Just when we thought the GOP war on women could not get more extreme, Arizona state Rep. Terri Proud (R-Tucson) writes that women should be forced to “watch an abortion being performed prior to having” one.
Proud wrote those words in an email response to a constituent who had emailed Proud (and other lawmakers) about her opposition to a bill that would ban abortions after the 20th week of pregnancy.
Here’s Proud’s (unedited) email:
“Personally I’d like to make a law that mandates a woman watch an abortion being performed prior to having a “surgical procedure”. If it’s not a life it shouldn’t matter, if it doesn’t harm a woman then she shouldn’t care, and don’t we want more transparency and education in the medical profession anyway? We demand it everywhere else.
Until the dead child can tell me that she/he does not feel any pain – I have no intentions of clearing the conscience of the living – I will be voting YES.”
In an e-mail to Arizona Republic‘s Political Insider blog, Proud defended her statement, saying women should be aware of any surgical procedure “especially when a foreign object is extracting from a delicate organ.”
Then Proud took to Facebook to blame the controversy on the Democrats.
“I always try to answer every email that I receive – friendly or hostile. I don’t apologize for emails I state are my personal opinion. I may not be cut out to be a politician, but I am cut out to be a Representative and it’s sad that the left like to play ‘I gotcha’ games through emails while sitting in my office. Some legislators don’t even respond to emails for fear it’s just another ‘gotcha’ moment – thank a Democrat for that.”
If Proud has her way, she’d go much further than even the most extreme bills regulating abortion and contraception already under consideration in the Arizona legislature.
Besides House Bill 2036 which bans most abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy, there is House Bill 2625. That would allow Arizona employers the right to demand proof that employees were seeking contraceptives for non-sexual, non-reproductive purposes, such as hormone control or acne treatment. Because Arizona is an at-will employment state, critics say this amounts to a bill giving employers license to fire their employees for using birth control and/or for refusing to disclose the reasons for using birth control (although we’re told the ‘Show Your Boss Your Whore Pills’ bill is being amended to make it more politically acceptable. Good luck with that!). And then there’s House Bill 2800, which would strip Planned Parenthood of public funds for health-care services. A war on women? Indeed. Just tell me it won’t get any worse than this!
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