Pro-life activists David Daleiden and Sandra Merritt called on an abortionist to help in their legal defense. Forrest Smith, who claims to have committed 50,000 abortions in his career, testified for the defense last week at the pre-trial hearing for Daleiden and Merritt, who face more than a dozen felony charges related to their work exposing how Planned Parenthood sold aborted babies’ body parts. Smith told a judge last week that Planned Parenthood’s practice of delivering live babies and harvesting their organs defied even the abortion industry’s standards of decency.

The 2,246 medically preserved fetal remains authorities found earlier this week at the Illinois home of late abortionist Ulrich Klopfer were stored in small, sealed plastic bags in cardboard boxes in his garage. “In the 31 years I’ve been doing this job, I’ve never seen anything like this, ever,” Will County Sheriff Mike Kelley said Thursday. Kelley said investigators think the remains date to when Klopfer worked at three abortion facilities in Indiana between 2000 and 2002.

In 2017, the number of babies who died from abortion hit its lowest since the practice was legalized in 1973. Though the abortion rate has decreased across the country, the total still reached more than 860,000, according to a report released Wednesday by the pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute. The number of abortions peaked in 1990 at 1.6 million.

WASHINGTON—A congressional act that would protect babies who survive abortion attempts needs just 17 more signatures from lawmakers to advance in the House. Last week, pro-life Republican representatives urged voters to call their representatives and ask them to sign onto the effort if they haven’t already.

“Ask them if they’ve signed the discharge petition, and, if not, why don’t they want it to come up to a vote on the House floor?” House Minority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., said at a hearing on the bill last week. “We know there are people who have survived abortions.”

Law enforcement officials announced the discovery of 2,246 medically preserved fetal remains at the Illinois home of a deceased abortionist. Ulrich Klopfer, who worked at an abortion center in South Bend, Ind., died earlier this month. His family discovered the remains and contacted the sheriff’s office in Will County, Ill. There’s no evidence he performed abortions at his home, but authorities have opened an investigation. “We are horrified,” said Mike Fichter, the president of Indiana Right to Life.

Pro-life activists Sandra Merritt and David Daleiden exposed the sordid underbelly of fetal tissue trade practices in 2015. Their undercover videos showing Planned Parenthood executives talking about selling the body parts of dead babies led to serious curbs on such transactions in the United States. Now Merritt and Daleiden are defending themselves from criminal charges in a California courtroom.

In its statement of values, the University of Vermont Medical Center says it respects “the dignity of all individuals” and promises to respond to their spiritual needs. Yet in one respect, it appears to have fallen short: The U.S. Department of Health and Human Resources notified the Burlington, Vt., hospital last week it violated federal law when it forced an operating room nurse to assist with an abortion against her religious beliefs.