| Congratulations, Republicans in the Texas Legislature! Your efforts to specifically curtail abortion rights here in liberal, progressive Austin have succeeded. Rick Perry's efforts to impede a woman's access to a safe, legal abortion have worked, and it's going to hurt the neediest women the most.
Texas Republicans have long made it a priority to curtail a woman's right to a safe, legal abortion. This past session, their draconian laws specifically targeted Austin, where women can readily exercise their right to choose, and where citizens deeply respect the right of a woman to make her own medical decisions.
Here's what happened.
In June, the Republican-dominated Texas Legislature voted to deny state funding to any health care district that provides funds to perform abortions.
In August, the board of Central Health, aka the Travis County Health Care District, was forced to vote to cease spending $450,000 per year to fund abortion services. Travis County has provided abortions to the lowest of low-income women since 2005. This $450K amounts to one half of 1 percent of the budget of the health care district. You can bet that the cost to the state of providing services for those unwanted children is much, much higher.
You can specifically thank State Rep. Wayne Christian, who in addition to being one of the most lady-punishin' members of the legislature, is clearly the most ironically named.
From the Texas Tribune, emphasis mine:
Christian said the purpose of his amendment was to put a stop to the agreements between Central Health and the three women's health clinics. He said he knew that Travis County was the only hospital district to fund elective abortions when he authored the amendment. He didn't intend to attack the county specifically, he said.
"I just think tax dollars should not be used for abortions anywhere in Texas," Christian said. "I think that what is going on in Travis County is wrong."
No, Wayne. What's going on in Travis County is correct, because we're empowering women to access their right to choose. We're labeling so-called "Crisis Pregnancy Centers" as the fear-mongerers that they are. Our State Representatives are speaking up about the importance of family planning to healthy women and healthy communities. We're supporting a diverse range of pro-choice and pro-women organizations that help women access their right to choose. And it is a right, one which will remain the law of the land as long as we block any one of the current crop of sufficiently lady-hating Republicans trying to occupy the White House.
So who is harmed by these actions of Texas Republicans? Poor women, women with almost no other options. And these women are seeing what few options exist dwindle further, because the Republican legislature also defunded Planned Parenthood.
A recent email from Planned Parenthood made it clear that their ability to offer not just abortion services but family planning and health care as a whole is being curtailed due to Texas Republicans. They lost all state funding for the fiscal year starting September 1 -- on four days' notice. They write (emphasis mine):
Thursday, September 1, Planned Parenthood in Austin's Downtown Clinic on E. 7th Street will no longer receive $474,000 in federal/state funds that provide birth control and essential breast and cervical cancer screenings and HIV tests to more than 4,000 Austinites who depend on these services each year.
Make no mistake---this is part of a nationwide effort to discredit and defund Planned Parenthood specifically, and women's health in general.
Here in Texas, Governor Rick Perry approved a state budget that singles out women's health, eliminating more than 2/3 of funding for basic women's health care services including life-saving breast and cervical cancer screenings.
So yeah, women will die of breast cancer and cervical cancer because Texas Republicans think blocking a woman's right to choose is more important than enabling her to seek health care.
That is, evidently, what it means to be pro-life!
It's appalling that with all of the power Texas Republicans, from Rick Perry to the super-majority in the legislature, have at their disposal, they decide their top priority is to decide for low-income women of Texas -- predominantly young, predominantly women of color -- what they can and can't do with their bodies. Of course, it goes without saying, it's not like Perry and Co. are supporting any policies that help once the unwanted children are born.
Rick Perry has considered abortion restrictions one of his top priorities. So while his sonogram law isn't faring so well in the courts so far (a preliminary injunction has stopped it from taking effect while the court case continues), Perry and his fellow Texas Republicans have succeeded in drastically curtailing abortion access here in Austin.
Of course, it's not just happening in Austin. It's happening across Texas. Folks who care about access to safe, legal abortion need to be on notice -- Rick Perry is waging the Republican war on women here in Texas, and by and large, Rick Perry is winning. |
