Trouble in Paradise? Speaker Pelosi & CA Gov. Newsom Squabble Over Abortion Inaction
23:04 GMT 08.05.2022 (Updated: 23:21 GMT 08.05.2022)
© Ken Cedeno, Jeff Chiu
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On Tuesday, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) leaked a draft majority opinion revealing their plans to overturn Roe v. Wade. The landmark decision gave women the federal constitutional right to abortion in 1973. Following the draft’s leak, backlash and upheaval from pro-choice groups has been unrelenting.
Nancy Pelosi is firing back at Democratic California Governor Gavin Newsom after he criticized his own party on Wednesday during a news conference held outside of a Planned Parenthood. While Newsom went after Democrats, he began his remarks by lashing out at SCOTUS for their draft opinion.
“At a time when countries around the world are expanding liberties, expanding freedoms, expanding rights, here we are in the United States of America about to roll back rights. The entire history of the Constitution has been about the expansion of rights,” said Newsom on Wednesday.
“And this Supreme Court is poised to roll back constitutionally protected rights,” Newsom, 54, added. He then emphasized that future rights are endangered, using marriage rights such as Loving v. Virginia as an example.
Governor Newsom then called out his own party while answering questions from reporters.
“Where is the Democratic Party?” He asked. “Why aren’t we standing up more firmly? More resolutely? Why aren’t we calling this out? This is a concerted, coordinated effort, and, yes, they're winning. They are. They have been. Let’s acknowledge that. We need to stand up. Where’s the counter-offensive?”
Newsom’s effort to rally his party echoed chants made by hundreds of protestors who gathered outside the United States Supreme Court Building in Washington, D.C. Monday night following the leak of the opinion draft, “Do something, Democrats!” the crowd chanted.
On Sunday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, 82, spoke with Face the Nation. Pelosi was asked why her party was “outmaneuvered” on the issue of women’s reproductive health, to which Pelosi responded, “I have no idea.”
“The fact is that we have been fighting for a woman’s right to choose—and that is to choose—we have been fighting against the Republicans in the Congress constantly, because the fact is they’re not just anti-women’s rights to choose in terms of terminating a pregnancy, but in terms of access to contraception and family planning and the rest.”
“This is a constant fight that we’ve had for generations—decades I should say in my case, in the Congress—we had been bipartisan early on in support of a woman’s right to choose, until the politics changed, and that’s what happened at the Court. The science hasn’t changed, but the Court changed.”
Pelosi then said she has “no idea why anybody would make that statement unless they were unaware of the fight that has been going on,” in reference to Newsom.
“Here we are on Mother’s Day, a week where this court has slapped women in the face in terms of disrespect for their judgment about the size and timing of their families,” Pelosi added. “So the fact is, let’s keep our eye on the ball. The ball is in the court of those justices, one of them at least said over and over again.”
Democrats on Capitol Hill are now doing whatever they can to protect a person’s access to abortion, one effort includes codifying Roe v. Wade.
"Congress must pass legislation that codifies Roe v. Wade as the law of the land in this country NOW," Independent Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders wrote. "And if there aren't 60 votes in the Senate to do it, and there are not, we must end the filibuster to pass it with 50 votes."
The Senate is split 50/50, and with today’s Republican lawmakers almost unanimously opposed to abortion, those 60 votes are highly unlikely.
