Vice President Mike Pence to become highest political official to address March for Life

(Image credit: Alex Wong/Getty Images)

published 27 January 2017

Vice President Mike Pence will become the highest political official to ever address the annual March for Life on Friday as thousands of abortion opponents arrive in Washington, D.C., to protest the 1973 Supreme Court decision legalizing the practice. Top White House adviser Kellyanne Conway will also join Pence at the demonstrations.

"A lot of people are gonna be showing up," President Donald Trump told Republicans on Thursday. "You know, the press never gives them the credit that they deserve. They'll have 300, 400, 500, 600 thousand people. You won't even read about it."

The march will unavoidably draw comparisons to last weekend's Women's March, which drew half a million people to Washington; organizers for the March for Life expect a more modest 50,000. But "I don't think that these numbers are the most important," March for Life president Jeanne Mancini told The New York Times. " The number most important for us is 58 million, which is the number of Americans that have been lost to abortion."

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Jeva Lange was the executive editor at TheWeek.com. She formerly served as The Week's deputy editor and culture critic. She is also a contributor to Screen Slate, and her writing has appeared in The New York Daily News, The Awl, Vice, and Gothamist, among other publications. Jeva lives in New York City. Follow her on Twitter.