Wisconsin GOP state Rep. Amy Binsfeld endorsed pregnancy center that promotes discredited abortion reversal treatment

A Facebook post from last December shows Wisconsin state Rep. Amy Binsfeld (R-Sheboygan) supporting Anchor of Hope Health Center, a crisis pregnancy center in Sheboygan that promotes experimental and discredited abortion-reversal treatments.

The post shows Binsfeld present while staff from Anchor of Hope accepted a $3,600 check from Choose Life Wisconsin, an anti-abortion organization that assists pregnancy resource centers.

Although Anchor of Hope claims to provide “truly unbiased information,” the center’s website claims that patients may be able to stop the effects of taking abortion pills and refers visitors to abortionpillreversal.com.

There are no scientifically proven ways to “reverse” medication abortions. The process of abortion pill reversal is highly contested by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists for its lack of ethical research and dangers to women’s health. In 2020, a clinical trial studying the attempts to reverse the effects of mifepristone had to be stopped after three women had to receive emergency room care from profuse bleeding.

In 2019, Wisconsin Republicans attempted to pass a bill which would have required doctors to inform patients that are seeking abortion services about the experimental abortion reversal treatment.

Anchor of Hope also compares its efforts to limit “abortion tourism” and “DIY abortions” to U.S. soldiers fighting in the European and Pacific theatres during World War II. The center also requires its volunteers to adhere to “sexual purity” and bars them from engaging in homosexual relationships or being sexually intimidate prior to marriage.

Binsfeld took office in the Wisconsin state Assembly in January 2023, where she was one of the co-sponsors of an attempted 14-week abortion ban. She also voted down an effort to establish a right to contraception in Wisconsin.

After new legislative maps were drawn, Binsfeld will run to represent the newly drawn 26th District, which is projected to be very competitive in November. She will face former superintendent of the Sheboygan Area School District Joe Sheehan.