Several days later, the evangelical Christian group bought ads on Facebook and Instagram warning about late-term abortions in several states where the procedure remains legal.
"Did you know that abortion is available all nine months of pregnancy in New Mexico — even up until the moment before birth and for any reason?"
Besides New Mexico, ads with the same text singled out Oregon, Alaska, Vermont and New Jersey. The ads urged viewers to sign online petitions against the "extreme abortion law" in each state.
Earlier Focus on the Family ads claimed that Colorado’s law "allows for abortion at any point of pregnancy — right up to delivery, no questions asked!"
Laws in those six states, as well as in the District of Columbia, do not explicitly prohibit an abortion from being performed at any stage of pregnancy.
But abortions later in pregnancy are rare, and are generally not being done "up until the moment before birth and for any reason."
These abortions are performed on a case-by-case basis when there are maternal or fetal complications, said Laurie Sobel, associate director of women’s health policy at the Kaiser Family Foundation, an authority on heath care information.
"People cannot opt for an abortion instead of child birth when they are full term," she said.
Abortions rare after 21 weeksThe overall number of abortions done each year in the United States is difficult to peg.
The Guttmacher Institute, a pro-abortion rights research organization, contacts abortion providers and uses other data to make estimates every three years. The group estimated in its latest report that there were 930,160 abortions in 2020, an increase of 8% from 2017.
The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in its latest count, published last November, that there were 629,898 abortions in 2019, up 2% from 2018. That’s based on reports by health agencies, though a few states, including California, did not report.
The vast majority of abortions are performed early in pregnancy, according to the CDC report. Nearly 93% of abortions in 2019 were done during the first trimester, at or before 13 weeks gestation, and about 6% occurred between 14 and 20 weeks of pregnancy.
Less than 1% were performed at 21 weeks or later.
A CDC spokesperson said the agency does not have more detailed statistics on abortions performed at or after 21 weeks.
The six statesWhen PolitiFact asked Focus on the Family to back up its claims, a spokesperson referred us to a WorldPopulationReview.com article. The article said the District of Columbia and seven states "allow for late-term abortions with no state-imposed thresholds." (The Focus on the Family ads focused on six states, not including New Hampshire.)