Associated Press stylebook puts politics over facts in new ‘abortion topical guide’
The Associated Press made changes to its style guidelines for journalists last week that demonstrate even further the extent of the media’s bias in favor of abortion.
The news agency announced that “a new entry has been added to the stylebook” in the “abortion topical guide.” In addition to instructing journalists to replace the terms “pro-life” or “pro-choice” with “anti-abortion” and “abortion-rights,” the Associated Press also noted that the word “abortionist” should be avoided because it, in their view, “connotes a person who performs clandestine abortions.” In reality, this is only one interpretation of the term. The term has actually been in use since 1884, according to Merriam Webster, and is defined as “one who induces abortions.”
In addition, the stylebook takes issue with the term, “late-term abortion” despite the fact that media has used this terminology for decades to mean an abortion committed late in pregnancy, such as the second and third trimesters. In fact, even abortion business websites themselves have long used that terminology, as have media outlets and the pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) is a pro-abortion entity and frequentlychanges its terminology to match its ideology.
Do not use the term “late-term abortion.” The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists defines late term as 41 weeks through 41 weeks and 6 days of gestation, and abortion does not happen in this period.
In regards to pro-life laws, the Associated Press also made some notable and shocking changes. The style guide now instructs journalists to avoid using the terms “fetal heartbeat” and “six-week abortion bans.” It states, “The terms are overly broad and misleading given the disagreement over details, such as what constitutes a heartbeat at varying gestational ages.”
The Associated Press also instructs journalists to put terms such as heartbeat bill in quotation marks when quoting a pro-life source and then provide an explanation. The AP claims, “Advanced technology can detect a flickering as early as six weeks, when the embryo isn’t yet a fetus, and it has only begun forming a rudimentary heart. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists [ACOG] says it is not accurate to call that a heartbeat. Use the term cardiac activity instead.”
Article continues below
Dear Reader,
In 2026, Live Action is heading straight where the battle is fiercest: college campuses.
We have a bold initiative to establish 100 Live Action campus chapters within the next year, and your partnership will make it a success!
Your support today will help train and equip young leaders, bring Live Action’s educational content into academic environments, host on-campus events and debates, and empower students to challenge the pro-abortion status quo with truth and compassion.
Invest in pro-life grassroots outreach and cultural formation with your DOUBLED year-end gift!
The AP, which publishes articles read by “more than half the world’s population” daily, is taking its reporting cues from the pro-abortion ACOG, which began widely claiming that embryos don’t have heartbeats following the enactment of the Texas Heartbeat Act in September 2021. ACOG was recently called out by Secular Pro-Life for its ongoing efforts to change the conversation around abortion by policing language. It seems the AP is doing the pro-abortion group’s bidding.
The AP may also be taking cues from NARAL Pro-Choice America, which released a report in 2020 claiming that mainstream media coverage of abortion is too pro-life. NARAL said it does not want the media to refer to bills restricting abortion to before a heartbeat can be detected “heartbeat bills,” but rather “so-called heartbeat bills.”
However, there is a large scientific consensus that the heart begins to beat about 16-21 days after fertilization. According to doctors and scientists without a pro-abortion agenda, the heart actually has “a nice flow of blood” at 23 days. The heart is the first organ to form because without it and its ability to pump blood, the embryo would not continue to grow and develop.
Dr. Mobeen Syed explains how the ❤️ is the 1st organ in the human embryo to develop and why that tiny ❤️ must be able to pump blood starting at the 3rd week of development (5 weeks LMP).
youtu.be/uwXJunOAg9k
Dr. Christina Francis, CEO-Elect for the American Association of Pro Life Obstetricians & Gynecologists (AAPLOG), told Fox News Digital that ACOG “denies the existence of the embryonic heart when it inconveniences the pro-abortion agenda.”
Likewise, Kristi Hamrick of Students for Life of America said “the Associated Press is gaslighting as policy in joining the pretense that changing definitions changes facts.” She noted that the AP is “putting pro-abortion politics over facts, to weaponize discourse.”
She added, “Despite what the heartless misinformation team at the AP says, ALL heartbeats involve an electrical impulse, putting all of humankind in the same category, born or pre-born.”
Live Action News is pro-life news and commentary from a pro-life perspective.
Contact editor@liveaction.org for questions, corrections, or if you are seeking permission to reprint any Live Action News content.
Guest Articles: To submit a guest article to Live Action News, email editor@liveaction.org with an attached Word document of 800-1000 words. Please also attach any photos relevant to your submission if applicable. If your submission is accepted for publication, you will be notified within three weeks. Guest articles are not compensated (see our Open License Agreement). Thank you for your interest in Live Action News!
Media
