NARAL Launches New Six-Figure Ad Campaign, Demanding Congressmen in Swing Districts Oppose Anti-Choice Tax Bill

Today, NARAL is rolling out a new six-figure digital ad campaign demanding that the GOP remove dangerous, ideological personhood language from their tax plan. NARAL is taking aim at a provision in the new tax plan that allows 529s to be established for an “unborn child.” The ads, which will run on the homepages of state papers, Facebook, and Twitter, pressure Representatives into taking their anti-choice ideology out of the bill.

An example of the ads can be found here and here.

“This provision preys on the dream so many Americans have- to make college even a little bit more affordable for their children – while doing nothing of the sort. It’s a cynical bait and switch to insert language so radical that even voters in red states have rejected it. The GOP’s goal is to ban abortion; they know they can’t do that head on, so they’re using the tax code. This charade takes the horror of this tax bill to an entirely new level,” said NARAL President Ilyse Hogue.

This is the first time “personhood” language has made it into the tax code, leaving the door open for future laws to use the same, ideological definition of when life begins. As shown in recent ballot measures across multiple states, the public largely does not support the concept of personhood–in red, purple, and blue states–and this attack on reproductive rights is out of step with legal precedent, science, and public opinion.

This provision is also wholly unnecessary, as Americans can already set up 529s for the children they wish to have. A 529 in a parent’s name can be transferred to a child once that child is born.

In order to push back on the GOP’s insertion of their anti-choice ideology, the campaign will target Congressmen in key 2018 districts: Rod Blum (IA-1), Steve Knight (CA-25), Darrell Issa (CA-49), Paul Ryan (WI-1), Erik Paulsen (MN-3), Mike Coffman (CO-6), Barbara Comstock (VA-10), Karen Handel (GA-6), and Pat Meehan (PA-7). The ads will run in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, as well as on Facebook and Twitter.