Tag Archives: abortion rights

The Hill reports: Planned Parenthood’s super PAC announced a $45 million electoral campaign on Wednesday to defeat President Trump and Republicans in key Senate races. The investment will fund “large-scale” grassroots organization and canvass, digital, television, radio and mail programs. “Next November, our very rights and freedoms will be on the ballot,” said Kelley Robinson, executive director of Planned Parenthood …

NPR reports: The U.S. Supreme Court has jumped headlong back into the abortion wars. The court said Friday that it will hear arguments in a case from Louisiana that is nearly identical to a Texas case decided by the court three years ago. Like the Texas law that the court previously struck down, the Louisiana law requires any doctor performing …

CNN reports: A federal judge on Tuesday blocked a Missouri law banning abortions after eight weeks from going into effect. “The various sections specifying prohibitions on abortions at various weeks prior to viability cannot be allowed to go into effect on August 28, as scheduled,” writes Judge Howard Sachs in an 11-page opinion. “However formulated, the legislation on its face …

Roll Call reports: A routine House debate nearly exploded Wednesday when California Democrat Norma J. Torres implied her Republican colleagues were “sex-starved males” for opposing abortion. “Mr. Speaker, it is tiring to hear from so many sex-starved males on this floor talk about a woman’s right to choose,” Torres said as lawmakers debated a rule setting up amendment consideration for …

NBC News reports: Louisiana lawmakers passed an abortion ban on a 79 – 23 vote Wednesday that would prohibit women from terminating a pregnancy once a fetal heartbeat has been detected. Democratic Gov. John Bel Edwards [photo] has indicated that he would break with his party and sign the ban if it crosses his desk. The Senate already approved the …

Time Magazine reports: Pope Francis said Saturday that abortion can never be condoned, even when the fetus is gravely sick or likely to die, and urged doctors and priests to support families to carry such pregnancies to term. Speaking to a Vatican-sponsored anti-abortion conference, Francis said the opposition to abortion isn’t a religious issue but a human one. “Is it …

ABC News reports: A federal court in Mississippi on Friday temporarily blocked the state’s new “fetal heartbeat” law that bans abortion after roughly six weeks of pregnancy. The law was set to take effect July 1. “Here we go again,” U.S. District Judge Carlton W. Reeves wrote in his opinion. “Mississippi has passed another law banning abortions prior to viability.” …

Law & Crime reports: A 51-year-old Brooklyn man who threatened to murder a sitting U.S. Senator for their criticism of President Donald Trump pleaded guilty on Friday, meaning he now faces up to 10 years behind bars. Michael Brogan, ostensibly a pro-life man, was accused of threatening to kill an unidentified U.S. Senator “in retaliation for the United States Senator’s …

CBS News reports: Missouri Gov. Mike Parson on Friday signed a bill that bans abortions on or beyond the eighth week of pregnancy without exceptions for cases of rape or incest, making it among the most restrictive abortion policies in the nation. Under the law that comes into force Aug. 28, doctors who violate the eight-week cutoff could face five …

Entertainment Weekly reports: Leslie Jones joined “Weekend Update” co-anchor Colin Jost on the Saturday Night Live season 44 finale over the weekend, decked out in the red robes worn by the women in The Handmaid’s Tale. Jones soon ripped off the robes to reveal her bold, defiant black T-shirt with the word “Mine” written across the front, above a white …

NPR reports: The Kansas Constitution protects a woman’s right to an abortion, the state’s Supreme Court ruled Friday. The landmark ruling now stands as the law of the land in Kansas with no path for an appeal. Because it turns on the state’s constitution, abortion would remain legal in Kansas even if the Roe v. Wade case that established a …

New York Magazine reports: A total abortion ban criminalizing the procedure and classifying it as a homicide cleared a committee Tuesday and will now be debated at the Texas House of Representatives. If House Bill 896 becomes law, abortion could carry penalties ranging from a state jail felony to a capital felony, and patients who seek the procedure could in …

The Associated Press reports: The Supreme Court is rejecting an appeal from an anti-abortion group that surreptitiously recorded Planned Parenthood employees. The justices joined lower courts Monday in allowing Planned Parenthood’s racketeering and other claims against the Center for Medical Progress to proceed. Two members of the group also are facing criminal charges in California over the secret recordings. The …

The Louisville Courier-Journal reports: Should pregnant women be monitored by the state? That’s what a Louisville lawmaker is proposing out of frustration with a flurry of bills in the current legislative session meant to restrict or eliminate abortion in Kentucky. “It’s so arrogant of a bunch of legislators,” said Rep. Mary Lou Marzian, a Louisville Democrat and supporter of abortion …

The Hill reports:  Conservative commentator and radio host Ben Shapiro has reportedly lost a second advertiser after giving a controversial speech at the annual March for Life anti-abortion rally in Washington, D.C., on Friday. Calm, a relaxation and meditation app, responded to users condemning Shapiro’s speech on Twitter, writing late Friday night that the company did do not “align with” …

The Jewish Forward reports: Conservative commentator Ben Shapiro, appearing Friday as the keynote speaker of the annual March for Life on the National Mall in Washington, shared with his audience a head-scratching scenario about abortion and Adolf Hitler. “The argument, I guess here, would you kill baby Hitler?” he started off, in a clip posted to Twitter. “And the truth …

Reuters reports: The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday dealt a setback to Louisiana and Kansas, turning away their appeals of lower court rulings that blocked their efforts to end public funding to Planned Parenthood, a national women’s healthcare and abortion provider, through the Medicaid program. The justices’ decision to turn away both states’ appeals leaves intact lower court rulings that …

Technically not a live video, since the show was taped in New York City last weekend. But I was there and you’ll enjoy this. The second Golden Probes taped on Saturday. In the words of creator Lizz Winstead, the satirical awards show “honors so many shitbags.” Hosted by Margaret Cho and featured presenters including Stormy Daniels, Michelle Buteau, Dan Savage …

Politico reports: A majority of voters want the next Supreme Court justice to support abortion rights, according to a new POLITICO/Morning Consult poll conducted in the immediate wake of Anthony Kennedy’s retirement announcement last week. With the prospect that President Donald Trump’s pending pick to replace Kennedy could join with the existing four justices appointed by Republican presidents to overturn …

“Given the fact that the left wants to make this all about abortion –  and I think it’s much bigger, I think we have religious liberty, we’ve got freedom of speech, the First Amendment in the crosshairs of the left. But they want to make it about life and if I were the president, I’d say, ‘Game on. I’m going …