life Alliance
37	Kerry Uhlenkott	Legislative Coordinator	Right to Life of Idaho
38	Dawn Behnke, Esq.	President	Illinois Federation for Right to Life
39	Mike Fichter	President and CEO	Indiana Right to Life
40	Kristi Judkins	Executive Director	Iowa Right to Life
41	Steve Scheffler	President	Iowa Faith & Freedom Coalition
42	Maggie DeWitte	Executive Director	Pulse Life Advocates
43	Mary Wilkinson	President	Kansans for Life
44	Carol Dengel	National Director	Kansans for Life
45	Hon. Addia K. Wuchner, R.N.	Executive Director and CEO	Kentucky Right to Life
46	Benjamin Clapper	Executive Director	Louisiana Right to Life
47	Hon. Karen Vachon	President and Executive Director	Maine Right to Life
48	Darla St. Martin	President	Maryland Right to Life
49	Myrna Maloney Flynn	President and CEO	Massachusetts Citizens for Life
50	Barb Listing	President	Right to Life of Michigan
51	Scott Fischbach	Executive Director	Minnesota Citizens Concerned for Life
52	Barbara Whitehead	Director	Mississippi Right to Life
53	Susan Klein	Executive Director	Missouri Right to Life
54	Medora Nagle	Director	Right to Life of Montana
55	Sandy Danek	Executive Director	Nebraska Right to Life
56	Melissa Clement	Executive Director	Nevada Right to Life
57	Lance Lemmonds	President	Nevada Faith & Freedom Coalition
58	Roger Stenson	President	New Hampshire Citizens for Life
59	Anne M. Perone, Esq.	President	New Jersey Committee for Life
60	Angie Smith	President	Right to Life Committee of New Mexico
61	Ethel Maharg	Executive Director	Right to Life Committee of New Mexico
62	Anne LeBlanc	Chairman	New York State Right to Life
63	Bill Pincus, M.D.	President	North Carolina Right to Life
64	Barbara Holt	National Director	North Carolina Right to Life
65	Jason Williams	Executive Director	North Carolina Faith & Freedom Coalition
66	McKenzie McCoy	Executive Director	North Dakota Right to Life
67	Michael V. Ciccocioppo	Executive Director	Pennsylvania Pro-Life Federation
68	Christopher Merola	Executive Director	Pennsylvania Faith & Freedom Coalition
69	Mike Gonidakis	President	Ohio Right to Life
70	Tony Lauinger	State Chairman	Oklahomans for Life
71	Lois Anderson	Executive Director	Oregon Right to Life
72	Barth Bracy	Executive Director	Rhode Island State Right to Life
73	Lisa Van Riper	President	South Carolina Citizens for Life
74	Holly Gatling	Executive Director	South Carolina Citizens for Life
75	Dale Bartscher	Executive Director	South Dakota Right to Life
76	Valerie Johnson	National Director	South Dakota Right to Life
77	Stacy Dunn	President	Tennessee Right to Life
78	Mark Hoffman, Ph.D.	Director	Right to Life of Utah
79	Mary Hahn Beerworth	Executive Director	Vermont Right to Life Committee
80	Olivia Turner	President	Virginia Society for Human Life
81	Esther Ripplinger	President & CEO	Human Life of Washington
82	Wanda Franz, Ph.D.	President	West Virginians for Life
83	Heather Weininger	Executive Director	Wisconsin Right to Life
84	Larry Hell	President	Wyoming Citizens for Life

§ 4 Organizations on this letter

77 distinct organizations and 83 named individuals, after normalizing renamed and affiliated entities.

Organizations

§ 5 Sources

Letter/statement text read from the organization’s own document.

nrlc.org/communications/rele…https://nrlc.org/communications/releases/2022/051222openletter/

Primary source

nrlc.org/uploads/communicati…https://www.nrlc.org/uploads/communications/051222coalitionlettertostates.pdf

Secondary

catholicnewsagency.com/news/251217https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/251217

Secondary

§ 6 Notes

Signatures as printed in the letter (user transcription verified against NRLC release).

Legacy ID in the earlier research report: L01.

Editorial note The rubric records distance from the standard published by Abolitionists Rising, not a moral verdict; every organization scored here regards itself as pro-life. Scores are judgment calls applied consistently by the published rubric; a disagreement is a disagreement with the rubric's conventions, not with an individual cell.