Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum is headed to Texas to campaign for a controversial abortion bill. The measure would ban most abortions after 20 weeks.
Santorum, a 2012 Republican presidential candidate, is to hold a news conference Thursday morning at the state capitol in Austin ahead of the state Senate's vote on the bill,
Politico reported.
"Rick is going to Austin this week to join those in giving a voice to the unborn," Republican strategist and senior Santorum adviser John Branbender
told CNN.
The measure has the backing of the Republican-led legislature and of GOP Gov. Rick Perry, who vowed to get the measure passed after it was stopped by Democratic state Sen. Wendy Davis June 25 in a
13-hour filibuster.
While in the Senate, Santorum led efforts to pass anti-abortion legislation, including the Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act, which prohibited certain late-term abortion procedures, CNN reported.
Santorum's grassroots conservative nonprofit organization, Patriot Voices, recently launched a petition that "has garnered thousands of signatures asking Americans to stand with life," according to CNN.
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