abortion

AZ House approves the “Lady Money Is Not Real Money” bill.

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Crossposted from DemocraticDiva.com

pin moneyPhoto: Etsy.com

Arizona bill SB1318, which requires doctors to pass on medically dubious information about “abortion reversal”, also bans coverage of abortion in private insurance plans, even if a policy holder has purchased an entirely separate rider with her own money which does not sully the pristine money of “taxpayers” – a group that (again) apparently does not include women who use any reproductive health care not directly related to having babies.

The bill went for third read on the House floor, the last step before before being transmitted to Governor Ducey, who is certain to sign it, and was passed on a 33/24 party line vote. I listened to the testimony at work and heard the Democrats valiantly (as always) trying to explain why it was a bad idea on several levels Republican Rep. Steve Montenegro waxed lugubriously about the need to “do everything possible to ensure a child has every opportunity to have it’s first breath!” and Rep. JD Mesnard anti-choicesplained, “We all know how accounting gimmicks work!” (He clearly doesn’t.)

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Victoria Steele’s courageous testimony showed why “rape exceptions” are a sham

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Crossposted from DemocraticDiva.com

Edited to correctly identify the committee chair. It was Kelly Townsend, not Kelli Ward. My bad.

Alas, due to our stupidly slow “high speed internet” connection at the house, I’ve been unable to view the two and a half hour Arizona House Federalism and States’ Rights (seriously?) Committee hearing from Wednesday. But there was one part that made the news, and for good reason. It was when Democratic Rep. Victoria Steele of Tucson, who was testifying against SB1318 (which denies insurance coverage for abortion, among other things), was overcome by the whole thing and shared how she had been a repeated victim of sexual assault by a family member as a young girl.

victoria steeleSorry for the screen shot instead of embedded video but Channel 12 insists upon them opening immediately

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AZ anti-choice legislators actually think you can reverse an abortion

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Crossposted from DemocraticDiva.com

pill cartoon

SB1318 was already bad enough. The anti-choice bill would bar any insurance exchange operating in the state (including the ACA) from covering abortion even if the woman purchased a separate rider, on the theory that money out of a woman’s own damn pocket that she earned herself is somehow “taxpayer dollars”. It also mandates that abortion doctors report to the state health director that they have admitting privileges at a local hospital, a requirement that opponents say could expose personal information about doctors to dangerous anti-choice zealots. But they weren’t done. Now there’s this amendment.

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Anti-choice AZ GOP legislators continue to promote idea that women don’t really ever pay for anything, refuse to protect doctors’ personal info

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Sen. Barto was gloating about SB1318 passing the Senate on Thursday afternoon. Here’s Sen. Kelli Ward (R) echoing the “pay for it yourselves, floozies” canard:

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Cathi Herrod demonstrates how anti-choicers erase women’s contributions, experiences, etc.

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Crossposted from DemocraticDiva.com

frowny cathi

I’ll say one thing for Howie Fischer of Arizona Capitol Media Services – he has a long record of thorough coverage on the battle over reproductive rights here and of getting opponents of it on record. Fischer’s report on Wednesday’s Senate Health and Human Services Committee vote on SB1318 contains this interesting nugget from Center for Arizona Policy head Cathi Herrod (italics and emphasis mine):

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