And we have Alexandra DeSanctis to prove it.
When I want to know the truth about some abortion-related controversy in America, I read National Review.
I know what you’re thinking: “Rich, you’re the editor in chief, of course you read National Review.”
Well, true, but I still find no other source out there that is as acute and reliable on the topic as the one you’re reading right now.
In fact, I don’t think there’s any general-interest publication in America that publishes as much, as consistently, of such stellar quality on this foundational issue as we do.
Just this year we’ve published scores of pieces, and it’s only May.
If you want to know the real import of what Ralph Northam said in his infamous radio interview, if you want to know the consequences of extremist pro-abortion legislation in places such as New York, if you want to know the truth about the heartbeat bills, if you want to know the real state of the law, if, in short, you want to know about this issue in all its moral and legal permutations, you must read NR.
If this coverage means anything to you, I humbly ask that you considered supporting it at whatever level you can.
We publish the work of Ramesh Ponnuru and David French, who are one-man truth squads on this issue. We publish the work of John McCormack, the only national political reporter in America who consistently holds the feet of pro-abortion politicians to the fire.
But I mostly want to bring to your attention one of our journalists in particular.
If you asked me what we especially need in this moment when abortion policy has a new salience — when the Left is all-in on a no-restrictions absolutism and when Roe might be in play — I’d say a talented young woman who is passionate about the pro-life cause, extremely knowledgeable, prolific, combative when necessary, and utterly, completely fearless.
In other words, I’d say we need Alexandra DeSanctis.
And fortunately, we have her. If we didn’t, we would’ve had to invent her in a laboratory.
A goodly portion of those articles I mentioned above were written by Xan (as we call her). She follows this debate obsessively. She lets no BS pass, and is the greatest friend pro-life legislators and advocates have.
She is extremely versatile. She can write long-form reports on the story behind the Trump administration’s stalwart pro-life policy-making and quick-hit blog posts on the outrage of the hour. She does videos and podcasts, and takes no guff on Twitter.
We’d like to take credit for “discovering” Xan, but it was more like out of Notre Dame, she discovered us. What we’ve done is give her a platform and a lot of running room as she’s done the rest.
We’ve been lucky that for about 60 years now such talented young journalists have been finding us. Few things were more gratifying to WFB than growing young talent, and it’s remained a priority of ours to this day.
It’s just another reason you should consider supporting what we do — it’s not just for us, it’s for the budding young conservatives who are reading us in high school (as I did) who someday might work here and make a difference for the cause.
When you support National Review, you support life. When you support National Review, you support Alexandra DeSanctis. When you support National Review, you support opportunities for young journalists who will influence our public debate for years to come.
After Roe v. Wade, we pro-lifers were always supposed to go away. We were on the wrong side of history. The tide of public opinion was sweeping us away. Social issues were costing the Republicans and had to be jettisoned (as we were told in “the autopsy” and countless other campaign post-mortems).
We never accepted that and never will. We never stopped making the case, not in 1973, not now.
Below is the entire list of our abortion coverage so far this year as of a couple of days ago, and it’s already out of date. Please consider what these pieces are worth to you. Maybe it’s nothing. Fine. But I expect it’s very important to a lot of you, so I ask you to consider chipping in on the basis of this coverage. Maybe you want to count the pieces accordingly, and think of each piece as worth $.01, or $.10, or $10.
Whatever it is, we will be very grateful and it will go to supporting a publication that has kept the faith on this issue for a long time and is committed to continuing to do so for as long as necessary.
Thank you very much.