It was exactly two years ago today when Republican-appointed Supreme Court justices overturned Roe v. Wade and launched a brutally regressive campaign that imposed restrictions on Americans’ reproductive rights in many states across the country.
But to hear GOP rep. Nancy Mace Just sayin’: Those who oppose the Supreme Court ruling and its consequences can take some solace in the fact that abortion is “still legal in this country.”
Mace: Abortion is still legal in this country. It may or may not be legal in your country… but it is still legal. No one stops you from traveling somewhere else, pic.twitter.com/QLSdTFElI6
— Acyn (@Acyn) June 21, 2024
During an appearance on Newsmax, the South Carolina congressman specifically said, “Well, I think you certainly can, you can protect life and you can protect women. Abortion is still legal in this country. It may or may not be legal in your state, but it’s up to the states now.”
Mace added, “But it’s still legal. No one is stopping you from traveling somewhere else and so on.”
So a few things.
First, ‘et cetera’ did a lot of work in that sense. For many Americans, simply traveling from one state to another is not nearly as easy as Republican lawmakers would like the public to believe. On the contrary, there are all kinds of practical and financial hurdles – paying for the trip, arranging transport and accommodation, finding childcare, all while getting time off from work at short notice – that prevent such an option available to millions of working people. -class families. It’s ridiculous that Mace acts like these hardships don’t matter.
Second, while it is true that abortion is “still legal” in parts of this country, many of Mace’s fellow Republicans, including some prominent members from her own home state, have endorsed national abortion bans that should be passed at the federal level imposed.
Third, the congressman said matter-of-factly that “no one is preventing” Americans from traveling from a red state to a blue state to terminate an unwanted or dangerous pregnancy. I wish it were that simple, but in reality, Mace’s fellow Republicans have been pursuing restrictions in several states that would prevent women from traveling from one state to another for reproductive medical care.
And finally, there is the simple fact that Americans should not have to pack their bags and travel great distances to access routine health care services.
In other words, two years after Roe’s death, Mace’s talking points still need to be fleshed out.
This article was originally published on MSNBC.com
