US Christian conservative groups escalate support for UK anti-abortion protesters

Co-ordinated network of well-funded bodies backs legal cases in Britain following JD Vance's challenge on buffer zones outside abortion clinics

- Phoebe Davies

The Trump administration has warned the UK that “buffer zones” that criminalise protest outside abortion clinics represent an “egregious violation” of free speech and threaten the “shared values that underpin US-UK relations”.

The US escalation in intervening in the prosecution of British antiabortion protesters comes after the White House took the highly unusual step of criticising the UK for a “worsening” human rights situation, citing “safe access zones” around clinics as an area of concern.

On Monday, JD Vance hosted Danny Kruger, a Conservative MP, and James Orr, a religious philosopher influential in Reform UK, who share the vice-president’s opposition to abortion. Orr does not think abortion should be allowed at any stage of foetal development, including those pregnancies resulting from rape.

The interventions followed a rise over the past few years in donations from US Christian conservatives to UK networks that seek to stop women having access to abortion.

An Observer investigation of funding patterns, protest materials and so-called pregnancy crisis centres reveals a network of US-based organisations and a coordinated rise in funding from across the Atlantic to push back on British abortion rights.

An influential US antiabortion legal advocacy group has told The Observer it supports people prosecuted for protesting outside clinics because the UK is an important jurisdiction as a permanent member of the UN, and “it carries a lot of weight with human rights bodies”.

In February, Vance told the Munich Security Conference that UK prosecutions showed a “backslide away from conscience rights” and a “retreat” from free speech. He also highlighted the case of Adam Smith-Connor who was convicted last October of breaching a designated “safe zone” outside a Bournemouth abortion clinic.