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Women’s March Keeps Hardline Pro-Choice Stance Even While Losing Support

Just three years after its conception, the Women’s March is making more headlines for dividing women than uniting them.

On Saturday, the 2019 Women’s March is descending on the capital, with smaller marches scheduled for cities around the country. Two years after President Trump’s inauguration, however, the divisions in the movement are starting to show–the event, which included more than 560 progressive organizations as partners in 2017, now lists just 200. One major reason for the protest’s decreased support is it hardline pro-abortion stance.

Starting with the first march in 2017, protest organizers have worked to exclude pro-life women’s groups. Pro-life feminist organizations including New Wave Feminists, And Then There Were None, and Students for Life for America discovered that their names had been removed from the list of partners after an article in the Atlantic highlighted their participation.

Women’s March organizers quickly moved to amend their statement of principles to include full-throated support of abortion rights.

“We do not accept any federal, state or local rollbacks, cuts or restrictions on our ability to access quality reproductive healthcare services, birth control, HIV/AIDS care and prevention, or medically accurate sexuality education,” the Women’s March states bluntly in its lengthy statement of principles.

This year, Planned Parenthood continues to be a proud partner of the protest. In a Medium post this week, Angela Ferrell-Zabala, the national director of strategic partnerships at the Planned Parenthood Action Fund said that the group was, “once again proudly joining our numerous progressive partners for the #WomensWave mobilization to protect and advance the progress we’ve made as a movement.”

For the organizers of the march, it is not enough just that abortion be legal. It must also be widely available and government-subsidized: “We understand that we can only have reproductive justice when reproductive health care is accessible to all people regardless of income, location or education.”

These statements put the Women’s March far to the left of where most Americans–and most women– stand on the issue of abortion. According to a poll released this week by Maris and the Knights of Columbus, Americans are overall in favor of increased restrictions on the availability of abortions. According to the poll, a full 60 percent of Democrats, 92 percent of Republicans, and 72 percent of independents support limiting abortions to cases of rape or incest or where pregnancy would harm the life of the mother. And an overwhelming majority of American women support some restrictions on late-term abortions.

Americans are also against the sort of abortion “accessibility” that the Women’s March promotes. The same poll found that three in four Americans spending taxpayer money to subsidize abortions overseas, while 54 percent were against using taxpayer money to pay for domestic abortions.

Perhaps reflecting this divide, sister marches across the country have been struggling to attract the donations and attendance they need to pull off events of their own. Already, several cities including New Orleans, Chicago, and Eureka, Cal. have cancelled their marches, both out of concern over the anti-Semitic statements and because of a lack of community support.

Just three years after the Women’s March was founded as an inclusive protest group, it appears to have morphed into an explicitly leftist one. The March did not respond to a request for comment on the shift.

This year, with both the March for Life and the Women’s March taking place on the same weekend, the issue of abortion will be front and center in Washington. For the Women’s March, there is little room for compromise. Unfortunately, it seems that the American people don’t necessarily see things the same way.

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New Hampshire Doesn’t Want or Need Abortion Extremism

At an Independence Day celebration, a Republican friend asked me about our starting a third party. Then he said it might not work because we disagree on one big issue…abortion.

Surprised, I asked, “You are pro-choice?”  He replied, “Yes, I don’t think we should take a right to abortion away, but I don’t think we should pay for it.” He clarified his position further by declaring his support both for parental consent and for a ban on abortion after 12 weeks. So, while he considers himself pro-choice, his clarifications show that “pro-choice” doesn’t always mean what you think.

In many ways, my friend represents the voters of New Hampshire, which is called a pro-choice state, but when you look deeper, the views on abortion are not so clear. The majority may not want abortion to be illegal, but many people support regulation.

The nuances of abortion are not stopping gubernatorial candidate Steve Marchand from taking one of the most extreme positions in the nation.

Marchand’s extremism contrasts with moderate New Hampshirites’ positions on life. His plan promotes abortion through nine months (most of Europe restricts abortion after the early second trimester), eliminates the Hyde Amendment (which prohibits federal funding of abortion), and abolishes reasonable restrictions of abortion.

Marchand advocates overturning a 2017 law that recognizes children at 20 weeks of pregnancy as eligible to be considered victims of crime. Ask any mother or father who has lost a preborn child as a result of a crime, and she or he will tell you that this law is a good thing. The law has nothing to do with abortion and everything to do with justice for grieving families.

The hostility of Marchand’s plan is frightening and will not win against a Republican incumbent who in recent polls showed a 25-point lead.

To win, Marchand should expand his base of support and recognize that abortion-on-demand is not what most women want. Most women who seek an abortion feel as if they have no choice. They are most often poor, in unhealthy relationships, and/or pressured to abort their unborn children by the fathers or other family members.

Marchand should replace his abortion-expansion plan with a woman-centered plan that whole-life voters would support.

First, he should advocate for paid maternity leave, so that a woman doesn’t have to choose between an abortion and keeping a job she needs.

Second, Marchand should support the thirty-plus pregnancy centers in New Hampshire, which provide diapers, cribs, strollers, clothing, and other necessities for mothers, free of charge.

Third, Marchand should promote perinatal hospice, which supports mothers and families who receive a diagnosis that the child in utero has a life-threatening disease and will likely not survive.

It matters that New Hampshire, which carries symbolic weight when it comes to picking the leader of the country, is seeing a frightening hostility to life in its gubernatorial race.

New Hampshire prides itself for being “first in the nation.” But will it lead the way for life or for hostility?

With a Republican State House, Could Several Abortion Bills Make It to the Governor’s Desk?

While House leadership said that bills restricting abortion rights would not be a priority for the Republican majority, there are still some bills before the New Hampshire Legislature tackling the contentious issue.

After the November election, House Speaker Shawn Jasper outlined his top priorities for the 2017 legislative session, which included concealed carry and right to work, but not any abortion bills.

However, that didn’t stop several state representatives from putting them forward. With a Republican-controlled State House, some bills that seek to restrict abortion rights could quietly make it far in the legislative process. While pro-life and pro-choice groups are paying attention to the issue, most eyes will be on the budget, right-to-work legislation, or other bills dealing with election laws.

Rep. Keith Murphy, R-Bedford, is hopeful his bill, which would ban abortions after “viability,” passes the House. He introduced a similar version of the bill last year, when it was deemed “ought to pass” in the House Judiciary Committee, but failed by three votes in a House session.

Murphy blamed the defeat on the fact that it was “the end of a long day and a lot of people already left.” He also thought some of the representatives did not fully understand the bill.

“I have vowed this year to be different,” he told NH Journal.

House Bill 578 would prohibit any person from performing or inducing an abortion on a woman when it has been determined that the age of the “unborn child” is 21 weeks or older, unless there is a medical emergency in order to save the woman’s life or stop physical harm. The bill also sets penalties for doctors who perform abortions in violation of the law.

New Hampshire is one of eight states that does not place a specific restriction on abortions at a certain point in pregnancy, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research and policy organization focused on sexual and reproductive health.

“New Hampshire tends to be a fairly moderate state on the question of abortion,” Murphy said. “I think this bill has an excellent chance [of passing] because it protects children who are viable, who will live if they are removed from the womb. There is no reason to kill these children because they will survive.”

Kayla Montgomery, director of advocacy and organizing for Planned Parenthood NH Action Fund, said the bill would criminalize doctors and make “it impossible for women who face complex pregnancy complications or severe fetal abnormalities to access abortion as currently provided in New Hampshire.”

“Equally as problematic, the bill requires an intrusive data collection system which would create a registry of women who obtain abortions and doctors who provide them and store this information at the Board of Medicine and the Department of Health and Human Services,” she told NH Journal.

While Murphy understands that his legislation might not be a priority for the House leadership, he said he has spoken to House Majority Leader Dick Hinch about the bill and “Speaker Jasper has indicated in general that he will go where the House takes him.”

“I don’t think he is dictating the outcome of the bill,” he said. “If the House passes it, it will be supported.”

If enough Republicans rally behind the bill, it could make it to Gov. Chris Sununu’s desk, and Murphy said he is optimistic that the Republican governor would sign it.

Sununu describes himself as a pro-choice Republican and said he stands by his vote to approve of state funding for Planned Parenthood last year. But he also said he opposes late-term abortions. He has not been specific about what that means.

“We can generally say third trimester, but some say 20 weeks,” he told the New Hampshire Union Leader in October. “I think we can look at those options, but I am not going to put a timeline on it now.”

Planned Parenthood, though, is expecting Sununu to protect women’s health.

“We will be watching the budget process closely to ensure that women’s health programs are protected and fully funded,” Montgomery said. “Gov. Sununu campaigned as someone who supports abortion rights and pledged to stand up to his party to protect women’s health, and that’s what we are expecting of him. New Hampshire has a long bipartisan tradition of respecting individual privacy. Support for access to safe, legal abortion in New Hampshire is among the strongest in the country. Defeating attacks has always been accomplished by bipartisan efforts, and we expect no different this year.”

There are two near-identical bills in the House and Senate that would allow prosecution of a person, such as an impaired driver or abusive domestic partner, whose actions cause a woman to lose a pregnancy that she has chosen to carry. It does not apply to abortion or to any act performed with the mother’s consent.

Senate Bill 66 specifies a “viable” fetus, which is a “developing human” that has basic human qualities. House Bill 156 is just a fetus, which is defined as after the eighth week of a pregnancy until birth.

The House Bill is known as Griffin’s Law, which has been introduced in the Legislature before by former Rep. Leon Rideout, R-Lancaster, whose daughter lost her baby in 2013 after another driver ran a stop sign and crashed into her. His daughter suffered serious injuries and despite an emergency C section to keep the child alive, he succumbed to injuries from the crash.

Rep. Jeanine Notter, R-Merrimack, is the prime sponsor of Griffin’s Law in the current legislative session. But the future of the bill remains unclear. It has failed in the Legislature before, so it will remain to be seen if it has more widespread support this time. The House bill will hear public testimony in the House Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee on Tuesday.

Montgomery said the House and Senate bills do not have a “direct impact on the health services that Planned Parenthood of Northern New England provides.”

“We do share concerns that have been raised regarding implications of recognizing fetal rights prior to viability,” she said. “There are examples of similar bills in other states which have led to the prosecution of women for their own behavior during pregnancy.”

Montgomery said Planned Parenthood would also be watching House Bill 589, which would repeal the “buffer zone law,” which was passed in 2014, allowing for a 25-foot zone outside abortion facilities where no one would be allowed to protest or impede anyone from entering the facility.

“Now, more than ever, health centers need the flexibility to adapt buffer zones if they feel the privacy and safety of patients are at risk,” Montgomery said. “Undoing this law would be a step backwards and removes an important tool from the toolkit.”

Sununu has indicated during the campaign that he would support repealing the law.

 

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