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WASHINGTON – A Hoosier, 26-year-old Andrew R. Beacham of Elkhart, was among four anti-abortion protesters arrested Monday after they disrupted Sonia Sotomayor’s Supreme Court nomination hearing.
“We were attempting to expose Sonia Sotomayor” and her abortion rights views, he said.
“Hopefully, maybe it emboldened some Republican senators to stand up as well as pro-life senators who are Democrats,” Beacham said in an interview after his three-hour detention.
He said lawmakers who embrace the “pro-life” label should have to do more than say they are against abortion.
Among the arrested protesters was the woman who triggered the Supreme Court case that legalized abortion. She is now an abortion rights opponent.
Beacham was arrested after shouting, “Abortion is murder. Defend life,” as Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., a member of the Judiciary Committee, was speaking.
Beacham said a few words in Spanish before he was hustled outside by Capitol police officers and later charged with unlawful conduct-disruption of Congress.
In addition to Beacham, police arrested Norma McCorvey, 61, of Texas. McCorvey was “Jane Roe,” the plaintiff in the 1973 Roe vs. Wade Supreme Court case that legalized abortion.
Beacham disrupted President Obama’s commencement speech this year at the University of Notre Dame. He was removed from the arena but not arrested.
Beacham said he has recently moved to the Washington area to work for Randall Terry, founder of Operation Rescue, who is filming a TV program about civil protest, including anti-abortion activities.
