World-famous surfer Bethany Hamilton will deliver the keynote speech at the March for Life in January, the organization’s president announced Thursday. 

Jeanne Mancini announced Hamilton’s appearance during a briefing by the March for Life Education and Defense Fund, saying the evangelical Christian surfer will speak Jan. 24 at the annual pro-life rally on the National Mall as well as at the Rose Dinner Gala. 

“We have had some national athletes before, more football players, so this is the first time we will be having a female athlete speak at the March for Life,” Mancini said. “Even just that will be incredible.”  

Also during the briefing, organizers announced that the theme for the 52^nd annual event opposing abortion and celebrating life will be “Every Life: Why We March.”  

Hamilton will speak between noon and 1:30 p.m., just after a concert in the same space by the Christian rock band Unspoken. 

Past speakers at the March for Life include athletes such as former NFL players Matt Birk and Benjamin Watson.  

Mancini said the March for Life had been seeking to book Hamilton as a speaker for “many, many years” and organizers are “delighted” to have her now.  

“She’s very pro-life, a mother of three, and is very committed to this cause,” Mancini said. “So we’re delighted to bring her to the stage this year. She and her family are coming all the way from Hawaii.”  

Hamilton lost her left arm in a shark attack at age 13 while a rising surf star, as documented on her website. She is still a professional surfer. 

A popular 2011 movie, “Soul Surfer,” was made about her life starring Dennis Quaid, Helen Hunt, and Kevin Sorbo. AnnaSophia Robb played Hamilton. 

Hamilton, now 34, refused to compete in the World Surf League in 2023 due to the league’s decision to allow men to compete in women’s sports, The Daily Signal reported.  

Jackie Kane, executive vice president of March for Life, said that having Hamilton speak could bring more young women into the pro-life movement. But, she said, Hamilton also “speaks more broadly to the movement as a whole,” including older generations.  

“I know she is very popular with the younger generation, with my kids, and we’re thrilled to have her joining us for that reason,” Kane told The Daily Signal. “But also because I think she speaks more broadly to the movement as a whole because of her story of embracing her own challenges and her own dignity and worth and ability to achieve greatness, despite any obstacles in the way.” 

“She has a natural testimony that provides her own witness to human dignity and then her family,” Kane added. 

Kane told The Daily Signal that the event organizers seek to engage more young Americans, but that Hamiton speaks to others too.  

“I think that as a mother and as somebody who has been a part of these movies that all the younger women watch … she’s going to speak to the middle generation and the older generations as well,” Kane said of Hamilton. “I think she’s going to have a broad reach.”  

Mancini described the 2025 march’s theme as “returning to the basics” and said the social media hashtag for the event, #WhyWeMarch, was designed to encourage people to tell their stories.  

“Why do you march? Why are you pro-life?” Mancini said. “That’s really the question underneath, and the personal stories are very moving.”  

Another reason organizers picked the theme “Every Life: Why We March,” Kane said, is because the march is a place where all generations gather.  

“It’s really kind of the one place you can think of where people who have been your grandmother may have been marching, your mother, your daughter, your children,” Kane told The Daily Signal. “I mean, this is a place where every generation can coalesce.”  

Some other themes from previous marches include “Love Saves Lives,” in 2018, and last year’s “Next Steps: Marching Into a Post-Roe America.”