Pro-life leaders react with alarm to Binnie’s abortion comments

New Hampshire’s pro-life community is reacting with alarm to Republican Senate Hopeful Bill Binnie’s answer to a question as to why he is pro-choice.

“I am greatly saddened by Mr. Binnie’s remarks,” said Barbara Hagan, a 40-year veteran of the pro-life movement and former President of New Hampshire Right to Life. “I could never decide whether or not one of my 7 children should die based on whether or not I could afford them.”

“Someone ought to tell Mr. Binnie that the decision to terminate a life is not a business decision as he so frankly describes it,” said Kevin Smith, President of Cornerstone Policy Research, a conservative think tank.

At issue are Binnie’s remarks delivered on January 16th to a small group of Republican voters in Hillsborough County. A video of Binnie’s remarks surfaced on the Internet over the weekend and is appended below.

“We had a child. We had a pregnancy, my wife and I. I don’t tell this story publicly as a rule. I’ll tell it now. It’s a small group. I’m pro-choice because we had a positive amniocentesis test. We were going to have a special needs child,” said Binnie when asked by an audience member about social issues.

“One of the things that happens when you realize you’re going to have a special needs child is they sit you down and you learn [how] it impacts the other children in your family,” Binnie continued. “Who’s going to take care of that child?”

“Now in my wife’s case, in my case, we could afford it and I though about it and we had that child,” he concluded. “It made me come to that other intersection of what matters. I’m pro-choice.”

Binnie also explains in the video that the test result was a false positive and that his child was born “healthy.”

Binnie has already spent hundred of thousands of dollars on television and direct mail advertising touting his business experience in his quest for the Republican nomination in the race to replace the retiring Sen. Judd Gregg.

“Mr. Binnie seems to be suggesting that we ought to support abortion on demand so that those who cannot ‘afford’ a special needs child have the option of terminating the pregnancy, as if they were some commodity like race cars,” said Smith. “At the very least, his comments seem cold if not ignorant. Is Mr. Binnie not aware of the many organizations such as Care Net Pregnancy Centers or Catholic Charities who work with families that find themselves in this very situation?”

“Children can also become disabled after birth, so the standard of economics is a very dangerous one,” added Hagan. “Mr. Binne is clearly stuck in economics, but fails to see that unborn children have a right to life, regardless of whether or not we can afford to have them or support their frail and innocent lives.”

When invited to elaborate on his answer, Binnie’s campaign issued a prepared statement from the candidate. “Our family, when faced with the toughest of personal decisions, chose life. I would hope that everyone, regardless of their economic situation, would also choose life, as we did.”

Team Binnie also appeared to make a high stakes political gamble by invoking the success of newly elected Massachusetts Republican Senator Scott Brown. “My stand on this issue is the same as Scott Brown’s, a man who was able to rally and unite behind him a coalition of conservatives, Republicans and independents on both sides of this question,” he said.

But Binnie’s situation is not exactly analogous to Brown’s.

Brown was an elected state Senator who ran uncontested for the Republican nomination for a Senate seat that had become the nation’s flashpoint for President Barack Obama’s health care plan. Binnie, a political novice, is involved in what will become a protracted primary battle against two well-known pro-life candidates. Ovide Lamontagne has been a leader of the pro-life movement for decades. And as the state’s Attorney General Kelly Ayotte defended New Hampshire’s parental notification law against Planned Parenthood before the U.S. Supreme Court.