We have learned via the Ogle Mole Network that Eric Roberts – a pro-life Republican State House candidate for HD 83 – allegedly paid for the abortion of a woman he impregnated in 1988.
According to Shannon Mantrom of Austin, Texas, she and Roberts had a lengthy “friends w/ benefits” style affair, when they were both students at Southern Methodist University in Dallas during the 1980s.
It ended when she got pregnant, Roberts paid for her abortion, and Roberts’ girlfriend at the time— who knew Shannon — accidentally found out about it.
Here’s a snippet from an email exchange I had with Shannon:
“In the early spring of 1988 I got pregnant after one of our encounters. I was a senior and Eric had already graduated and I knew I was NOT going to let a pregnancy derail my future, especially by someone I had no desire to marry or even really be with anymore. So, Eric paid for an abortion at a local Dallas women’s abortion clinic. I was five weeks pregnant at the time and we both knew that was the right thing to do. I would move on to graduating and he and his girlfriend could move on with their lives.”
Shannon’s account was corroborated by Roberts’ then-girlfriend, Sara Marshall, now living in the New York City area. We spoke on the phone yesterday.
According to Sara, she was picking up Eric’s apartment one weekend in 1988 when he was in Oklahoma City visiting family. While doing so, she stumbled across the paperwork / receipts for an abortion clinic located on Mockingbird Lane in Dallas. It had Shannon’s name as the patient.
Yeah, that’s right. The guy left an abortion receipt for another woman in his apartment, and his girlfriend found it. Whether you’re pro-choice or pro-life, I think we can all agree that’s pretty stupid. If he gets elected, he’ll fit in well with the rest of the geniuses in the Oklahoma legislature.
Sara, Shannon and Eric were all in the same social circle at SMU, so upon finding the receipt paperwork, Sara immediately grabbed a phone and called Shannon. Here’s how Sara describes that conversation:
“I called up Shannon and told her what I found, and said that either Eric was helping you out or he was part of the part of the problem. She then broke down and cried and said ‘You need to call Eric.’”
And that’s what she did.
According to Sara, Eric got defensive and played the “Nothing’s wrong because we’re not official” card. Their phone call ended in an argument, but when he returned to Dallas, they smoothed things over. They would remain together for another four years. She even moved in with him in Oklahoma City for a few years in the 1990s.
So, why does this matter?
If you ask me, it’s just another obvious example of the blatant, double-standard hypocrisy that conservative, primarily male politicians like Eric play when it comes to abortion.
Shannon and Sara agree.
Like most people from the analog age, they reconnected on social media a few years ago and became friends again. During a recent chat, Eric got brought up, and Shannon learned of his political aspirations. At that point, she decided to reach out to the local media and got connected with us.
“I was compelled to reach out because the hypocrisy is so glaringly stunning. Having put this decision and action in my past, I have gone on to marry and see my two beautiful daughters grow into adulthood. It is for them, and women everywhere, that I felt the need to speak up. Even if Eric is “born again,” that does not mean he also enjoys the privilege of denial, even to himself, of our shared past.”
This is the second time that Roberts – a Chamber of Commerce style Republican – has run for public office in the Northwest Oklahoma City metro. In 2018, he sought the Republican nomination for Senate District 30. He’s a Casady grad, businessman, and — thanks to his family’s oil and land holdings — firmly entrenched in the OKC ruling class, serving on a variety of boards and foundations and who knows what else.
Although Eric is not one of those gung-ho abolitionist types, he does toe the GOP party line when it comes to being in favor of restricting abortion rights, all while apparently taking advantage of those rights when it suits him.
Just check out these social media screenshots:
We reached out to Eric via email last night for a statement or comment about the claims from both Shannon and Sara. He has not replied.
Stay with The Lost Ogle. We’ll keep you advised.
Oops
I’m sure his evangelical voters will forgive him for being hypocritical about the abortion but not for graduating from a Texas university. He may be toast with that reckoning.
They call out “murdering babies” unless it’s a baby of theirs, then it’s a “problem.” So no murder!
That way they are still pro-life. Excuse me, pro-birth.
You mean PRO-FORCED-BIRTH.
#OklahomaStandard
Here’s a thought for the ardent abolitionists who insist on regulating women’s bodies, how about they come up with a plan to oblige all men to have a vasectomy to help address the irresponsible ejaculations going on.
No matter his (or her) personal beliefs, anyone running for public office as a Republican must toe the “pro-life” party line in their public persona. To violate this rule is immediate political suicide.
But the issue shouldn’t be anyone’s actual complicity in an abortion. It’s the hypocrisy, stupid!
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A well-designed peer-reviewed study found that nearly one in four American women will have at least one abortion during her lifetime.
https://www.guttmacher.org/news-release/2017/abortion-common-experience-us-women-despite-dramatic-declines-rates
No doubt, many of these women’s partners are complicit in their decisions to abort. How many supposedly pro-life politicians can you think of who have likely paid for abortions?
Not even a solid 6-3 pro-life majority on the Supreme Court can ever put the abortion toothpaste back in the tube. Although “pro-life” has achieved total victory in capturing the Judicial branch of government, abortion will remain legal in America in states where a majority of the American people live. That won’t change.
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What causes a demand for abortion services? Unwanted Pregnancy! Duh!
Ironically, “pro-life” forces consistently wage war against the most effective organization in reducing the number of abortions: Planned Parenthood. Easy access to family planning and birth control is the ONLY strategy that will effectively reduce the number of abortions in America. But a precipitous drop in the abortion rate would largely remove the issue from the public forum, and reduce voter enthusiasm for certain candidates. We can’t have that, can we?
She was “picking up his apartment” and “stumbled upon” the paperwork.
Uh, huh. OK.
It’s not that I don’t believe the guy is a hypocrite, but her story sounds a bit too much like a cover-up of some snoopy-snoopy-nosiness.
I am the girlfriend that you speak of, and no, there was no snooping around in his apartment. The truth is that Eric had just left his apartment to go visit his family in OKC, and I was gathering my things to go back to my apartment.
He had already left, and while I was making up his bed, I saw a piece of paper sticking out from underneath his bed. I simply picked it up off of the floor and put it on his desk. Unfortunately, the letterhead of the letter is what caught my eye, and the rest is history.
Trumpers are now saying, “I’m only interested in the present, not the past” so I am sure this will be one of the excuses.
Except when it comes to Democrats.
Welcome to Oklahoma, where what Republicans think and do is GOD.
Republicans only have two moves for decreasing abortions, banning it and telling teens not to have sex. Democrats have a more multi-faceted approach, both from promoting safe sex to children, providing contraceptives, to funding social services to provide support for low income families.
Abortions spiked after Roe V. Wade, but have been steadily declining since the 80’s. According to the CDC, the rate drops more drastically during Democrat administrations, but you can’t really tie administrative policies because reporting abortion rates isn’t mandatory. What we can do is point to the fact that the 10 worst state for teen pregnancy (which I’d wager is a group at greatest risk of having an abortion), are southern or southwest states, and the only one that’s Democratic is New Mexico.
Which, to me, indicates that maybe this whole philosophy of “pretend sex doesn’t exist and ban everyone from abortions” probably isn’t going to be the best approach for promoting life.
So, he’s all against other people doing the Skeet-N-Delete…..unless he needs to partake in it his damn self.
I’m glad I already voted via absentee…..back in September. I’ve never been so certain on who I was voting for in my entire life.
Awwww..this warms my cold, dead choice-lovin’ heart.
Why would you ever expect an SMU Republican to ever follow rules he imposes on others? I mean, really, there are laws for one caste but certainly not for the elite.
Few things are more unequal than denying abortion access to poor women. Is there a single elected Republican that isn’t reprehensible?
Casady and SMU. No need to say more cause their shit don’t stink.
I, like many in my age group of old people, am conflicted on this issue. I guess I’m in the camp that thinks it should be legal, safe and rare. I only know 1 woman who admits to having an abortion several years ago. She regrets it to this day, mainly I think because she has no kids and is probably too old to start now. But this story is really about the hypocrisy of the man as opposed to the question of whether they should be legal. We should really not be surprised by this.
See, I’m in a similar camp in that I don’t want anyone to have an abortion unless it’s for a medical reason. But I want women to know that she is safe at work if she’s pregnant and that there are a lot of options and support for her during the pregnancy. I want women to be able to have support if they don’t want to give them up and if they do. I don’t want teens to be kept totally in the dark about how to have sex safely and for them to know the value of contraceptives and the challenges of parenthood.
I don’t want pregnant women to ever feel like they have to get an abortion, so that they don’t have to. I don’t think that makes me care about life any less than the people who just want a cart blanche ban on it.
Perhaps you should take on the children of those not capable of raising them? How many have you adopted so far?
^^That right there…
I already have one child that’s not mine and my wife and I have discussed adoption in the future. I also favor a robust and well funded social services system that promotes fostering and adoption for those who do not want to or cannot care for children on their own.
How about yourself?
Having been raised by the great state of Oklahoma and seeing a plethora of mental illnesses and trauma response life cycles in a rainbow of boys and girls; who spent a lot of their lives inside the foster care system. I’m here to tell you, nice sweet adoptive parents dont want broken kids and for the most part dont want kids they want babies. So all the kid ever knows is them, not that, that is wrong. It just leaves so many kids with less than a choice or chance. We become your overcrowding problem in your prisons, we become your massive adult population that is incapable of holding a job for any length of time. We become your homeless guy you give dollars to once in a while. We are unwanted babies and kids whose parents tried maybe for a minute or two but couldn’t handle it. Most of the time by the time the state steps in we are entirely too old for any hope of adoption and too broken for any smooth transition into a normal family. Which by the way is what messes up foster parents how many angry, fire starting, abusive, hurtful kids can you have walk through your door before it becomes just about the payments? If abortion becomes illegal you can triple the current number of children in the already overcrowded system. We would have to streamline adoption as well as change some of the more ridiculous restrictions that families face when trying to save their loved ones from the system. The mother who raised me wasn’t allowed to keep me because she was my step-mother… The system has been broken for decades, why add more buden?
You have me wrong. I want a world with as few abortions being performed as possible, but I want to achieve that by 1) decreasing the number of unwanted pregnancies through better education programs and improved contraceptive availability and 2) increasing support women have when they are pregnant so that they don’t feel like that’s a choice they need to make. I don’t think banning abortion is the way to go, I think doing whatever you can to make it not necessary is.
Before anyone considers having a non-medical abortion, we have already had a failure – an unwanted pregnancy.
I don’t want women (and their partners) to have unwanted pregnancies. Let’s start there.
I agree. We should make sure we teach children about sexual health, safe sex, and make sure contraception is pretty easy to get in the first place.
Personally, I have yet to meet one of these nut jobs that was raising, feeding and educating someone else’s unwanted ‘pregnancy’.
They’re just not smart enough to realize that the government that can deny a woman the right can REQUIRE it too.
He is deleting comments and blocking folks on his campaign Facebook page. I made a comment and it was deleted and I was blocked within 30 seconds. You know what to do folks….give him hell.
His record can’t be defended. What can the guy do besides run away and hide?
Roberts’ opponent in the election is an incumbent Democrat. At least this district is not one where a slimeball gets elected automatically if he’s a Republican.
So he got a girl pregnant, paid for an abortion, and now wants to criminalize it.
So sick of these mealy mouthed hypocrites. Instead of working toward “Handmaidens Tale” society, why can’t he be honest about this issue? Abortion is often the “least worst” choice, and if you want less of it, just make birth control cheaper and easier to get. Outlawing it just causes more tragedy: back alley deaths, more lives derailed by incarceration.
For Eric, I guess there’s no Forgetting Sara Marshall or Shannon Mantrom.
You win! I’m loving ALL the comments, but this one is, as they say, “Classic”. 🤣🙌🏻
Ok, so I’m gonna be the oddball here and say that this should really only be an issue if he’s claimed to be 100% “pro-life” his entire life. People’s beliefs change (for good and bad) over their lives and I just can’t get too worked up over this gotcha moment-unless he denies it and gets all defensive about it.
Then again, if this were my district, I wouldn’t have been voting for him anyway so this isn’t influencing my opinion of him at all-the Casady/SMU thing (and him being a Republican) would have been enough for me.
I think Kendra Horn went to SMU law school.
I tend to give people a little more of a pass for graduate/professional school…not much but a little.
Back in the 90’s I was very pro-life. I’m not any more. I don’t think that make me a hypocrite. We also don’t know the whole situation. She may have made the decision and he just went along with it. Men tend to do that.
If he’s deleting posts/banning people, then he pretty much is denying it and getting defensive.
I do believe that people should have the right to change their opinions on things, my current opinions don’t match my opinions at 18, after all. But if a politician is going to go that rout, then when something like this comes out, they should be candid about things that happened in the past and try to reconcile those views with where they stand now. Trying to bury a story just makes you look like more of a hypocrite.
Again, the issue is hypocrisy.
While it’s true that people can change, be “born again”, and do many wonderful things for their community, they do not have the right to promote anti-abortion and pro-life platforms when you have not come clean to your supporters about your own mistakes.
If only he had been upfront and truthful about this, his supporters would’ve forgiven him and would’ve viewed him as being more trustworthy, the issue would’ve been out in the open, and the world would’ve moved on. He certainly had plenty of time to do this after I reached out him to in February.
But when you’re continuing to run a political platform that doesn’t align with your character, the truth will find a way to sort it out. He’s another example of the toxic culture of wealthy, Republic males who think that they can preach “do as I say, not as I do”, when trying to seek sovereignty over women’s bodies; this is hypocrisy in the highest sense.
I’ve thought very carefully about this, and I stand by Shannon.
This story needs to be shared.
wonder how many abortions trump has paid for. Republicans aren’t pro life, they’re pro fetus. Once the fetus is birthed get the fuck out of here if you have any needs.
I don’t think most of the R’s have any deep seated thoughts against abortion or any of the social issues they pound on. They just know it gets votes. Check out some of the Trump rally videos if you can stomach it and note the camera pans to the Nuns in the crowd. Actors?
Grump’s abortion logbook will eventually surface. “Trust in Karma”.
Shannon has it exactly right– The jackass definitely picked the right state in which to run for office. He’ll fit right in alongside the other knuckle-dragging, know-nothing Republicans.
Sadly and unfortunately, this human paraquat will most likely win the election. At least he didn’t get my vote.
To those who may think me “the woman spurned” and my coming forward so close to the election an October surprise of my own, I can assure you neither is the case.
I am a real person who at age 21 let my hormones do the walking and not my brain. (I’m fairly sure I’m not alone in this.) Eric’s ex, Sara, reached out to him via FM Messenger in February of this year not to threaten him, but to point out the hypocrisy of his anti-Planned Parenthood platform. He never responded. She wrestled with telling me about his run for the state house all these months. It was only last week Wednesday we got on a Zoom to “catch up”. And, boy, catch up we did!
I myself DID threaten Eric with further exposure if he wins and runs for reelection, or if he loses and chooses to run again. Let’s hope Chelsey Barnham wins and Eric recedes into his white, doughy, country club background.
Now, if he were to come clean to his constituents about our stupidity in our wasted youth and they forgive him, fine. But, they can’t forgive when they don’t have the full story on this candidate. And, by judging by the fact the link to this story is deleted almost immediately each time someone posts it to his campaign’s Facebook page, I think we all have our answer about Eric being either a man or a mouse.
To further prove I’m a real person with a real life who is only coming forward so other young women who are scared and seeing their very bright futures melt before their very eyes because they simply committed the “crime” of unprotected sex, below is a link to my Linkedin profile. Remember, if it weren’t for the guy doing his thing, we women wouldn’t have the onus on us about “what to do” regarding an unwanted pregnancy. I hope this helps to clear up some speculation. If I am reviled for speaking up, so be it, but it’s too important to me that my 2 daughters, and women everywhere, have dominion over their own bodies.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/shannonmantrom/?msgControlName=reply_to_sender&msgConversationId=6728062078780751872&msgOverlay=true
Flip flopper. He was for abortion before he was against it.
Sadly, this does not surprise me in the least. It would shock me if Trump (sr and jr) had not funded a few abortions themselves. I’m sure other GOP pols have versions of this skeleton in their closets too.
Many Republican leaders don’t give a shit about abortion. They toe the “pro-life” line to rope in gullible religious conservatives and proceed to screw the rubes with their pro-business, pro-wealthy policies.
My neighbors kids showed up in this ice storm to help him with all the damage, but my son was a no show. I guess he’s still pissed that I paid to abort his sorry ass some 45 years ago.