Tim Murphy, Outspoken Pro-Life Congressman, Urges Mistress to Get an Abortion

Tim Murphy, a Republican Congressman from Pennsylvania, is in the news this week because The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports that he once urged his mistress to get an abortion.

This would be cause for scandal when it comes to nearly any politician.

But it's especially noteworthy in this case because Murphy is one of D.C.'s most outspoken supporters of the pro-life movement.

Not only does Murphy possess a lengthy anti-abortion voting history, but he’s been praised praised by the Family Research Council for his stance on abortion.

He's also been endorsed by LifePAC, which opposes abortion rights.

Moreover, the Congressman is a member of the House Pro-Life Caucus, an affiliation often cited by his office in press releases and on his website.

Oh, and also, there's this:

Murphy is the co-sponsor on a bill passed by the House of Representatives this week that would ban abortions nationwide after 20 weeks.

On January 25, however, a forensic psychologist named Shannon Edwards wrote the following text message to Murphy:

And you have zero issue posting your pro-life stance all over the place when you had no issue asking me to abort our unborn child just last week when we thought that was one of the options.

Murphy has admitted to carrying on an extramarital affair with Edwards.

In response to the above message several months ago, Murphy wrote:

I get what you say about my March for life messages. I've never written them. Staff does them. I read them and winced. I told staff don't write any more. I will.

The relationship between Murphy and Edwards was initially exposed as part of Edwards' divorce from her husband, Dr. Jesse Sally, when he filed in July of last year.

These damning text message exchanges were included among a series of documents obtained by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

The newspaper says it has tried to reach out to Murphy for a comment, but has not yet received a reply.

Murphy noted in a January 24 Facebook post that he hoped "we will once again be a nation committed to honoring life from the moment of conception and ensuring American taxpayer dollars are never spent to end a life before it even begins."

As far as we know, no Republican members of Congress have spoken publicly about Murphy, either.

We'll update this story with more information as news breaks.