Topic: Reproductive Rights
“The next conservative President must make the institutions of American civil society hard targets for woke culture warriors. This starts with deleting the terms sexual orientation and gender identity (“SOGI”), diversity, equity, and inclusion (“DEI”), gender, gender equality, gender equity, gender awareness, gender-sensitive, abortion, reproductive health, reproductive rights, and any other term used to deprive Americans of their First Amendment rights out of every federal rule, agency regulation, contract, grant, regulation, and piece of legislation that exists.”
I’m curious how words merely existing are depriving Americans of their First Amendment Rights, and how deleting those words from government regulations/legislation is going to restore those rights. If anything, removing those words arbitrarily is a violation of 1A – it’s literally censorship by the government. Again, lots of cognitive dissonance here, and he’s unclear on what removing these words actually hopes to accomplish, other than effectively legalizing discrimination against anyone who fits into any of those phrases. Seriously? The phrase “reproductive health” is woke? Insanity.
Full contextual analysis of foreword here.
“Reverse policies that allow transgender individuals to serve in the military. Gender dysphoria is incompatible with the demands of military service, and the use of public monies for transgender surgeries or to facilitate abortion for servicemembers should be ended.”
The prevalence of rape in the military is well-known. In 2018 alone, there were an estimated 20,500 sexual assaults on 13,000 women and 7,500 men. Donald Trump, of course, has dismissed this as “normal” and even expected:
Call us crazy, Donald, but we expected the men not to rape the women. That’s a real tweet that’s still up today. The image is linked to it.
In any case, ending abortion services for military personnel is not only an infringement of freedom of choice, but another insidious form of forcing women to give birth to their rapists’ children.
Full contextual analysis of Section 2.1: Department of Defense here.
“It is paramount to create a healthy culture of respect for life, the family, sovereignty, and authentic human rights in international organizations and agencies. To support this goal, the U.S. led an effort during the Trump Administration to forge a consensus among like-minded countries in support of human life, women’s health, support of the family as the basic unit of human society, and defense of national sovereignty. The result was the Geneva Consensus Declaration on Women’s Health and Protection of the Family.”
Sounds good on the surface, right? Wrong. The Geneva Consensus she’s referring to opposes abortion, and emphasizes that thre is no international obligation to recognize abortion as a human right, and that decisions on reproductive health and family matters should be made at the national level. Read the last half of that sentence again. The “like-minded” countries that also signed? The United States (under Trump), Brazil, Egypt, Hungary, Poland, and Uganda.
After the Biden administration took office in 2021, the U.S. withdrew from the declaration, signaling a policy shift toward supporting reproductive rights, including access to safe and legal abortion, in line with international human rights standards. Skinner is arguing for bringing this back. This is a cleverly disguised argument for a federal abortion ban.
Full contextual analysis of Section 2.3: Department of State here.
“Under the Trump Administration, USAID focused on ending the need for foreign aid by placing countries onto a Journey to Self-Reliance. The Administration restructured the agency to reflect this strategic approach to development, streamlined procurement procedures to diversify its partner base, increased awards to cost-effective local (including faith-based) organizations, and improved internal governance. It instituted pro-life and family-friendly policies. It promoted international religious freedom as a pillar of the agency’s work and built up an unprecedented genocide-response infrastructure.”
This requires some nuance to fully explain. Visit the link below for full context and an unpacking of this statement.
Full contextual analysis of Section 2.6: Agency for International Development here.
“The Biden Administration has deformed the agency by treating it as a global platform to pursue overseas a divisive political and cultural agenda that promotes abortion, climate extremism, gender radicalism, and interventions against perceived systemic racism.”
This is a grotesquely exaggerated and partisan interpretation of reality. Yes, the Biden administration rescinded the disastrous Mexico City Policy. (And it should be noted here that USAID still follows U.S. federal law, which prohibits using federal funds directly for abortions in most cases and has since 1973 – see the Helms Amendment.)
Full contextual analysis of Section 2.6: Agency for International Development here.
“USAID now aggressively promotes abortion on demand under the guise of “sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights,” “gender equality,” and “women’s empowerment” and advocates for those who claim minority status or vulnerability.”
This is a lie, the U.S. has never “aggressively promoted abortion on demand.” See detailed analysis below.
Full contextual analysis of Section 2.6: Agency for International Development here.
“In addition, the next conservative Administration should rescind President Biden’s 2022 Gender Policy and refocus it on Women, Children, and Families and revise the agency’s regulation on “Integrating Gender Equality and Female Empowerment in USAID’s Program Cycle.” It should remove all references, examples, definitions, photos, and language on USAID websites, in agency publications and policies, and in all agency contracts and grants that include the following terms: “gender,” “gender equality,” “gender equity,” “gender diverse individuals,” “gender aware,” “gender sensitive,” etc. It should also remove references to “abortion,” “reproductive health,” and “sexual and reproductive rights” and controversial sexual education materials.”
Apparently, he’s taking a page from Russ Vought’s book where he appears to believe that if you don’t say the words that talk about a thing, then that thing ceases to exist. I touch on that in Section 1.2, but suffice it to say, this is not a policy position grounded in reality. Moreover, the term “reproductive health” is radical to him? That’s not the position of a normal person. Henceforth, I will be referring to this phenomenon as the “Bruno Strategy,” because?
Full contextual analysis of Section 2.6: Agency for International Development here.
“The Biden Administration restored abortion subsidies to pro-abortion NGOs including Planned Parenthood International and MSI Reproductive Choices.”
This is, if not an outright lie, deliberately misleading. The Biden Administration did restore funding to organizations like Planned Parenthood International and MSI Reproductive Choices, but these funds do not directly subsidize abortions due to existing U.S. laws (see analysis). Rather, they support broader reproductive health services, such as contraception and family planning, pre- and post-natal care, testing, treatment, and prevention of sexually transmitted infections, education on sexual and reproductive health, safe sex practices, gender-based violence prevention, cervical and breast cancer screenings, and more.
Full contextual analysis of Section 2.6: Agency for International Development here.
“The continued high rate of maternal and infant mortality is a persistent global tragedy. Contrary to current publicity, this problem is not solved by abortion.”
Literally nobody is arguing that abortion “solves” maternal and infant mortality. This is, quite frankly, an insane statement. Fact: Maternal mortality in the U.S. far outstrips that of other industrialized nations (nearly three times that of France, which is the next highest.) [Source]
“The reasons for mortality are manifold. Most cases are due to inadequate medical care or obstetric care. Complications often occur as early as during pregnancy and the risk of death for mothers and their babies increases during the delivery due to a lack of professional help on site. A lack of education and poor nutrition also increase the risk of mortality.” [Source]
Additionally, the CDC found that more than 80% of pregnancy-related deaths in the U.S. were preventable. I recognize that this feels like a digression from Primorac’s original statement, but I’m unclear on how to effectively counter outright insanity.
Full contextual analysis of Section 2.6: Agency for International Development here.
“In the context of current and emerging reproductive technologies, HHS policies should never place the desires of adults over the right of children to be raised by the biological fathers and mothers who conceive them.”
This is an argument against certain types of IVF, surrogacy, adoption, and use of donor gametes to create families.
Full contextual analysis of Section 3.5: Department of Health and Human Services here.