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Warren Hern announces retirement after 50 years of committing late-term abortions
One of the country’s most infamous late-term abortionists is retiring after 50 years. Warren Hern will step down from his position at the helm of Boulder Abortion Clinic, which he founded — though the facility will remain open to continue ending the lives of preborn human beings.
Ms. Magazine reported that Hern’s official retirement date is today, January 22, 2025, exactly 50 years to the day that he opened his facility in Boulder, Colorado. He said that his facility will continue to provide “the safest, most compassionate and highest quality outpatient abortion services available anywhere.”
Notably, January 22, 1973 was the day Roe v. Wade was foisted upon the nation by the U.S. Supreme Court. It was just two years later that Hern opened his business.
While Ms. Magazine portrayed Hern in glowing terms, which is common among media outlets, the outlet also perpetrated numerous falsehoods about abortion, and about Hern himself.
Hern told the magazine his facility will continue committing abortions through 32 weeks of pregnancy; who his replacement will be is not clear, as few abortionists are willing to commit abortions so late in pregnancy. Ms. Magazine noted, however, that the facility would continue “[specializing] in caring for women with advanced pregnancies afflicted with serious medical complications and fetal abnormalities.”
This is a relatively new strategy from the abortion industry, with the goal of making late-term abortions more palatable to the public by claiming they are committed only in extreme, heartbreaking circumstances. Hern himself has taken to claiming this in recent years — but the problem is, it’s not true… and Hern himself has said so.
In the Hern-authored textbook, “Abortion Practice,” he wrote:
At times, medical considerations enter into the picture, but decisions are usually made on the basis of such factors as desire or lack of desire for parenthood, stability of relationships, educational status, emotional status, or economic status, among others (emphasis added).
Of course, this textbook was only meant to be read by abortionists, not by the general public. And the facts are clear: most late-term abortions are not committed out of medical necessity.
A 1988 Guttmacher study found that just two percent (2%) of women who had abortions late in pregnancy did so because of a health problem with the baby. More than 20 years later, a 2013 study — also published by the pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute — said, “[D]ata suggest that most women seeking later terminations are not doing so for reasons of fetal anomaly or life endangerment.”
Another study from the pro-abortion group ANSIRH in 2022 stated, “The reasons people need third-trimester abortions are not so different from why people need abortions before the third trimester… [T]he circumstances that lead to someone needing a third-trimester abortion have overlaps with the pathways to abortion at other gestations” (emphasis added).
That research also revealed:
There are thus many reasons—financial, logistical, and social—why third-trimester abortion care is exceptional compared to first-trimester abortion care. However, there is reason to believe that the circumstances that lead to someone needing a third-trimester abortion are not exceptional. Several studies have highlighted the importance of the timing of pregnancy discovery, with later discovery associated with later presentation to abortion care.
Other research has identified how laws that complicate people’s ability to access abortion, including parental involvement laws and laws that contribute to the reduction of abortion clinics, are associated with later presentation to abortion care for patients.
Some women in the study reported that they didn’t know they were pregnant until later in pregnancy, and this was why their abortions were sought late in pregnancy.
According to a report from the Congressional Research Service, pro-abortion researcher Diana Greene Foster stated that abortions for fetal abnormalities “make up a small minority of later abortion.” In addition, a 2010 paper from Julia Steinberg of the pro-abortion Bixby Center for Global Reproductive Health said, “Research suggests that the overwhelming majority of women having later abortions do so for reasons other than fetal anomaly (Drey et al., 2006; Finer et al., 2005, 2006; Foster et al., 2008).”
Hern even alluded to what he sees as “serious medical complications” in an appearance on the Michael Shermer Show. What sort of serious complications? Pregnancy itself.
“Do you ever get any women in their second half of the second trimester or in the third trimester that say they have no medical problems, they just don’t want the baby, they change their mind?” Shermer asked. “Would you do it?”
Hern responded, “Well, of course, if the woman doesn’t want to be pregnant, there’s no justification for forcing her to continue the pregnancy.”
“Okay. Has that happened?” Shermer pressed.
“It happens all the time, of course,” Hern answered. “She has a potentially fatal illness, condition that can kill her – ”
“No, no, I mean, if she has no medical problems,” Shermer interjected.
“The medical problem is that she’s pregnant!” Hern snapped.
That Hern would argue pregnancy is a life-threatening medical condition in and of itself, even when everything is normal and there are no complications, is not unusual. He has authored essays which call human beings a “planetary cancer,” and has called pregnancy a disease.
“Pregnancy is not a benign condition. It can kill you. The treatment of choice for pregnancy is abortion unless the woman wants to carry the pregnancy to term and have a baby,” he said. “That is a view that is abhorrent to those who believe that the purpose of women, aside from giving men pleasure and doing the housework, is to have as many babies as possible.”
Only one study has ever been able to find that childbirth is more dangerous than abortion (and its results have never been replicated); it was authored by two pro-abortion researchers.
Ms. Magazine claimed that Hern has spoken about abortion so frequently in an attempt to counter the stigma surrounding abortion. The outlet described Hern with fawning praise, including for his anthropological study of the Shipibo people of the Peruvian Amazon. Because of his “long involvement in the Peruvian work, love of the Colorado outdoors, strong family and friendship ties and, above all, the appreciation of patients,” Hern was able to withstand the hardships of the supposedly-violent pro-life movement. (The violence of the pro-abortion movement, both against preborn children and against the pro-life movement, is not mentioned.)
Hern is also supposedly beloved by the thousands of women whose children he has killed:
As Warren Hern moves into the next phase of his life, he will carry the memories of the thousands of women and other pregnancy-capable individuals he has treated over the course his long abortion practice. A note he received from one patient no doubt reflects the feelings of many: “I can’t put into words my gratitude for your compassion during the hardest time in my life.”
The clear picture being painted here of Hern is of a noble, kind, heroic individual who is selfless and good. Yet committing abortions is not something that most people can stomach, and there is good reason for that; as Hern pointed out in a previous profile, one abortionist-in-training had to leave as he was ending the life of a preborn child at 34 weeks. “This was rather disconcerting to her, and I told her there was nothing wrong with feeling that way,” he said.
Another profile in the Los Angeles Times likewise reported that staffers working for Hern struggled:
The work has caused some of his employees “serious emotional reactions that produced physiological symptoms, sleep disturbances, effects on interpersonal relationships and moral anguish,” Hern reported in a medical journal.
Some said they dreamed that they vomited fetuses.
Originally in his career, Hern seemed to have felt the same way. After creating the violent dilation and evacuation (D&E) procedure, he would have recurring nightmares. “He would often retreat to his office to compose himself after an abortion,” a feature on Hern published in the Atlantic said. “Partly, it was the high-stakes nature of the procedure. But he also needed time to process how the dead fetus looked, how removing it felt. Sometimes he’d sit in his office and think, What am I doing?”
He eventually was able to get past this; now he says of committing abortions, “I love it.”
It certainly pays well. He gets as much as $25,000 per abortion, and he built himself a lavish home in Colorado… even as his abortion facility fell apart around him. As the Los Angeles Times (seemingly unironically) pointed out:
Security costs and debts have become so “crippling,” Hern said, that he delayed building a new clinic. For now, he’s stuck with the 70-year-old building’s plumbing problems, finicky water heater and uneven clay foundation.
Back home on a recent evening, Hern considered the stunning mountain vista framed by the front window of his living room. His wildlife photography covered the walls surrounding his gleaming grand piano.
Hern didn’t commit late-term abortions out of compassion; he did so because it pays well and because he wanted to. He isn’t a noble savior of women preventing them from dying horrible, preventable deaths. He has misanthropic views and believes pregnancy itself is a disease worthy of committing abortion, at any time in pregnancy. That isn’t compassion, and it’s not what women need or deserve.
Tell President Trump, RFK, Jr., Elon, and Vivek:
Stop killing America’s future. Defund Planned Parenthood NOW!
Live Action News is pro-life news and commentary from a pro-life perspective.
Our work is possible because of our donors. Please consider giving to further our work of changing hearts and minds on issues of life and human dignity.
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!
Warren Hern announces retirement after 50 years of committing late-term abortions
One of the country’s most infamous late-term abortionists is retiring after 50 years. Warren Hern will step down from his position at the helm of Boulder Abortion Clinic, which he founded — though the facility will remain open to continue ending the lives of preborn human beings.
Ms. Magazine reported that Hern’s official retirement date is today, January 22, 2025, exactly 50 years to the day that he opened his facility in Boulder, Colorado. He said that his facility will continue to provide “the safest, most compassionate and highest quality outpatient abortion services available anywhere.”
Notably, January 22, 1973 was the day Roe v. Wade was foisted upon the nation by the U.S. Supreme Court. It was just two years later that Hern opened his business.
While Ms. Magazine portrayed Hern in glowing terms, which is common among media outlets, the outlet also perpetrated numerous falsehoods about abortion, and about Hern himself.
Hern told the magazine his facility will continue committing abortions through 32 weeks of pregnancy; who his replacement will be is not clear, as few abortionists are willing to commit abortions so late in pregnancy. Ms. Magazine noted, however, that the facility would continue “[specializing] in caring for women with advanced pregnancies afflicted with serious medical complications and fetal abnormalities.”
This is a relatively new strategy from the abortion industry, with the goal of making late-term abortions more palatable to the public by claiming they are committed only in extreme, heartbreaking circumstances. Hern himself has taken to claiming this in recent years — but the problem is, it’s not true… and Hern himself has said so.
In the Hern-authored textbook, “Abortion Practice,” he wrote:
At times, medical considerations enter into the picture, but decisions are usually made on the basis of such factors as desire or lack of desire for parenthood, stability of relationships, educational status, emotional status, or economic status, among others (emphasis added).
Of course, this textbook was only meant to be read by abortionists, not by the general public. And the facts are clear: most late-term abortions are not committed out of medical necessity.
A 1988 Guttmacher study found that just two percent (2%) of women who had abortions late in pregnancy did so because of a health problem with the baby. More than 20 years later, a 2013 study — also published by the pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute — said, “[D]ata suggest that most women seeking later terminations are not doing so for reasons of fetal anomaly or life endangerment.”
Another study from the pro-abortion group ANSIRH in 2022 stated, “The reasons people need third-trimester abortions are not so different from why people need abortions before the third trimester… [T]he circumstances that lead to someone needing a third-trimester abortion have overlaps with the pathways to abortion at other gestations” (emphasis added).
That research also revealed:
There are thus many reasons—financial, logistical, and social—why third-trimester abortion care is exceptional compared to first-trimester abortion care. However, there is reason to believe that the circumstances that lead to someone needing a third-trimester abortion are not exceptional. Several studies have highlighted the importance of the timing of pregnancy discovery, with later discovery associated with later presentation to abortion care.
Other research has identified how laws that complicate people’s ability to access abortion, including parental involvement laws and laws that contribute to the reduction of abortion clinics, are associated with later presentation to abortion care for patients.
Some women in the study reported that they didn’t know they were pregnant until later in pregnancy, and this was why their abortions were sought late in pregnancy.
According to a report from the Congressional Research Service, pro-abortion researcher Diana Greene Foster stated that abortions for fetal abnormalities “make up a small minority of later abortion.” In addition, a 2010 paper from Julia Steinberg of the pro-abortion Bixby Center for Global Reproductive Health said, “Research suggests that the overwhelming majority of women having later abortions do so for reasons other than fetal anomaly (Drey et al., 2006; Finer et al., 2005, 2006; Foster et al., 2008).”
Hern even alluded to what he sees as “serious medical complications” in an appearance on the Michael Shermer Show. What sort of serious complications? Pregnancy itself.
“Do you ever get any women in their second half of the second trimester or in the third trimester that say they have no medical problems, they just don’t want the baby, they change their mind?” Shermer asked. “Would you do it?”
Hern responded, “Well, of course, if the woman doesn’t want to be pregnant, there’s no justification for forcing her to continue the pregnancy.”
“Okay. Has that happened?” Shermer pressed.
“It happens all the time, of course,” Hern answered. “She has a potentially fatal illness, condition that can kill her – ”
“No, no, I mean, if she has no medical problems,” Shermer interjected.
“The medical problem is that she’s pregnant!” Hern snapped.
That Hern would argue pregnancy is a life-threatening medical condition in and of itself, even when everything is normal and there are no complications, is not unusual. He has authored essays which call human beings a “planetary cancer,” and has called pregnancy a disease.
“Pregnancy is not a benign condition. It can kill you. The treatment of choice for pregnancy is abortion unless the woman wants to carry the pregnancy to term and have a baby,” he said. “That is a view that is abhorrent to those who believe that the purpose of women, aside from giving men pleasure and doing the housework, is to have as many babies as possible.”
Only one study has ever been able to find that childbirth is more dangerous than abortion (and its results have never been replicated); it was authored by two pro-abortion researchers.
Ms. Magazine claimed that Hern has spoken about abortion so frequently in an attempt to counter the stigma surrounding abortion. The outlet described Hern with fawning praise, including for his anthropological study of the Shipibo people of the Peruvian Amazon. Because of his “long involvement in the Peruvian work, love of the Colorado outdoors, strong family and friendship ties and, above all, the appreciation of patients,” Hern was able to withstand the hardships of the supposedly-violent pro-life movement. (The violence of the pro-abortion movement, both against preborn children and against the pro-life movement, is not mentioned.)
Hern is also supposedly beloved by the thousands of women whose children he has killed:
As Warren Hern moves into the next phase of his life, he will carry the memories of the thousands of women and other pregnancy-capable individuals he has treated over the course his long abortion practice. A note he received from one patient no doubt reflects the feelings of many: “I can’t put into words my gratitude for your compassion during the hardest time in my life.”
The clear picture being painted here of Hern is of a noble, kind, heroic individual who is selfless and good. Yet committing abortions is not something that most people can stomach, and there is good reason for that; as Hern pointed out in a previous profile, one abortionist-in-training had to leave as he was ending the life of a preborn child at 34 weeks. “This was rather disconcerting to her, and I told her there was nothing wrong with feeling that way,” he said.
Another profile in the Los Angeles Times likewise reported that staffers working for Hern struggled:
The work has caused some of his employees “serious emotional reactions that produced physiological symptoms, sleep disturbances, effects on interpersonal relationships and moral anguish,” Hern reported in a medical journal.
Some said they dreamed that they vomited fetuses.
Originally in his career, Hern seemed to have felt the same way. After creating the violent dilation and evacuation (D&E) procedure, he would have recurring nightmares. “He would often retreat to his office to compose himself after an abortion,” a feature on Hern published in the Atlantic said. “Partly, it was the high-stakes nature of the procedure. But he also needed time to process how the dead fetus looked, how removing it felt. Sometimes he’d sit in his office and think, What am I doing?”
He eventually was able to get past this; now he says of committing abortions, “I love it.”
It certainly pays well. He gets as much as $25,000 per abortion, and he built himself a lavish home in Colorado… even as his abortion facility fell apart around him. As the Los Angeles Times (seemingly unironically) pointed out:
Security costs and debts have become so “crippling,” Hern said, that he delayed building a new clinic. For now, he’s stuck with the 70-year-old building’s plumbing problems, finicky water heater and uneven clay foundation.
Back home on a recent evening, Hern considered the stunning mountain vista framed by the front window of his living room. His wildlife photography covered the walls surrounding his gleaming grand piano.
Hern didn’t commit late-term abortions out of compassion; he did so because it pays well and because he wanted to. He isn’t a noble savior of women preventing them from dying horrible, preventable deaths. He has misanthropic views and believes pregnancy itself is a disease worthy of committing abortion, at any time in pregnancy. That isn’t compassion, and it’s not what women need or deserve.
Tell President Trump, RFK, Jr., Elon, and Vivek:
Stop killing America’s future. Defund Planned Parenthood NOW!
Live Action News is pro-life news and commentary from a pro-life perspective.
Our work is possible because of our donors. Please consider giving to further our work of changing hearts and minds on issues of life and human dignity.
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!
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·Interviewer: "Do you ever get any women in their second half of the second trimester or in the third trimester that say they have no medical problems. They just don't want the baby. They change their mind. Would you do it?” Abortionist: “Of course…. That happens all the time.”
Interviewer: "Do you ever get any women in their second half of the second trimester or in the third trimester that say they have no medical problems. They just don't want the baby. They change their mind. Would you do it?” Abortionist: “Of course…. That happens all the time.”
