Yikes! American right-wingers coming for the U.K. next.

[MsAmerica]

They Helped Topple Roe v. Wade. Now Their Sights Are Set on Britain.
An organization that fought abortion rights in the United States is now an unlikely conduit between MAGA Republicans and Britain’s ascendant Reform U.K. party.
By Jane Bradley and Elizabeth Dias

The presence of Mr. Farage, a longtime Trump ally, as the Republicans’ star witness in Washington was not merely a symbol of his growing political clout or the power of conservative populism. Rather, it was the result of a discreet, monthslong campaign by one of America’s most influential conservative Christian groups, famous for being an architect of the effort that helped overturn Roe v. Wade and end the constitutional right to an abortion.

The group, Alliance Defending Freedom, has taken its playbook to Britain and has rapidly established itself as a power broker between the country’s rising populist movement and President Trump’s Washington. They are catalyzing Reform U.K., Britain’s fastest growing political party that is seeking to upend the Conservative Party with an agenda centered on anti-establishment and anti-immigration sentiments. The A.D.F. is guiding its leadership even further to the right, on a conservative Christian agenda similar to the one that is sweeping through the United States...

The A.D.F.’s British arm orchestrated Mr. Farage’s appearance in Congress, reaching out to ask if he would like to give evidence on censorship and passing on his interest to the House Judiciary Committee, which formally invited him, according to both a Reform U.K. and a Republican official. An A.D.F. lawyer testified alongside Mr. Farage in the hearing, together building a case against what they saw as growing government censorship in Europe. A.D.F. officials have also quietly arranged briefings in Britain with visiting congressional leaders. They brokered a secret meeting between Mr. Farage and top State Department officials in London. And in private briefings, they have supplied the Trump administration with attack lines that cast the British government as hostile to free speech.

In Britain it is highly unusual for advocacy groups to hold influence the way they do in the United States....

Britain is, in many ways, an unlikely place for an American anti-abortion organization to build a base and leverage influence. Abortion rights hold overwhelming cross-partisan support and, unlike in the United States, religion plays little role in national politics. But the A.D.F. believes that British politicians, and the public, can be swayed and wants abortion rights to be rolled back, its lawyers said in an interview. More broadly, the group wants to empower conservative Christianity in Europe, and it sees Britain as a key bridgehead.

The A.D.F. has begun its effort with a topic it believes will resonate with British voters: free speech. The group is spearheading an alliance of organizations that argues that Britain’s center-left government is too restrictive on political and religious speech.

For the complete article:

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/13/world/europe/uk-abortion-farage.html

I think this would absolutely explain the rise in anti-abortion rhetoric and trad wife bollocks I’ve seen on this site over the last few months. They’re coming for our rights.

They're definitely gearing up to have influence here... whether they will succeed is another matter but we must be vigilant. And if people like them are funding Reform, Farage should be called out again and again for taking money to advance causes from another country after he went on and on about Britain 'taking back control'. The little toad has even advised the US government to use trade deals to clamp down on free speech (what he calls 'out free speech probelm', in that people have it), so literally telling a foreign power to put pressure on us to change our law to their preference.

These people are definitely using 'free speech' as a Trojan Horse, and by 'free speech' they mean the right to punch downwards and be hateful towards others with no consequence. Not the right to criticise the government, not the right to protest if the cause isn't about scapegoating minority groups.

They know they can't come in with the Christian stuff as that doesn't wash, so they have to find an angle to will chime with the right, who are upset they can't just slur people who they believe are inferior to them these days.

Won't happen here. The US is a far more Christian country than we are.

The Archbishop of Canterbury is pro choice. I don’t think it would gain ground here- unless there was a push to extend it later. I think that would be counterproductive. The push should be to improve services within the current date.

Salami slice tactics worked in the US and they could work here. The written law here is actually much more restrictive than in a lot of US states, and it functions ok for women (mostly) due to a basic unwritten consensus that I think is probably vulnerable if tested. Farage couldn’t give a toss about women or this country as long as Reform’s no doubt spiralling bills are paid, quite obviously.

As for free speech - forced birth enthusiasts have free speech (don’t we know it). The ‘freedom’ to harass women outside medical facilities is rightly not absolute.

I think we can already see the evidence of these influences at work in different ways, and it seems that we have a population that is highly susceptible to manipulation by external actors.

It feels like there is a certain inevitability to it, which is terrifying.

I think it's Labour that don't give a toss about women? Keir Starmer doesn't know what one is and the grooming gang enquiry is not exactly going well.

I've always believed that a woman's right to an abortion was safe in the UK but after all the trans bollocks we've had forced on us, Im not so sure anymore.

I

We’re much less secure than we believe we are. The convention in Parliament that issues of conscience are run as a free vote (ie. no party whipping) is just that, a convention. It has no teeth. If Reform win, have words such allude to abortion rights on the bottom of page 42 of their manifesto (or frankly even if they don’t, that’s a convention too) they can run a whipped vote on this and win it. The Lords could delay it but the lower house takes precedence. The convention that a minister must resign if they lie at the despatch box was repeatedly flouted by Boris Johnson and he just…didn’t resign. And nothing could be done about it.

A bit of an aside, but I do find it puzzling when people align trans people having rights and loss of women's bodily autonomy as political goals... I mean, you do realise the people supporting each of those are at the totally opposite end of the political spectrum? I can't name any person, not even some crank on the internet, let along an actual politician, who supports trans rights and forced birth, so I'm not sure how these things are supposed to be politically aligned.

They aren't aligned, as far as I can see. They are both merely evidence that misogyny is everywhere - on both the left and right of our politics.

Fair point if that is people's view @MrsBennetsPoorNervesAreBack

I agree. Abortion access here is simple but that’s because the law is pretty loosely applied. I’ve had an abortion. I had a call with a nurse where I said I didn’t want to have a baby, and then when I went in to have the procedure (surgical at 6 weeks due to not being able to take the pills) the two doctors’ signatures were done. I imagine they just have a pile of paper to sign off each morning. I certainly didn’t speak to two drs. I spoke to the doctor who did the procedure but he was just explaining what would happen and asking if I was sure, the reason for the abortion didn’t come up. If I’d had pills by post, I assume I wouldn’t have spoken to a dr at any point.

I’m fine with all that and think that’s how it should be, but under the guise of women’s safety, stricter rules could be put in place that, for example, you need to have a separate face to face appointment with two separate drs before they can sign it off. And you could probably tighten up how the criteria is applied fairly simply - I assume mine was done under the criteria of risk to mother’s mental health (I assume most are?). But that wasn’t really tested by the nurse - as it happens, I nearly killed myself with severe PND after the birth of both my DDs, so a third child was a risk to my health and life. But that didn’t come up, I guess it was signed off under the general assumption that an unwanted child is a risk to the mother’s mental health. Which I agree with, but you could tighten that criteria to only be for more demonstrable/diagnosed mental health issues. That was probably what was imagined when the law was first written.

Its needs to be legalised properly.

Being pregnant and giving birth are always more of a risk to a woman that not doing either. This is why nobody should have to do it if they’re not willing and is why the current set up usually works.

I didn’t mention Labour, I mentioned Farage. If there is one woman who has done something concrete to improve the legal setup for abortion in the UK, it’s Stella Creasy.

We are an American vassal in all but name, and no doubt they own more of our country than we do - certainly more than the average working class worker does, thanks to the rentier economy brought in by the boomers we own nothing.

Our government does not act in our favour but in the name of money, preferably foreign money, and men are blaming all the issues on women. The internet fuels the growth of male sexualisation and misogyny.

The epidemic of male violence in Britain is only going to get worse and the push to remove women’s rights will increase.

It may not happen here, but they had a bloody good go at it in the 1980s, I think it was. And a few skirmishes since.

There's no doubt the Overton window is being shoved to the right aggressively with the backing of people and orgs who have the money to do so because things like equity and transparency are a threat to them. It'll be handled differently in the UK though because we just don't have the massive church infrastructure or the people for whom church is all-enveloping. I just could not understand, for example, how America Christians could see Trump as in any way Christian, but I have watched and read quite a lot of material by ex-Evangelical Americans and they make it very clear that what the Pastor says - goes. If your Pastor says Trump is Christ's representitive on Earth, here to combat the satanic Dems - you vote for him. And that's a decent chunk of Americans that applies to.

Here it'll be cloaked in 'it's just common sense' or 'it's a waste of money' and, just occasionally 'this is a Christian country', rather than 'Because Jesus doesn't like it/it's a sin'

Britain is too much of a secular society to support anti abortion. Most people are better educated and anti religion than your average American.

Doubt it will happen here, America is much more religious than the UK

Every day Reform UK give us more reasons to vote against them in future elections.

I’m very GC and about as pro-choice as you can be as well. Because it’s important to me that women’s rights can be described and defended. No man has ever needed an abortion or gone through pregnancy and labour, and its important IMO that that’s clear when we hear from people like James Orr.

My point is that I never imagined the UK would become a country where men could say they've become a woman and trample all over women's rights. If that can happen in the UK then a woman's right to an abortion can be taken away.

In UK and most of Europe Termination of a pregnancy is a legal right even if restricted with a time limit. In the USA it was not a law in the same way.
Whilst I can see that the time limit may be reduced for good reasons of viability I cannot see a political party wanting to put a Bill to cancel that right. It would take forever and monopolise political time.
Will we re-adopt the death penalty? Unlikely.
Will we allow firearms to be more available? No Way.
Do they want us to drive on the other side of the road? 🤔
Let's fix the Trans & Woke problems before we give brain time to anything else.

Abortion is not a legal right in the UK. It is illegal unless 2 doctors say that pregnancy is a risk to your health.