Last week Planned Parenthood held a policy summit in Grand Island, as they have done for the past four years. The first I heard of it was when I read this Letter to the Editor in the Grand Island Independent filled with already disproven lies, and published by the paper without fact-checking or disclaimer. The paper then published this poll asking if Grand Islanders would approve of a Planned Parenthood in their town. As it turns out, most folks in Grand Island understand that having a Planned Parenthood in their town would benefit not only the women in the community, but the entire community as a whole, and they voted accordingly. Then the forced-birth fetishists unleashed their mob and the poll was heavily skewed, presumably by people who are not Grand Islanders or even Nebraskans.
Keep abortion safe and legal
The Grand Island Independent also chose to classify those opposed to a Planned Parenthood as “anti-abortion” and those in support of Planned Parenthood as “pro-abortion“, furthering the fallacy that abortion is the only service Planned Parenthood provides. Of course everyone who has done 20 seconds of research already knows Planned Parenthood offers many affordable, life-saving services for all genders and abortion is only a tiny fraction of the services they perform, but the forced-birth zealots don’t care and they continue to push lies because it is all they have. Let’s be clear though: even if abortion was the only service provided by Planned Parenthood I would still support them 100%. Abortion is a legal medical procedure that has existed since the beginning of time, and abortion saves lives.
Ben Sasse’s statement makes it crystal clear that women’s lives only matter if they are doing their job having babies and making him sandwiches. He also laughingly claims to be pro-science, and rued the “fact” that he doesn’t have government subsidies and an “army of lawyers” like Planned Parenthood does. First of all, Planned Parenthood wouldn’t need an army of lawyers if misogynist, small-minded politicians like Ben Sasse didn’t take it upon themselves to try to stifle women’s rights and control women’s bodies, and secondly, what the forced-birth movement DOES have is Joe Ricketts’s billions and an army of deliberately misinformed Catholics. And what exactly does he mean by “pro-lifers are winning”? They are winning at putting people’s lives at risk, forcing rape victims to carry their rapist’s children, increasing teen pregnancies and STDs, and generally keeping the public as ignorant as possible when it comes to their own bodies and rights? And why would he use that term “winning” anyway?
Ugh, enough of that shit, let’s see what Sasse’s opponent Angie Philips has to say. As expected, Angie not only supports Planned Parenthood, she was there with feet on the ground at the summit. Her statement reads, “Today I participate(d) in the Tri-Cities Policy Summit with Planned Parenthood. I was excited to learn about the work they are doing in collaborating with other area nonprofits to promote sexual education, prevent the spread of STI’s, increase access to healthcare, raise awareness to systemic injustices in care for LGBTQ people, and protect our reproductive rights. Planned Parenthood is about a lot more than ensuring those of us with uterus’s have access to abortions. Anyone who refuses to see that is actively working against a truly prolife approach and is simply pro forced birthing. ”
We reached out to Angie today for a response to Sasse’s statement and she added, “I agree Nebraska is Pro-Woman and Pro-Science and (I) therefore expect (Sasse) to quickly reauthorize the VAWA act that expands protections for victims of Gender Based Violence and removes guns from the hands of convicted abusers by closing the “boyfriend loophole”. We’d also expect him to address the climate crisis. As someone who claims to be prolife and concerned about children, I expect he will do something about the nearly 70,000 children we have detained this year and the children dying at our Southern Border due to the GOPs inhumane immigration policies.”
Now THAT is someone I want representing the people of Nebraska. Unlike Sasse, Angie is accessible, empathetic, and sincere, and she will work hard for EVERY Nebraskan. You can read Angie’s full statement here, donate to her campaign here, and connect with her to learn more about her policies and find out how you can help get the word out about her here.
