SC anti-abortion group was a fixture at Planned Parenthood, then came a shooting
The green high visibility vests were a familiar sight outside Planned Parenthood Columbia. Over the last 13 years, Mark Baumgartner’s sidewalk ministry, A Moment of Hope, had approximately $2 million and grown into a sophisticated and well-drilled operation.
From Monday to Friday, the group’s cameras hidden in bushes would record volunteers in high visibility vests keeping in touch with walkie-talkies, waving down cars and handing out gift bags outside the clinic on Middleburg Drive. Their goal was to try to talk patients away from Planned Parenthood and into their rainbow-colored RV for an ultrasound and counseling that would steer them away from an abortion.
It could be tense. Planned Parenthood volunteers and members of A Moment of Hope, who call themselves “sidewalk counselors,” were known to heckle each other. And there were confrontations when the anti-abortion activists tried to intercept and block cars. But it had never been violent.
That changed on Friday when eyewitnesses identified Baumgartner as the assailant who shot a man in a tussle outside Planned Parenthood.
Baumgartner did not respond to multiple requests for a comment.
The Columbia Police Department has not released the name of the shooter, but multiple people familiar with Baumgartner identified him from the video.
Video from the scene shows the unnamed victim of the shooting, believed to be a passerby with no connection to Planned Parenthood, with his hands in his pockets, confronting an individual witnesses identified as Baumgartner. After Baumgartner pepper sprays the man, the man chased Baumgartner and a fight breaks out between the two.
In the video, two other members of A Moment of Hope can be seen rushing to Baumgartner’s aid, one with a gun drawn. But as the man gets up and takes another swing, Baumgartner shot him, according to the incident report.
In statements following the shooting, the Columbia Police Department took pains to distance the incident from Planned Parenthood. In statements released online as well as in a press conference given by Captain P.J. Blendowski, the department emphasized that the incident took place in a parking lot “adjacent” to Planned Parenthood.
The victim’s name has also not been released and was redacted from the police incident report. Shortly after the shooting, police said the victim had been taken to the hospital and was in stable condition.
Jennifer Timmons, a spokesperson for the Columbia Police Department told The State Wednesday afternoon that no decision had been made on charging anyone from the incident.
The spokesperson from the Fifth Circuit Solicitor’s Office said that the responsibility for filing charges fell with the Columbia Police Department. The office would likely not be involved “until or if charges are filed.”
On Nov. 18, a near total ban on abortion in South Carolina failed to pass out of a committee in the state house. Currently, abortion in the state is banned after six weeks. The state provides limited exceptions, including abortions up to 12 weeks in cases of rape or incest, or when the life of the mother is threatened.
While A Moment of Hope hasn’t been the only group of protestors at the Planned Parenthood in Columbia, over the years they have been the largest, most consistent and coordinated group.
Baumgartner was a near-daily fixture outside the clinic. A former airline pilot and bank examiner for the Federal Reserve, Baumgartner began A Moment of Hope in 2012 after being “challenged by a friend to go to the Columbia abortion facility to offer hope and help,” according to his website.
Unlike other anti-abortion groups, they don’t rely on loudspeakers condemning mothers or gruesome photos of aborted fetuses. Instead, their volunteers attempt to persuade patients with gentle conversation and the promise of free services.
According to their website, the Evangelical group’s sole focus is the Planned Parenthood clinic in Columbia, but Baumgartner’s ambitions appear to be broader. In testimony before a state house committee on a right to life bill, Baumgartner encouraged legislators to adopt laws that would hold mothers criminally accountable for abortions.
Abortion is a “horrendous evil,” Baumgartner said. “For those acting in such a high-handed way against the law of God, we need a threat of punishment to act as a deterrent.”
Who are A Moment of Hope?
Since its founding, the group has grown rapidly. Tax forms from the IRS show that donations to the organization grew from just under $112,000 in 2016 to over $450,000 in 2023. In 2022, the group brought in $771,000 in donations.
Available tax records from 2016 to 2023 indicate that A Moment of Hope has raised more than $1.8 million.
As executive director, Baumgartner was paid $110,708 in 2023. His wife, Carrie Baumgartner, who is listed as secretary and treasurer on the organization’s tax forms, was paid $72,623 in 2023.
Their sole focus, according to their own materials, is the Planned Parenthood clinic in Columbia.
The group is well coordinated. On their YouTube page, the group posts videos of interactions with patients and Planned Parenthood volunteers gathered from cameras hidden in bushes and around the office park.
In recordings, they can be heard coordinating over walkie-talkies, directing members to different areas and passing along descriptions of cars and license plates in the NATO phonetic alphabet.
In testimony before the South Carolina House of Representatives, Baumgartner said that his group kept “meticulous records,” including daily tallies of visitors to Planned Parenthood.
The most frequent conflict appears to take place as anti-abortion activists in high-visibility vests attempt to intercept cars pulling into Planned Parenthood’s parking lot. Across multiple videos, members of A Moment of Hope can be seen waving cars down and asking if the occupants are looking for Planned Parenthood. Before identifying themselves, they lean into the driver’s open window and try to offer them gift bags containing chips, granola bars and anti-abortion literature.
The group regularly posts videos “doxxing” Planned Parenthood volunteers by providing their name and contact information.
Their videos also show confrontations between the volunteers and employees of A Moment of Hope and Planned Parenthood volunteers.
In other videos, they accuse CPD of “blatant bias.” In one, the group attempted to rebut allegations in a police report that they had surrounded a vehicle leading to the driver making threats to shoot members of A Moment of Hope.
In another, they claim that police are “interrupting” their work when they attempt to move vehicles stopped by A Moment of Hope out of the roadway.
Since the shooting, the group has not been seen outside Planned Parenthood.
This story was originally published November 20, 2025 at 7:54 AM.