Latest news with #antiabortion
The Guardian
5 days ago
- Business
- The Guardian
GOP nominee for Virginia governor tries to distance herself from anti-abortion past
The Republican nominee for governor of Virginia has recently tried to distance herself from her long-standing, hardline anti-abortion record, declining recently to state whether she would support any restrictions on abortion access if she is elected to lead the state this fall. But her record reveals a candidate staunchly opposed to the procedure. Winsome Earle-Sears, now the state's lieutenant governor, supported a 15-week abortion ban and has previously said she wants to make abortion illegal in almost all cases. In audio obtained by the Guardian, Earle-Sears also suggested an equivalence between consenting to sex and consenting to pregnancy. Virginia is the only state in the US south without a strict abortion ban, and abortion is legal in the state through the end of the second trimester of pregnancy. The state's current Republican governor, Glenn Youngkin, previously failed to build support for a 15-week abortion ban, a framework Earle-Sears endorsed. While campaigning for lieutenant governor in January 2021, before Roe v Wade was overturned and support for abortion rights rose among the US public, Earle-Sears told a reporter that she considered abortion to be 'genocide' and that she wanted to make abortion illegal in all cases unless the mother's life was at risk. But she has recently struck a different tone. In a local news interview last week, a reporter with WRIC 8News asked Earle-Sears about her past support for limiting abortion access. She replied: 'I never said limiting access.' Sears, who is Black, then referenced abortion rates among Black women and asked: 'Who doesn't want us to have babies?' When asked if she would sign a law banning abortion at 15 weeks or less, Earle-Sears said: 'We're not limiting access at all. That's not what we're saying. As a matter of fact, what we really need to do is get together and try to figure out, where is the limit?' Virginians broadly support abortion rights, with 71% saying abortion should be legal in all or most cases per a 2023 Public Religion Research Institute survey. The interview comes as some GOP strategists told Politico that Earle-Sears is struggling to make traction, citing slow fundraising and controversial comments connecting slavery to diversity, equity and inclusion programs. Her campaign wrote in a fundraising email: 'Slaves did not die in the fields so that we could call ourselves victims now in 2025.' Polling shows Earle-Sears trailing the Democratic nominee, former representative Abigail Spanberger, by nearly seven points according to polling averages. Virginia gubernatorial races often swing in the opposite direction of the presidency. Earle-Sears may be attempting to strike a softer tone on abortion in advance of the November election, but she has made hardline anti-abortion statements for years. In a little-noticed radio interview from June 2022, Earle-Sears suggested to then conservative radio host John Reid, now the Republican nominee for lieutenant governor, that women consenting to sex are consenting to pregnancy. 'We need to make our choices before we're pregnant, not, you know, after,' she said, just days after the supreme court overturned Roe. 'You already made a choice.' That comment was of a piece with other past statements. In September 2021, Earle-Sears said on Newsmax that she supported a six-week abortion ban like the one that had just taken effect in Texas. Her campaign website's 'issues' page previously included an anti-abortion section where she referred to 'late-term abortion' as murder. (Abortion opponents use that term to refer to abortions later in pregnancy; in obstetrics, 'late term' refers to a pregnancy after 40 weeks.) She scrubbed the site of that section in 2021. Sign up to Headlines US Get the most important US headlines and highlights emailed direct to you every morning after newsletter promotion Most recently, Earle-Sears, who is required as the state's senate president to add her signature to bills that pass the legislature, added a note to a constitutional amendment to codify abortion rights that the legislature passed in May. The Virginia Mercury reported that she wrote above her signature: 'I am morally opposed to this bill; no protection for the child.' The amendment must pass the legislature again next year before it can go to voters. The Earle-Sears campaign declined to comment on the record on her recent interview as well as the 2022 interview. Reid, the lieutenant governor nominee, has been mired in his own scandal for allegedly maintaining a social media account featuring photos of nude men. Governor Youngkin asked him to drop out of the race, but Reid, Virginia's first openly gay candidate for statewide office, has denied connection to the photos and claimed that attempts to push him constitute discrimination against his sexual orientation. Following news of the photos, Earle-Sears cancelled events with Reid. News also broke that, last year, she wrote a note on a marriage equality bill saying that she was 'morally opposed' to same-sex marriage. Politico described the relationship between the two nominees at the Republican ticket as 'frosty'.
Russia Today
26-05-2025
- Politics
- Russia Today
US interfering in UK's internal affairs
US officials recently travelled to the UK to meet with local anti-abortion campaigners who Washington believes face retribution for expressing their views, The Telegraph reported on Saturday. The paper described the move as evidence of Washington's desire to 'intervene in domestic British affairs.' In March, the State Department dispatched a delegation from the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor (DRL), to meet with officials from the Foreign Office and communications regulator Ofcom to 'affirm the importance of freedom of expression in the UK and across Europe.' The talks, which also overlapped with separate UK-US trade negotiations, focused on Britain's new online safety act and its potential consequences for freedom of speech. However, the five-member US team also quietly met with British activists who had been arrested for protesting outside abortion clinics, the article said. The US officials also reportedly attended an event held at a 'nondescript' office block where campaigners were present. 'The visit is the latest sign of the Trump administration's willingness to intervene in domestic British affairs,' The Telegraph noted. While the paper did not provide details on whom the US officials met, Washington has sounded the alarm over several controversial cases where the right to free speech in the UK may have been violated. One of them was that of Livia Tossici-Bolt, a 64-year-old campaigner who was charged in 2023 for holding a sign reading 'here to talk if you want' outside an abortion clinic in Bournemouth. She refused to leave when asked by police and faced prosecution under a Public Spaces Protection Order (PSPO) – a legal restriction that creates a 150-meter buffer zone around facilities providing abortion services. In February, US Vice President J.D. Vance also singled out the case of Adam Smith-Connor, a 51-year-old British army veteran and anti-abortion activist, who was convicted in October 2024 for silently praying near the same Bournemouth clinic. Vance called it a 'most concerning case' and said it illustrated the threats to the 'basic liberties of religious Britons.' UK law enforcement has been criticized for so-called 'two-tier policing,' a term suggesting that much harsher measures are often taken against right-wing protesters than against left-wing ones. Elon Musk, a close Trump ally, has been particularly vocal on the matter, blasting the UK over its response to what he described as a disproportionate response to anti-immigration demonstrations.
CBS News
21-05-2025
- Health
- CBS News
Bipartisan support propels Texas bill to clarify medical exceptions in near-total abortion ban
A bill that clarifies the medical exceptions to the state of Texas' near-abortion ban could be headed to the governor's desk as early as Thursday. It comes as lawmakers in the Texas House gave preliminary passage of the legislation Wednesday afternoon. The bill is aimed at better defining for doctors when it is ok for them to perform an abortion. The measure received widespread and bipartisan support in the Texas House, passing by a margin of 129 to six and 10 lawmakers present but not voting. Many abortion-rights and anti-abortion groups backed this legislation. Some conservatives opposed the bill. The measure came after some women, their doctors, and hospitals sued the state, complaining that the state's near-total abortion ban was too vague. As a result, they said critical care was either delayed or denied and some had to leave the state to get an abortion, putting their lives in danger. Exceptions under abortion law In Texas, the only exception to an abortion is to save the life of the mother. This new bill says that a doctor can perform the procedure if a mother's life or a major bodily function is in danger, either imminently or long-term. Examples include cancer treatment, kidney and liver failure. Opponents said they worry the bill will be a slippery slope in allowing more abortions, but the author of the bill, Rep. Charlie Geren, R-Fort Worth, disputed that during debate on the legislation. "We are in no way promoting abortion on this," said Geren. "What we are trying to do is save the life or the bodily functions of a mother. I get a little emotional about this. I've got friends who watched their wives nearly bleed out." "This bill creates loopholes to recharge the pro-choice industry in Texas, and I will be voting no," said Rep. David Lowe, R-Arlington, one of the six lawmakers who voted against the measure. The Texas ACLU opposes the bill and, in a statement, said, "No amount of 'clarification' can fix a fundamentally unjust law." The Texas House will give final passage on Thursday. The Senate already approved the measure unanimously, 31-0. The next stop after Thursday's vote in the House will be Gov. Abbott's desk. House passes another abortion related bill Wednesday SB 33 bans local governments from paying for residents to go out of state to get an abortion. One other piece of legislation, SB 2880, seeks to crack down on the sale and trafficking of abortion pills. After passing in the Senate, it has been referred to a House committee. Watch Eye On Politics at 7:30 Sunday morning on CBS News Texas on air and streaming
The Guardian
21-05-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
State and federal MPs describe death threats and vile abuse in wake of Joanna Howe's anti-abortion campaign
State and federal MPs around the country say they and their staff have received death threats from third parties amid controversy generated by the self-described 'assertiveness' of the anti-abortion activist Joanna Howe. Howe, an expert in migration law at the University of Adelaide, has campaigned for anti-abortion laws in various state parliaments, and this month organised a rally – attended by the former prime minister Tony Abbott – against NSW reforms to improve access to services. She said on social media people 'need to be hysterical' about the bill, which represented what she called 'an extreme, radical takeover of our country'. In NSW parliament this week, the state Liberal leader, Mark Speakman, accused Howe of 'brazen bullying'. The NSW Greens MP Amanda Cohn, who introduced the bill, told Guardian Australia she had received 'threats to my personal safety' from third parties and felt her workplace had become 'unsafe' for her staff. Sign up for Guardian Australia's breaking news email Labor's Julia Finn accused Howe in NSW parliament last week of using 'bizarre and nasty' tactics and 'obnoxious, attention-seeking behaviour'. She told parliament Howe had gone into her office and spoken to a heavily pregnant and 'vulnerable' electorate officer, and 'while she did not say anything unkind', the interaction was filmed and posted without the staff member's knowledge or consent. 'That is not OK,' Finn said. Howe did not take the post down when asked, Finn said. Howe said in a social media post it was possible the staff member did not know she was being filmed but didn't know if she (Howe) could be held responsible for that. A federal MP who asked not to be named told Guardian Australia they were targeted online by Howe after expressing their views on abortion. They said they then received abusive messages from anonymous people, including one who said they hoped the MP would suffer and die, and another who said their mother should have 'swallowed' so that they were never born. The MP said they were concerned enough about those messages to contact the police. The independent South Australian MLC Tammy Franks, formerly of the Greens, told Guardian Australia her office received threats from third parties after Howe named her as part of the 'Baby-Killers Club' for being opposed to what the Greens described as a 'forced birth' bill last year. Howe was banned from SA parliament for her behaviour during the vote for that bill. 'We got lots of death threats, we got rape threats to the office … that was to the person who answered the phone,' Franks said. Howe has posted multiple videos of herself following MPs and asking them questions about abortion. In one, she follows the South Australian child protection minister, Katrine Hildyard, as she leaves Easter mass and, as Hildyard helps a parishioner into a car, asks her why she wants 'babies born dead'. Hildyard was also one of the women Howe branded as part of the 'Baby-Killers Club'. Staff in the office of the Queensland Labor leader, Steven Miles, called the police after Howe entered their office last year and the person with her began filming without consent, while she asked a staff member about abortion and refused to leave when asked. Howe posted a video of the police talking to her after the incident. The police said their concern was that she had not left when asked. Howe said she thought it was 'problematic in a democracy' that she couldn't speak to Miles, who was premier at the time, to 'hold him to account', and 'insane' that the staff member called the police. No charges were laid. One social media post from Howe about Miles attracted multiple comments from other internet users wishing death on Miles, including saying someone should 'terminate his life', that he should 'have a date with a NOOSE' and that he should swing 'from the gallows'. The comments remain online. In 2023, the Labor MLC Lorna Harper told the Western Australian parliament Howe had attacked her and her beliefs online and encouraged her followers to 'leave offensive messages' on her social media for supporting abortion legislation. Harper said 'according to [Howe's] followers' she was 'a baby killer, a murderer, not fit to be in parliament, a radical, highly offensive, gutless, coldblooded and a feminist extremist'. Howe has been praised by the Coalition senators Alex Antic and Matt Canavan, the United Australia Party senator Ralph Babet and some state parliament representatives for her advocacy for anti-abortion laws, none of which have passed. Speakman told parliament this week Howe had 'threatened to lead a public campaign aimed at encouraging a grassroots opposition to you as Liberal leader' if he supported the NSW bill. Sign up to Breaking News Australia Get the most important news as it breaks after newsletter promotion 'I will not cave to brazen bullying like this nor to the Americanisation of NSW politics,' Speakman said. Howe said in response on social media that politicians used parliamentary privilege to tell 'the most brazen lies' while they 'work with their comrades in the media in advance' to get coverage. She said MPs weaponised accusations of misinformation and disinformation and likened it to 'some kind of Tourette's' or 'verbal diarrhoea'. She said of being called a bully that it was 'democracy' and she was just asking questions. 'It's not like I'm going around threatening to beat up their family or I'm finding them in a dark alleyway and I'm … harassing them,' she said. She said pro-life women and church leaders had always sat down with politicians for meetings and 'just lost dismally', playing 'Christian voters for fools'. 'I'm not your nice pro-life Christian girl,' she said. 'I bring a level of activism and assertiveness and it's clearly effective because it's rattled you [NSW politicians],' she said. 'You're just going to have to get with the program, because the old sitting down for a meeting and listening to your BS … those days are over. We're not doing that any more.' Howe also published video of the NSW premier, Chris Minns, criticising her. 'He's just called me a liar and a bully,' she said. 'It really just shows how fragile these snowflake politicians are.' Other comments he made were 'good' for a potential defamation action, she said. 'For Minns to say that, you know, I'm responsible for all this misinformation, whipping up this hysteria – people need to be hysterical about this bill,' she said. 'This was an extreme, radical takeover of our country.' Howe targeted the federal Liberal senator Maria Kovacic with a petition for her to be 'dumped', describing her as having an 'anti-child, anti-family ideology'. Kovacic told Guardian Australia MPs had a duty to resist attempts to coerce them into silence or submission. Franks said she 'can't believe' the University of Adelaide lets Howe 'trade on her association with that institution as a law professor when her lack of respect for … what is reasonable behaviour in the democratic process continues to be flouted'. The university said academics were free to 'make lawful public comment on any issue in their personal capacities', but were expected to comply with the university's code of conduct. It did not say whether it considered Howe's actions to be in accordance with the code. Howe did not respond to a request for comment, but posted on X saying she did not need to answer questions and was 'busy being a real person with a life'.
Washington Post
20-05-2025
- Politics
- Washington Post
Kansas group fights campaign donor law it sees as a response to its success defending abortion
TOPEKA, Kan. — A group that successfully defeated an anti-abortion ballot measure in Kansas has filed a federal lawsuit against a new state law aimed at curbing foreign influence in elections, saying it violates free speech rights and would keep the group from waging future campaigns. Kansans for Constitutional Freedom argues that the law taking effect July 1 is a direct response to the decisive August 2022 statewide vote against a proposed amendment to the Kansas Constitution that would have allowed the Legislature to greatly restrict or ban abortion. The group led the 'no' campaign, and its largest single donor was the Sixteen Thirty Fund, tied to Hansjörg Wyss, a Swiss billionaire who lives in Wyoming and finances liberal causes.
