Christian leaders making good on 'threat legal scholars have been warning about': reporter

Although President Donald Trump tried to soften his party's image on abortion rights during the 2024 presidential campaign, many of his hardcore evangelical supporters are pushing his administration to take drastic action to curb access to abortion medications.

Mother Jones reporter Julianne McShane flags a letter sent this week from major anti-abortion activists to the Department of Justice requesting the enforcement of the Comstock Act to prevent the distribution of the drug mifepristone.

"This appears to be the first step towards a threat legal scholars have been warning about: a de facto federal abortion ban," commented McShane on BlueSky.

ALSO READ: 'Risk of overreach': Even some of RFK Jr.'s own advisers getting nervous about his plans

McShane also adds that the anti-abortion groups' letter "contains misinformation [they] have long peddled about abortion pills, including that they enable intimate partner violence—an argument they also included in friend of the court briefs in the abortion pill case earlier this year."

The Heritage Foundation, which created the highly controversial Project 2025, has for years been advocating for using the Comstock Act, which banned the mailing of "obscene" material, to enact a de facto national abortion ban without requiring an act of Congress.

While the United States Department of Justice in the past has not held the Heritage Foundation's interpretation of the law, that could easily change with new DOJ personnel who are more sympathetic to the anti-abortion cause.