Over the last two years, through budget cuts and political maneuvering, Rick Perry has denied hundreds of thousands of women access to basic healthcare services.
First he signed a budget that slashed $73 million dollars in funding for family planning and women's health -- money that provides cancer screenings, well-woman care, annual check-ups, and helps prevent unwanted pregnancies. Next, Perry's Texas chose to exclude Planned Parenthood from the state's Medicare Women's Health Program, thus ending our state's participation in the program, which provided $9-to-$1 matching Federal funds for basic women's healthcare. Bowing to public pressure, Perry pledged to fund the program with state money, at the expense of Texas senior citizens and children.
Our Governor has no problem using Texas women and children as collateral damage in his efforts to score political points and remain relevant to the national Republican base.
Texas Democrats are fighting back. The Lone Star Project has put together the following video that reminds us of the real human costs of these budget cuts: the mothers, daughters, wives, and sisters of Texas that will be denied regular check-ups, denied cancer screenings, denied healthcare when they need it most. Take a look:
When a mother gets sick, the whole family hurts. This attack on women's health affects all of us. Click below the jump to see more about Perry's unrelenting, full-on assault on the health of mothers in Texas.
This is BOR's Video of the Day, or VOTD, our nightly video clip segment that hopefully provides you with a laugh or a chance to think at the end of the day.
There's something about the absurdity of women repeating the horrendous misogynistic claptrap of the contemporary Republican party. From Rick Santorum to various state legislators to professional gasbags Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter, this MoveOn video shows real women repeating the really offensive things Republicans have said about women's choice and reproductive freedom.
Of course it's not just what they say, it's what the Republicans do: legislate endless procedural hurdles to getting an abortion, try to deny insurance coverage for birth control, oppose an end to co-pays for birth control, and shut down women's health and family planning programs.
If you haven't read it yet, Frank Rich's in-depth New York Magazine article "Stag Party" details the history of the GOP's war on women, and how the formerly pro-choice, it's-her-own-damn-business country-club type Republicans were replaced with a group of men who want to take away every basic reproductive freedom women have. It's really worth a read, and a bookmark.
In the meantime, here's the video:
Check out all of our BOR videos of the day on the VOTD tag.
Wondering how Rick Perry is going to find over $30 million to fund the women's health program, now that he's ended our state's $9-to-$1 federal match to fund it? Easy: he'll take the money away from other needy Texans by playing a shell game with Health and Human Services funding.
Rick Perry told Empower Texans, a right-wing conservative organization, that he will divert money from other health and human services programs to fund the Women's Health Program. On a statewide conference call with the group, Perry stated:
"There's absolutely no reason to go into the Rainy Day Fund. There's no reason to raise taxes. What we'll do is we'll go back into the programs that are at Health & Human Services. We'll make prioritizations about what is important... we'll find savings in the programs that are there."
Rick Perry is just playing a shell game with the health and well-being of all Texans. There isn't any Health and Human Services money to divert!
Last session, the legislature cut $73 million from the state's family planning budget. Those cuts caused women's health clinics across the state to lay off workers, decrease services, or shut down entirely. The sneaky Republicans didn't merely eliminate the $73 million -- they diverted $61 million into other programs that serve the disabled, children, and the elderly, thus trying to force Democrats to vote against amendments to fund these programs at the expense of family planning programs. Now, HHS will have to look for any money that hasn't been spent yet, or bills that aren't due until later in the biennium, and divert the money back to the women's health program. Meanwhile, Rick Perry refuses to raise revenue, refuses to use the Rainy Day fund. He'll just let the people of Texas suffer for his own fiscal mismanagement.
Texas will have to take money away from children, the disabled, and the elderly to fund women's health simply because Rick Perry is determined to shut down Planned Parenthood.
The Legislature underfunded Medicaid last session by $4.8 billion dollars. That means the state expects Medicaid costs to be $4.8B higher than what they've budgeted to pay for it all. By law, the state must pay for services to Medicaid-eligible patients, so our state will be running up a multi-billion-dollar debt before the next session due to Republicans' refusal to fully fund the program. Most recently, Health and Human Services Commissioner Tom Suehs in February told a legislative committee that Medicaid faces a $15-$17 billion shortfall.
Rick Perry could have continued the successful Medicaid WHP Program that provides Texas with $9 in Federal funds for every $1 in state funds we spend on women's health and family planning. Instead, he's so determined to shut down Planned Parenthood -- which Federal law says Perry cannot shut out from the women's health program -- that he'll take funding for seniors, children, and the disabled down with him if he has to.
The Texas Democratic Party released a strong statement excoriating this move by Rick Perry:
""It's unconscionable that Rick Perry make seniors and other vulnerable Texans pay for his assault on women's health. Rick Perry has already endangered the well-being of thousands of Texas women. It was both cruel and fiscally irresponsible of Perry to turn down federal funding for women's healthcare. Now he's promising to inflict harm on more Texans by slashing essential state services again."
Rick Perry is playing politics with women's health, and kicking the budgetary can down the road to the next session with his refusal to fully fund health and human services programs here in Texas.
And don't forget -- Planned Parenthood is one of the most efficient providers of women's healthcare in Texas. So by shutting them out of the program, Perry is going to have to find a lot more than $35 million to make up for all of the services their network of 65 clinics provide. Most of the other family planning clinics are already in peril due to the original budget cuts to HHS. So while he's talking a good game about funding women's health, in reality Perry is just playing a shell game with our insufficient state funding, a game that the people of Texas are going to lose.
As we reported on Monday, this week's strip of Doonesbury comics takes aim at the absurdity of Texas's mandatory sonogram law, which requires a transvaginal ultrasound of women seeking abortions in Texas. Tuesday and Wednesday's cartoons will be appreciated by Burnt Orange Report readers, as they stick it to the three middle-aged male Republicans responsible for this bill: Governor Rick Perry, State Senator Dan Patrick, and State Representative Sid Miller. The cartoons also bring in the ongoing Republican war on birth control, as the GOP wants to come between women and their monthly blister packs of pregnancy-prevention.
Here are Tuesday and Wednesday's strips:
TUESDAY
WEDNESDAY
Tuesday's panel, in which "Sid Patrick" (hmm, sounds like a mash-up of Sid Miller and Dan Patrick to me...) asks the young lady if her parents know she's "a slut," resonates strongly with the remarks made by Radio Blowhard Rush Limbaugh, in which he called Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke a "slut" and a "prostitute" for not only using birth control pills, but also having the audacity to speak up as a woman in favor of access to women's healthcare. More than 30% of American women who use contraception use The Pill. Looks like Rush just insulted one third of the country's ladies. Good work.
Additionally, 14% of pill-takers use them for non-contraceptive purposes including premenstrual dysphoric disorder, endometriosis, and controlling acne. Women also take the pill when they're prescribed other medications that have the risk of birth defects, to make sure they don't get pregnant. Thanks to the ongoing war by Texas Republicans on women's health and family planning programs, there are legions of women lining up to tell their stories about taking the pill for a variety of non-sexy reasons. In short, women take the pill for a whole lot of reasons, and it's none of our legislators' damn business why, nor is it their job to forbid us from receiving them.
Wednesday's panel takes direct aim at Rick Perry, who made sonogram legislation an "emergency item" to speed up the process by which it worked its way through the Republican legislature and into the vaginas of Texas. In his press release, Perry stated that the goal of the legislation was to make sure the "patient understands what's truly at stake" -- because, you know, most women seeking abortions have no idea that they're terminating a pregnancy.
Perry added that he hopes the sonograms compel women to make what he terms "the right choice" -- i.e. not to have the abortion. Of course, sonogram laws don't actually deter many women from having an abortion at all. The real key here is the 24-hour waiting period and procedural delays it causes women. Women need to take an extra day off from work, travel twice, pay for gas twice, pay for other childcare twice, all to exercise their legal right to an abortion. (Meanwhile, all of Perry's efforts to end women's health and family planning in Texas will only increase abortions, as a result of increasing unwanted pregnancies. Bitter irony!)
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch ran a story about the hardships of Texas women who now seek abortions under the sonogram law, and quoted two providers who described their patients' experiences with the law. (Ironically, the Post-Dispatch is one of the papers that refused to run the Doonesbury cartoon, since it wasn't "family friendly" enough.) From their article on the sonogram law, emphasis mine:
"What we have noticed primarily is absolute outrage that they have to come twice," [Amy Hagstrom Miller, CEO of Whole Women's Health] said. "Many of our clients are already mothers; they know what is on a sonogram. They don't see it and say 'Oh, my gosh, I'm pregnant' and change their minds."
"It treats women as if they are stupid and don't know what is in their uterus," [Jenni Beaver, assistant director at Southwestern Women's Surgery Center in Dallas] said. "The law just creates hoops and barriers and drives up the cost for the women. And we have not had anyone decide not to have an abortion because of a sonogram."
Beaver's comments above are accurate with other research on sonogram laws: they don't cause women to change their minds. However, the increased procedural hurdles -- waiting periods, added costs -- do deter some women from accessing abortion, and as always it's the low-income and rural women who will suffer the most.
Wednesday's comic ends as the resigned doctor reads the ideological claptrap required by the state. As far as the Legislature is concerned, doctors "cannot be trusted" to provide their patients with the necessary information about abortion and have to say what the government thinks is correct. It's a move that irked the American Medical Association, and it's a move that should send a clear message to Texas doctors and patients alike: when it comes to women's healthcare, the Republican legislature thinks only they know best.
Last week, Austin musician Marcia Ball sent an e-mail out to some friends about the ridiculous cuts in healthcare that our illustrious governor has planned. Here's what was posted on Facebook:
What the heck's happening with our poor country?! Who knew that in 2012 in the USA we would be fighting about contraception and basic women's health?
Next Tuesday, March 6, and the following two Tuesdays, between noon and 2:00 PM, I am going to put on a red shirt and st...and in front of the Texas State Capitol at the corner of Congress Avenue and 11th Street holding a sign decrying the defunding of women's health services. I am calling my effort SEEING RED and it may be just me and a few friends or a few hundred. This is my own personal response to the outrage of the Texas Taliban's war on women and, peripherally, my sadness over the death of foreign correspondent Marie Colvin who gave her life to tell us about the inhumanity and injustice of those who target the powerless. My vigil is in honor of Molly Ivins who said nothing will change until we get out in the streets and bang on pots and pans. I'm just going to stand there and hold a sign (and a broadsheet with talking points).
By the way, this is not a "women's movement". Come one, come all.
Some of you have been in on the brainstorming that only began yesterday about this and you're the "core committee" of a completely unorganized movement. No keynote speakers. No podium. No PA. Just red shirts and signs. Spread the word.
This is BOR's Video of the Day, or VOTD, our nightly video clip segment that hopefully provides you with a laugh or a chance to think at the end of the day.
Today, Planned Parenthood wrapped up their statewide "Don't mess with Texas" bus tour, highlighting Rick Perry and the Republican legislature's efforts to defund family planning and women's health programs in Texas. Tonight's event was a huge success and we'll bring you coverage tomorrow. Speaking of tomorrow, tomorrow is the last day for the Medicaid Women's Health Program in Texas. Rick Perry and the Republicans are so determined to cut Planned Parenthood out from the program, they're scrapping the whole thing. Perry even thinks he can find $35 million to pay for it all in-state. (As if!)
In all likelihood, as of Thursday, another 130,000 Texan women will lose access to basic care, joining the 180,000 Texan women who lost access due to budget cuts in the last Legislative session.
Tonight, our video is from Planned Parenthood, and features women's health providers explaining the impact of slashing these programs and ending Medicaid funding.
Check out all of our BOR videos of the day on the VOTD tag.
Clearly succumbing to intense statewide and national pressure not to end the Women's Health Program in Texas, Rick Perry promised yesterday that he'd find the $35 million necessary to keep WHP going without Medicaid, while also barring Planned Parenthood from receiving any funds. Good luck with that!
In 2011 Rick Perry cut $15 billion from the state's budget, including $73.6 million from family planning alone, due to a massive budgetary shortfall. He can no longer plug the holes in the budget with the Federal stimulus funds he loves to accept and then campaign against. Now, rather than pay a mere $4 million to keep WHP going and in return receive approximately $35 million from the Feds, Perry says he's going to find that $35 million in state funds to keep the program going, while also cutting the largest service provider to low-income women in Texas.
According to CPPP, the $73 million in cuts by Perry and his Republican legislature to family planning funding resulted in 150,000 low-income women losing access to preventative care and family planning. If the Medicaid WHP program shuts down, another 114,000 women will lose access. That will result in an 80% decrease in the number of low-women in Texas who receive basic healthcare services.
Texans should be extremely skeptical of the political game Rick Perry is playing with women's health funding.
Let's look at the facts:
Our state is broke -- at the start of last session, there was a $27 billion projected budget shortfall. Things are so bad I always expect to see Comptroller Susan Combs panhandling at the corner of 11th and I-3.
The current Medicaid WHP program saves the state $231 million in Medicaid costs by preventing unwanted pregnancies.
Planned Parenthood is the largest provider of services under the Medicaid WHP -- they provide 44% of all services under the program. They're also one of the most cost-efficient providers.
Our other providers lack the capacity to handle what PP can't if they're excluded. The $73 million Perry slashed from the Department of State Health Services (DSHS) to support family planning caused many of the other providers to cut staff, reduce hours, or close outright.
Planned Parenthood's 65 health centers in Texas provide over 100,000 cervical cancer screenings, 120,000 breast cancer screenings, and 440,931 tests and treatments for sexually transmitted infections. Our other clinics simply can't handle this increased patient load.
Perry is only now promising to reinstate women's healthcare funding due to the tremendous public outcry over ending the Medicaid WHP program -- an outcry that is the work of Planned Parenthood and other partners that support providing low-income women with access to basic healthcare. His real goal is to defund and shut down Planned Parenthood. Initially the Legislature passed a law barring Planned Parenthood from receiving Medicaid funds as part of the WHP -- however, that law was in direct violation of the Social Security Act, which makes clear that a state can't discriminate against any provider. There is clearly nothing medically wrong with Planned Parenthood's 65 health centers -- they still have all of their necessary licenses. This is a politically motivated effort by Perry to shut down the state's top provider of services to low-income women because they also support a woman's right to a safe, legal abortion.
Rick Perry is willing to unnecessarily balloon state spending on the women's health program in an attempt to drive one provider out of business. As taxpayers, we should all be outraged! Here we have a gaping budget hole, schools are closing, state workers are losing their jobs, and important programs are getting cut left and right. Meanwhile, Perry is smiting the one bright spot in our state's healthcare program -- the $9 in Federal funds we get for every $1 Texas spends on women's health and family planning, which in turn saves us $40 million in Texas taxpayer dollars and $231 million in Medicaid costs per year by preventing unwanted pregnancies.
The big irony here is that Perry's decision will actually INCREASE abortions. As CPPP explains, "by devastating family planning, the state will actually increase abortions. A state-only program would be a shadow of the program Texas has now, undermining the health care of women and children, costing taxpayers, and increasing abortions."
Helluva job, Perry! Now you've got to shake $35 million out of the couch cushions in your rental mansion in order to fund a sorry replacement for our excellent Medicaid Women's Health Program. Clearly Perry's feeling the heat from slashing 80% of low-income women's healthcare. Let's keep it up and see if we can't get him to back down from a state-run program and restore the Medicaid WHP, Planned Parenthood and all.
This is BOR's Video of the Day, or VOTD, our nightly video clip segment that hopefully provides you with a laugh or a chance to think at the end of the day.
Thank heavens for Cecile Richards, President of Planned Parenthood Federation of America and daughter of another strong Texas woman, Ann Richards. Richards is sounding the alarm about the national Republican war on women's health, and given her close ties to Texas, making sure that her home state gets the attention it deserves for the Legislature's draconian cuts to women's healthcare and family planning services.
Here's Richards on The Daily Show last night talking about the good work Planned Parenthood does to prevent unwanted pregnancy and help keep women healthy. She also touches on the big problems we're having here in Texas. We are so lucky to have Cecile Richards in charge of an organization as important as Planned Parenthood!
Don't mess with Texas women!
Check out all of our BOR videos of the day on the VOTD tag.
Today is International Women's Day. The purpose of the day is to mark the economic, political, and social achievements of women. It's hard not to mark the occasion without a hint of irony, as Republicans in Texas and across the country work tirelessly to roll back women's rights.
Republicans' foremost goal over the last year and a half, has been to take women back to what they must consider the "good old days" -- before safe, legal abortion; before widely accessible birth control; before prenatal testing; before we had control of our bodies and as a result control of our lives. Make no mistake -- Republicans want to make the "Second Sex" into a permanent second class.
Republicans hold hearings on our own private healthcare decisions, and don't bother to let any women speak up on the topic. Republicans force women to undergo unnecessary transvaginal probing, and force women's doctors to recite unnecessary ideological claptrap to their patients. Republicans slash 66% from the family planning budget, then decide if they can't exclude the largest provider of care within the Women's Health Program from receiving funds, they'll just shut down the entire program, no matter the cost in women's lives.
Today, on International Women's Day, there's no reason for women to be celebrating here in Texas -- our rights and our basic access to healthcare is under attack.
25% of Texas women are uninsured, the highest rate of uninsured women in the country.
Texas has the 3rd highest rate of cervical cancer in the country -- an easily diagnosed and treated disease if women have access to care.
In 2011, Rick Perry signed a budget that slashed funding for women's health by 66%, resulting in 180,000 women losing access to preventative care.
By banning Planned Parenthood from receiving funds through Medicare's Women's Health Program, Perry will cause another 130,000 women to lose access to basic care.
This program Republicans are eliminating saves the state $42 million a year by preventing unwanted pregnancies.
It sure is a great time to be a woman in Texas! Yee haw!
It's just as bad across the country. In 2011, states passed83 laws restricting access to abortion, due to the new wave of Republicans elected in 2010. States are banning abortion after 20 weeks, implementing procedural hurdles including mandatory sonograms and waiting periods, and banning private insurance plans from covering abortions -- talk about Big Government!
And it's just going to get worse for women before next year's International Women's Day.
According to the Guttmacher Institute, 430 abortion restrictions have been introduced in state legislatures just this year. And it's only March! Yet again I'm thankful the Texas legislature only meets every other year -- less chance to mess with Texas women.
Meanwhile, the Republican presidential candidates compete to see who can be more extreme in their opposition to women's health. Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum, Ron Paul and Newt Gingrich all want to defund Planned Parenthood, the leading provider of healthcare to low-income women; they support "personhood" amendments that make a fertilized egg equivalent to a person corporation; and all but Romney signed a pledge that they would only appoint anti-choice individuals to key governmental positions. Rick Santorum is by far the most extreme, opposing abortion even in the case of rape or incest, and supporting the rights of states to ban birth control, even amongst married couples. (Again with the Big Government!) He thinks that birth control harms women and society. And of course, none of them want insurance companies to provide a co-pay for said birth control, oh my heavens no!
Make no mistake: Republicans are trying to destroy women's access to basic healthcare, and limit our ability to use our reproductive rights. And they're doing it for political gain, regardless of the actual cost in human lives to women and their families.
Today, in honor of International Women's Day, Burnt Orange Report is devoting our coverage to the Republican War on Women. This is a war on women's access to healthcare, it's a war on access to basic reproductive services, it's an war on women's abilities to control our own bodies, and as a result our own lives.
There was a boisterous scene at the corner of Guadalupe and 22nd streets this afternoon, as Planned Parenthood’s Women’s Health Express Bus Tour stopped in central Austin.
Activists from Texas Voices For Reproductive Justice and Texas Freedom Network collected signatures urging Governor Perry to reconsider his decision to cut all state funding for the Medicare Women’s Health Program which provides basic health care services to over 130,000 Texas women. About a dozen anti-choice activists were also in attendance.
