HARLESTON, S.C. - Hoping to slow Arizona Senator John McCain's momentum before the GOP primary here, the National Right to Life Committee and its South Carolina affiliate today will endorse Texas Governor George W. Bush for president.
The move is unusual; the nation's most powerful antiabortion group has never endorsed a candidate in the midst of a primary contest, and this support for Bush comes as he is being challenged in the Feb. 19 primary by two rivals - Steve Forbes and Alan Keyes - who have made opposition to abortion central to their campaigns.
''It should be self-evident that this has come down to a race between Governor Bush and Senator McCain in South Carolina,'' said Holly Gatling, executive director of the political action committee of South Carolina Citizens for Life. ''And unborn babies can't live with a president who says abortion is necessary.''
At a news conference today in Columbia, Gatling says she will formally make the Bush endorsement and unveil a new radio ad that attacks what the National Right to Life Committee and its state affiliate say is McCain's inconsistent record on the issue.
McCain supporters in the state say their candidate has had a stellar antiabortion voting record throughout his career in Congress. The Bush endorsement, they contend, is being directed by National Right to Life Committee lobbyists in Washington who fear that the senator's pledge to overhaul the campaign-finance system and limit special-interest contributions will jeopardize their political influence.
''We all know what is behind this: It's the emergence of McCain and campaign-finance reform, and the prolife lobby is very scared,'' said Cyndi Mosteller, who is an adviser to the senator on family issues and president of the Charleston chapter of Citizens for Life.
McCain, campaigning in South Carolina yesterday, also traced the Right to Life endorsement of Bush to his campaign finance bill.
''The national prolife committee obviously sees me as a threat ... despite my 17-year prolife voting record,'' he said. ''I'm a threat to [them], and I'm a threat to the establishment in Washington because I'll break the iron triangle of big money, lobbyists, and legislation, and they're scared to death.''
Douglas Johnson, legislative director for the National Right to Life Committee in Washington, acknowledged that his group ''has made no secret'' of disliking many provisions of McCain's campaign-finance legislation. But he says it's ''nonsense'' to suggest that is the reason the antiabortion activists are aggressively working against the senator.
''Over the last year-and-a-half, McCain has positioned himself with those on the left who see abortion as a `necessary evil,' and that is a position we very much disagree with, and think it is something the prolife movement would be foolish to ignore,'' Johnson said.
Last August, McCain told the editorial board of the San Francisco Examiner that he would not support the repeal of Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion, because in the short term ''it would force X number of women in America to (undergo) illegal and dangerous operations.'' McCain insists he made a mistake, misstating his long-held anti-Roe position.
In fact, both Bush and McCain have been less ideological on the abortion issue than other candidates who are in, or were in, the GOP field. Both Bush and McCain would make abortion exceptions for victims of rape and incest, and when the life of the mother is endangered. Forbes, Keyes, and onetime candidate Gary Bauer allowed for no such exceptions, and Bauer unsuccessfully pressed Bush to pledge that he would pick a running mate, and Supreme Court judges, who opposed abortion rights.
Mosteller said she believes the Bush endorsement was engineered by officials of the National Right to Life Committee at a meeting of the South Carolina affiliate on Saturday. ''It was basically forced on them,'' Mosteller said, ''and I know some Keyes and Forbes people who aren't happy about it.''
Dan Griffith, a board member of South Carolina Citizens for Life, resigned Monday because of the Bush endorsement, saying he thought the board was coerced by the parent organization.
''In the name of integrity, I cannot lend my support to the use of coercion to effect an endorsement decision,'' Griffith said in his resignation letter.
Yvonne Abraham of the Globe Staff contributed to this report.
