When a Christian activist ran an outreach at the University of Pittsburgh about the violence of abortion, a young man reacted with violence — and a cup of red paint.
T. Russell Hunter leads Abolitionists Rising — a cultural education nonprofit that promotes abortion abolitionism, or the immediate criminalization of abortion as murder.
They often film themselves starting conversations with pedestrians by means of signs about abortion and the forgiveness for murdering preborn babies found in Jesus Christ alone.
Abolitionists Rising published a two-minute video of some recent interactions at the University of Pittsburgh that ended in Hunter getting red paint splashed all over his face, clothes, and sign.
The interaction started with a young woman speaking with Hunter — and even fantasizing about his death — as a young man watched quietly from a distance.
Campus Assault & Citation pic.twitter.com/7upTt3Hkvy
— Abolitionists Rising 🌳🪓 (@AbolitionRising) April 20, 2026
After Hunter turned to speak to a different young woman, the young man opened the cup and tossed the red paint on Hunter.
“You were waiting that whole time to do that?” Hunter exclaimed.
“Come back, buddy,” Hunter said, walking after him. “Hey! Come and give me a hug!”
Sure enough, Hunter caught up to the young man and embraced him with paint-soaked arms.
“Thank you for that. Thank you,” Hunter told him. “Turn the other cheek!”
Hunter warned the young man that he would press charges.
“A lot of people are going to see this, and they’re going to say, listen, if you don’t press charges, people will think that is good behavior,” Hunter said.
The young man listened smugly for a moment before opening the cup again and tossing even more paint on Hunter — this time getting some in his eye.
Thankfully, a Pittsburgh Police officer was shown in the video apprehending the young man and promising Hunter that he would be held accountable.
Because abortion is a violent practice, those who defend it are often more than comfortable with violence.
The red paint is unavoidably a reminder of the blood of preborn babies spilled across our nation by the same types of people who hate Christians enough to assault them in public.
The darkness of the human heart compels them to reject God — leading to violence against people called by His name, and violence against innocents made in His image.
While abortion is murder, the only way to confront and root out such works of darkness from a wicked culture requires the light of the gospel — the same gospel that Hunter was trying to share with the students who wished him harm, and then actually harmed him.
If Christians want to abolish abortion in our nation, we can and must expect to endure much more hardship, sacrifice, and mistreatment — but we must suffer for the glory of God and the good of our preborn neighbors.
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