Scott Beard: A 'staunch position' on abortion informs need for sanctuary city ordinance

Scott Beard, who pastors Fountaingate Fellowship, said he and his church have held a “staunch position” on abortion, from a desire to see Roe v. Wade fall to the recent push to make Abilene a "sanctuary city for the unborn."

Beard, along with political group Project Destiny, was instrumental in a recent petition drive that put before the Abilene City Council an ordinance to give the city that designation.

It took 2½ months, Beard said, and roughly $30,000 in funds, to get the ordinance heard by the council.

The council voted to send it to voters in November.

Knit together

Paraphrasing Psalm 139, Beard said he believes God knew each person even before he or she was born, the Psalm itself saying "you knit me together in my mother’s womb."

That driving, guiding spark means to Beard that abortion is “murder, at the end of the day,” he said.

“(On the) religious side, there's going to be a judgment of God on the shedding of innocent blood,” Beard said. “… Our prayer and our focus for years and years and years has been to see this happen. That's my motivation, obviously."

Texas’ Heartbeat Act, which bans abortion after detection of a fetal heartbeat, was a “great step in the right direction,” Beard said.

“We know that heartbeat, most of the time, is detectable around five or six weeks,” he said.

Abilene's ordinance would fill in the gaps from conception to heartbeat, Beard argues, and would be useful even if Roe v. Wade is rescinded, something a recent leak indicates is the desire of a majority of Supreme Court justices.

“It completely protects the baby from conception,” he said.  “Even with the overturning of Roe v. Wade and everything returning back to states … it's still good for municipalities that to have an ordinance like this in place.”

Beginning of the end?

Beard believes the leak favors to return to abortion regulation to states and indicates “the beginning of the end” at a federal level, though abortion will “still be legal in certain states.”

“It's not like it's going to be completely done away with, (though) I'd like for it to be completely done away with,” Beard said. “We've had a hardline stance on this. Call it religiously motivated, (but) we believe that life is precious and sacred.”

He believes the leaked opinion was “done on purpose to try to make some of these justices back down."

Beard, who has a bobblehead of Donald Trump prominently displayed in his office, believes the reason Donald Trump was elected, in part, was that he would deliberately put in conservative judges “to make sure that Roe v Wade was overturned.”

“The ghost of Donald Trump is still looming around Washington, and thank God for it,” he said. “… I pray these guys hold their ground, stand their ground, and they don't back down and reverse their decision because they're being bullied and intimidated.”

Preventive measures

Beard acknowledged a recent move away from provisions for rape and incest in abortion law, as seen in the Heartbeat Act and in the sanctuary city ordinance being examined by Abilene.

“The life of the mother is the only exception,” he said, acknowledging there are hard issues present in such a stance.

“That's just the way the ordinance is written,” he said. “God forbid that my (own) daughter, I look up and she's in one of those kinds of situations. But you know, two wrongs don't make a right, either. … You have those stories everywhere. Tragic as they are, we've kind of, again, come down on the side of if the mother's life is in danger, then that would be the only exception.”

Asked how one might explain, for example, to a 12-year-old incest survivor the need to carry a child to term, Beard acknowledged he had spent some time trying to think through such conundrums.

“It’s tragic,” he said. “(But) there's a life there that’s still viable and that got created,” he said. “The taking of that life isn't necessarily justified. It's just a hard question. I get it. I get, just from things we've watched over the years, how polarizing this this whole discussion is, even in our own city.”

That includes people who describe themselves as "pro-life" and Christians, he said, some of whom don't agree with the ordinance.

“There have been other leaders, leaders, and other pastors and churches, mainly leadership, that just don't want to get involved politically,” Beard said. “They just have different reasons why they didn't feel like it was a good idea for them to get involved with this. And I respect that.

"I didn't necessarily agree or like it, but there's some of that, so it's even polarizing amongst those who are pro-life.”

Beard confirmed the ordinance’s goal was, in part, to prevent an abortion provider, such as Planned Parenthood, from setting up shop in Abilene.

The city did at one point have a Planned Parenthood clinic. It closed its doors in 2012.

“I think we're silly to think that they wouldn't come back to this market, a growing market, given kind of what's happening everywhere else,” Beard said. “And so, for me, it's more preemptive in terms of what I believe, why I believe this ordinance is good. If we can go in preemptively put an ordinance in place that could keep Planned Parenthood from coming back, then, man, I want to do that.

"I don't want to risk it. Why would we?”

Questions and answers

Asked about public comment that some never had a chance to read the ordinance before signing it, Beard said, “Every petition had an ordinance stapled to it,” per the city’s charter, and said many who signed it did “read it, look at it and highlight it.”

“There’s not one petition that we had signed that did not have an ordinance attached,” he said, adding that paper costs were much of the expense incurred by Project Destiny.

Asked how requirements the ordinance imposes on insurance companies, district attorneys and those who help someone seek an abortion would be enforced, Beard said each would have to be a “per case situation,” and would likely need to be tested real time.

He admitted he didn’t have all those details mentally in place.

“When we get to that point, we'll get to that point,” he said. “We've got a legal document in place to show us kind of how that's going to play out. But yeah, I wouldn't be able to sit here and give you details (about) how I think that might play out because it gets sticky and complicated.”

Tough stance justified?

The text of Abilene's ordinance was written by Mark Lee Dickson of East Texas Right to Life, who has closely shepherded the "sanctuary city for the unborn" movement, along with attorney and former Texas Solicitor General Jonathan F. Mitchell, Beard said.

Mitchell and state Sen. Bryan Hughes worked together in 2020 to craft what became known as the "Heartbeat Act," which shares many similarities.

Beard said he was “OK with the (ordinance’s) language being as tough as it is,” since it is “for the sake of removing all doubt that a baby's life is going to be OK and protected.”

The language will “make folks think twice, for sure, in terms of aiding and abetting” an abortion Beard said.

“I’m just OK with that, because again the point here is saving babies’ lives,” he said.

Asked about an attempt to legislate morality, Beard didn’t budge.

“Morality is morality,” he said. “(And) if morality is protecting innocent lives, yeah, let's legislate morality.”

Beard said that for those trying to decide which way to vote in November, the ordinance is, in his opinion, an opportunity to “take a stand against an atrocity that began in 1973,” and to answer for the “untold millions of babies aborted, mostly for convenience’s sake.”

No matter what the Supreme Court ultimately decides about Roe v. Wade, Beard said, supporting Abilene’s ordinance is “making a difference here.”

It is something he believes will “bring the blessing of God on our community.”

“What better thing to do than to take a stand for life?” he said.

Asked if the initiative could be considered opening the door for similar measures, Beard said if someone “has the drive and initiative” to do what Project Destiny done, they should “knock (themselves) out.”

“Did we set a precedent? We may have, but I won’t apologize about that,” he said. “We were supposed to do it.”

Not a ‘springboard’

Speaking the day before the May 7 Abilene City Council election, Beard said he didn’t personally endorse any of the three candidates running for council that made the sanctuary city ordinance part of their core issues.

He did say the ordinance was not something that should have been used as a “springboard to get elected.”

“Run on your own merits,” he said. “And you can't be one-dimensional. … We’ve got to have (individuals) on the City Council that can negotiate and think through budget issues and think through other issues other than just abortion.”

Making the latter part of their mix, Beard said, is fine.

“But I'll tell you this: If I'm running for City Council, I want to be well versed in a lot of topics, from water to the city to models, roads and all this stuff you’ve got to deal with,” he said. “I would hope that they're well-versed enough that it's not just it's not just the pro-life stance, hoping that that might get them elected. I would hope that they could they help manage the city as a key leader.”

The election ended with incumbents Kyle McAlister and Travis Craver, both of whom voted to pass the ordinance on to voters instead of accepting it outright, winning the day.

Brian Bethel covers city and county government and general news for the Abilene Reporter-News.  If you appreciate locally driven news, you can support local journalists with a digital subscription to ReporterNews.com. 

This article originally appeared on Abilene Reporter-News: Scott Beard: 'Staunch position' informs need for sanctuary city