Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
Arizona's anti-abortion zealot, Rep. Trent Franks, who fancies himself the "Mayor" of Washington, D.C. by trying to impose his anti-abortion crusade on the District, has convinced the GOP leadership (sic) in the House to give him a purely symbolic vote on his 20 week abortion ban bill — the same bill that has already been struck down by federal courts, and Arizona's version of the bill is being heard on appeal by a panel of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday.
How's that GOP rebranding working out for ya? The GOP's war on women continues unabated.
Steve Benen reports, House GOP eyes more anti-abortion votes:
House Republicans' laser-like focus on job creation — which is to
say, they've passed zero jobs bills in three years — is poised to take yet another detour.
The House will vote next week on a bill banning abortions across the country after 20 weeks of pregnancy.
Doug Heye, deputy chief of staff to House Majority Leader Eric
Cantor, R-Va., confirmed to CQ Roll Call that the chamber is on track to
consider legislation next week that would ban all abortions after the
20-week threshold — the point at which some medical professionals
believe a fetus can begin to feel pain.
The effort started in late April, when Rep. Trent Franks (R-Ariz.) started pushing an anti-abortion bill, which he hoped to impose on the residents of the District of Columbia against their will. As we discussed
in May, the proposal mirrors efforts that have popped up among
Republican lawmakers at the state level: abortion would remain legal,
but only if pregnancies are terminated within the first 20 weeks.
* * *
It was not
immediately clear what House GOP leaders would do about this. On the
one hand, they support the party's culture-war agenda and want to keep
far-right, rank-and-file members happy. On the other, the Republican
leadership realizes that voters would prefer to see Congress tackle real
issues, occasionally even passing meaningful bills that can become law,
and more work on pointless anti-abortion legislation undermines the
whole "rebranding" idea.
So, would GOP leaders prioritize the
culture war, working on yet another abortion bill that can't pass the
Senate and won't get the president's signature? Of course they will. In
fact, they're poised to do it more than once.
Franks' 20-week bill is now poised for a floor vote, but Dorothy Samuels noted yesterday that another anti-abortion provision is on the way, too.
[O]n Thursday, the House passed a Homeland Security Appropriations
bill containing a Republican amendment that would go a step beyond the
current, restrictive federal policy regarding the ability of women held
in immigration detention centers to access abortion services. The
extreme provision, which the Senate should firmly reject, could be read
to allow an employee with no medical training to decide whether or not a
woman's pregnancy is "life-threatening," and to grant leeway to refuse
to facilitate an abortion even then.
Party leaders are no doubt aware of the GOP's larger
difficulties, including the gender gap, and the fact that younger voters
have no use for the party's right-wing agenda, seeing Republicans as "closed-minded, racist, rigid, [and] old-fashioned."
But for now, it appears the GOP just can't help itself.
The lunatics are running the assylum.