West Virginia Watch reported on the forced-birth-for-children-and-others bill. It noted that after Roe v. Wade was overturned, West Virginia’s overwhelmingly Republican legislature exempted rape, incest and medical emergencies from its abortion ban.
Apparently, that’s not enough for the radical righties. Even though such bans are so unpopular that a Senate version of the bill was withdrawn because its sponsor said he and his family members had received heavy criticism and threats over it.
Republican Del. Lisa White remains undeterred, along with enough Republican cosponsors to move the bill forward. But you know White is feeling the pressure because West Virginia Watch reported Nixonian-like comments that sound like she’s protesting too much.
“I think what people are focusing on is that I don’t care about women or little kids or anything like that. That’s the furthest thing from the truth for me,” said White, who is new to the House of Delegates this year. “I do believe that life begins at conception, and I cannot, in my mind, rationalize that their lives don’t matter … because this baby was conceived under horrible, horrific circumstances, it’s still a life to me.”
“I just want to stress that I’m not a horrible person,” she said.
Something tells me that stressing one is “not a horrible person” is not a winning argument.
Even the Republican governor, described as “fiercely anti-abortion” by West Virginia Watch, has said that the state’s abortion ban should remain as is.
But I don’t put any radicalism past the Republicans these days.