Foregoing any interest in getting America back to work, House Republicans continued their campaign against women’s health yesterday by passing the “Protect Life Act.” Known as the “Let Woman Die” act to women’s health advocates, the radical measure would allow hospitals that receive federal funds to reject any pregnant woman seeking an abortion in any circumstance, even if it is necessary to save her life.
On the House floor before the vote, Rep. Jackie Speier (D-CA) — who revealed earlier this year that she had to have an abortion for medical reasons — rebuked Republicansfor a bill that “goes to the farthest extreme in trying to take women down, not just a peg, but take them in shackles to some cave somewhere.” Republicans are basically saying, “‘‘Oh, except for a woman who is in need of an abortion, or except for a woman who is bleeding to death who happens to be pregnant. Or except for a woman who is miscarrying,’” she declared. “It’s absolutely misogynist.”
But North Carolina Rep. Virginia Foxx (R) was having none of it. This bill “takes away no protections from women in this country,” she insisted. “It takes away no rights. It is not extreme.” Declaring herself to be foremost defender of women’s rights, Foxx countered that pro-choice advocates are actually misogynists because “fifty percent of the unborn babies being aborted are females”:
FOXX: For my colleagues across the aisle who say this is a misogynist bill,nobody has ever fought more for the rights of women than I have. But fifty percent of the unborn babies that are being aborted are females. So the misogyny comes from those that promote the killing of unborn babies. That’s where the misogyny comes in.
Watch it:
The bizarre logic of Foxx’s misogyny argument is not even in the vicinity of fact. The majority of abortions in the U.S. occur around the 10th week, well before gender is definitively known. There is no data — let alone evidence — to back up her claim.
But her claim that “nobody has ever fought more for the rights than I have” throws facts straight out the window. As Raw Story notes, Foxx voted against women’s health bills at least nine times in her congressional career, including a vote against funding for Planned Parenthood — an organization with the chief purpose of providing cancer screenings and sexually transmitted disease tests and treatment to low-income women. Along with lowering costs and free preventive care, the health care law also prohibits insurance companies from denying coverage women “due to pre-existing conditions, such as cancer and having been pregnant.” Foxx, however, believes such health reforms pose a greater danger than “any terrorist.”
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) told Republicans that a vote for this bill is a vote “to say that women can die on the floor of health care providers.” And Foxx is fighting for women to have that chance.
Truthout Is Preparing to Meet Trump’s Agenda With Resistance at Every Turn
Dear Truthout Community,
If you feel rage, despondency, confusion and deep fear today, you are not alone. We’re feeling it too. We are heartsick. Facing down Trump’s fascist agenda, we are desperately worried about the most vulnerable people among us, including our loved ones and everyone in the Truthout community, and our minds are racing a million miles a minute to try to map out all that needs to be done.
We must give ourselves space to grieve and feel our fear, feel our rage, and keep in the forefront of our mind the stark truth that millions of real human lives are on the line. And simultaneously, we’ve got to get to work, take stock of our resources, and prepare to throw ourselves full force into the movement.
Journalism is a linchpin of that movement. Even as we are reeling, we’re summoning up all the energy we can to face down what’s coming, because we know that one of the sharpest weapons against fascism is publishing the truth.
There are many terrifying planks to the Trump agenda, and we plan to devote ourselves to reporting thoroughly on each one and, crucially, covering the movements resisting them. We also recognize that Trump is a dire threat to journalism itself, and that we must take this seriously from the outset.
Last week, the four of us sat down to have some hard but necessary conversations about Truthout under a Trump presidency. How would we defend our publication from an avalanche of far right lawsuits that seek to bankrupt us? How would we keep our reporters safe if they need to cover outbreaks of political violence, or if they are targeted by authorities? How will we urgently produce the practical analysis, tools and movement coverage that you need right now — breaking through our normal routines to meet a terrifying moment in ways that best serve you?
It will be a tough, scary four years to produce social justice-driven journalism. We need to deliver news, strategy, liberatory ideas, tools and movement-sparking solutions with a force that we never have had to before. And at the same time, we desperately need to protect our ability to do so.
We know this is such a painful moment and donations may understandably be the last thing on your mind. But we must ask for your support, which is needed in a new and urgent way.
We promise we will kick into an even higher gear to give you truthful news that cuts against the disinformation and vitriol and hate and violence. We promise to publish analyses that will serve the needs of the movements we all rely on to survive the next four years, and even build for the future. We promise to be responsive, to recognize you as members of our community with a vital stake and voice in this work.
Please dig deep if you can, but a donation of any amount will be a truly meaningful and tangible action in this cataclysmic historical moment.
We’re with you. Let’s do all we can to move forward together.
With love, rage, and solidarity,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy