US Christian conservative groups escalate support for UK anti-abortion protesters

The US escalation in intervening in the prosecution of British anti-abortion protesters comes after the White House took the highly unusual step of criticising the UK for a “worsening” human rights situation, citing “safe access zones” around clinics as an area of concern.

On Monday, JD Vance hosted Danny Kruger, a Conservative MP, and James Orr, a religious philosopher influential in Reform UK, who share the vice-president’s opposition to abortion. Orr does not think abortion should be allowed at any stage of foetal development, including those pregnancies resulting from rape.

The interventions followed a rise over the past few years in donations from US Christian conservatives to UK networks that seek to stop women having access to abortion.

An Observer investigation of funding patterns, protest materials and so-called pregnancy crisis centres reveals a network of US-based organisations and a coordinated rise in funding from across the Atlantic to push back on British abortion rights.

An influential US anti-abortion legal advocacy group has told The Observer it supports people prosecuted for protesting outside clinics because the UK is an important jurisdiction as a permanent member of the UN, and “it carries a lot of weight with human rights bodies”.

In February, Vance told the Munich Security Conference that UK prosecutions showed a “backslide away from conscience rights” and a “retreat” from free speech. He also highlighted the case of Adam Smith-Connor who was convicted last October of breaching a designated “safe zone” outside a Bournemouth abortion clinic.

That month, in response to the rise in activity of anti-abortion groups, it was made illegal in the UK to protest within 150 metres of an abortion clinic under the 2023 Public Order Act. Local councils have also enforced no-protest zones through public spaces protection orders (PSPO) since 2018.

Following Vance’s speech, the US Department of State has made a series of highly unusual interventions in cases such as Smith-Connor’s. In March, senior state department officials publicly stated they were “monitoring” the case of Livia Tossici-Bolt, a retired medical scientist who was found guilty of protesting outside the same Bournemouth clinic. A state department spokesperson told The Observer the “persecution of silent prayer” was a “concerning departure from the shared values that ought to underpin US-UK relations”.

“It is common sense that standing silently and offering consensual conversation does not constitute harm,” the spokesperson said.

A UK government spokesperson said: “Free speech is vital for democracy including here in the UK, and we are proud to uphold freedoms while keeping citizens safe.”

Research by Amnesty International UK has tracked the growth and funding of what it calls a “fast-growing and well-funded” network of “anti-rights” groups “determined” to roll back existing human rights protections for women and LGBTQ+ people.

The highest spenders among these organisations are those with new UK branches, spending a total of more than £34m. They include Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), which financially supports and provides legal counsel for Tossici-Bolt and Smith-Connor.

A lawyer representing Tossici-Bolt and Smith-Connor said the cases are “not strictly about abortion” but “a free speech issue first and foremost”.

Lawyers acting on behalf of ADF were instrumental in the US supreme court case that overturned Roe vs Wade in June 2022 and removed the constitutional right to abortion.

Since opening a London office in 2017, ADF’s UK branch has received more than £4.9m in unrestricted donations, largely from its US arm. According to filings with the Charity Commission between 2019 and 2023, ADF increased its UK spending by 187% to more than £1.13m.

Chiara Capraro, Amnesty’s gender justice programme director, said it was clear that “anti-right” organisations such as ADF are “mobilising, growing and influencing at an alarming rate”. Lorcan Price, legal counsel for ADF International and part of Tossici-Bolt and Smith-Connor’s defence team, told The Observer the UK entity of ADF was a “legally separate organisation” and “not directed” from its US base in Scottsdale, Arizona.

However, Price said a meeting held in London in March – which included senior state department officials, ADF representatives and Tossici-Bolt – was set up by the department through his US colleagues.

Price raised the protest cases with delegates from the Republican-led House Judiciary Committee when they visited Westminster last month and briefed the US ambassador to the UK, Warren Stephens, on his clients.

When asked how the vice president had come to know about Smith-Connor’s case, Price said he “didn’t know” how Vance’s staffers had come across it “but “couldn’t say for sure” that nobody in ADF’s US team was involved in bringing it to his attention. “Like, I mean, come on, seriously. It’s a small world, they probably did,” he added.

ADF is listed among the contributors to Project 2025, the rightwing policy initiative written in preparation for Trump’s administration. Other prominent US figures associated with ADF include Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson, Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett and Senator Josh Hawley.

ADF’s legal team in London is seeking to appeal Tossici-Bolt and Smith-Connor’s convictions in a crown court hearing later this year. “As long as the authorities keep prosecuting these people, we'll keep defending them,” said Price, “and at a certain point in time hopefully a court somewhere will say, this is just wrong.”

Kuljit Bhogal KC, a PSPO expert, said she couldn’t comment on ongoing cases that “it is wrong to suggest PSPOs are an infringement of human rights”. , “PSPOs ensure public spaces can be used by everyone without fear, they do this by placing controls on activities which are having a detrimental impact.” Amnesty has also identified another area of increased US spending in the UK: “crisis pregnancy centres” run by anti-abortion organisations.

Originating in the 1960s in the US after abortion was legalised, these centres are often unregulated helplines, websites or “clinics” that claim to provide neutral advice but actually aim to dissuade people from accessing abortion services.

The NHS website for abortion states that crisis pregnancy centres may offer pregnancy counselling but warns they “may not offer you balanced or accurate advice” and cannot refer women for an abortion. A spokesperson for the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS), the UK’s leading abortion provider, said these centres can cause significant harm. Women are deterred from having an abortion with false and misleading information about the physical and mental harms of the procedure, they said.

BPAS, which runs the clinic outside which Tossici-Bolt and Smith-Connor protested, warned it is now “seeing a much more professionalised crisis pregnancy centre operation”, which it says may be due to the influence of US organisations and the result of increased funding.

Louise McCudden, the UK head of external affairs at MSI Reproductive Choices, another major UK abortion provider, said the lack of regulation on crisis pregnancy centres was concerning. “There should, at the very least, be greater transparency.

“Anyone seeking advice or information deserves to know whether they are speaking to someone they can trust, or someone with an agenda,” she said.

When Tossici-Bolt was issued with a fixed penalty notice in March 2023, she was holding a sign stating: “Here to talk, if you want.” However, images of her protesting in 2021 and 2022 show her holding a sign with a number for a crisis pregnancy centre. It is run by the Good Counsel Network, which says it is a “life-affirming women’s organisation which offers moral support, medical information, legal advice and practical help to women seeking abortion”.

The network’s website claims that abortion “carries serious risks” to health, including increased risk of miscarriage, sterility and “post abortion syndrome”. This condition, which is not recognised as a legitimate one by health professions, originated in the US in the 1970s.

Between 2019 and 2023, the network’s funding rose by 30% to more than £500,000, according to Charity Commission filings.

Its founder and director, Clare McCullough, told The Observer that it offers “real help, friendship and practical support to expectant mothers facing difficulty. That’s it. That’s what we do”.

The UK’s first use of a PSPO around an abortion clinic was in London after women complained of “intimidation, harassment and distress” by Good Counsel Network campaigners.

A leaflet that Tossici-Bolt can be seen holding in photographs outside the Bournemouth clinic before the buffer zone was introduced includes an unattributed quote stating “it was harder to get over the abortion than the rape”, and unfounded claims that abortion increases the risk of breast cancer and suicide.

An ADF spokesperson said it has more than 750,000 supporters worldwide and receives donations from more than 107 countries, including the UK. They added that the donations support its “advocacy efforts in defence of fundamental freedoms”. The central website for ADF states that the organisation “plays the long game… that’s why we pursue strategic victories that will bring lasting change in law and culture”.

Photograph by Mark Reinstein, Corbis/Getty