While speaking at the College of Charleston in South Carolina Monday night, presidential candidate Robert “Beto” O’Rourke (shown) took a question from a man who referenced how Beto had answered a question in another venue about third-trimester abortions. O’Rourke said that’s a decision left up to the mother. The man then asked Beto this: “I was born September 8th, 1989, and I want to know if you think on September 7th, 1989, my life had no value?”
O’Rourke answered:
Of course I don’t think that. And of course I’m glad that you’re here. But you referenced my answer in Ohio, and it remains the same. This is a decision that neither you, nor I, nor the United States government should be making. That’s a decision for the woman to make. We want her to have the best possible access to care and to a medical provider, and I’ll tell you the consequence of this, this attack on a woman’s right to choose….
In my home state of Texas, thanks to these “trap” laws that make it harder for providers to offer the full spectrum of reproductive care, more than a quarter of our family planning clinics have closed. And it has made us one of the epicenters of this maternal mortality crisis because not only can you not get safe, legal access to an abortion, you cannot get access to a cervical cancer screening, or a family planning provider, or — in a state that refused to expand Medicaid — any provider at all and we are losing the lives of women in our state as a result. I don’t question the decisions that a woman makes. Only a woman knows what she knows, and I want to trust her with that.
But if Beto believes the man’s life had value the day before he was born, why would he think it’s okay to terminate that life on that day, so long as that is what the mother wants to do? Instead of attempting to explain that paradox, Beto mixed apples and oranges by lumping together abortion with “family planning” and medical care,” asserting that the closure of abortion clinics results in a “maternal mortality crisis.” However, numerous statements made by former employees of Planned Parenthood, the nation’s largest abortion provider, confirm that employees at their clinics pressure women into having abortions, which are a more lucrative revenue stream for the organization than are other services, such as pregnancy tests or ultrasounds, which can be obtained free of charge at numerous pro-life crisis pregnancy centers across America.
It is interesting that Beto still regards himself as a Catholic, yet has admitted he disagrees with his pro-life Catholic mother on abortion. Perhaps he has never read The Catechism of the Catholic Church, which states:
Since the first century the Church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion. This teaching has not changed and remains unchangeable. Direct abortion, that is to say, abortion willed either as an end or a means, is gravely contrary to the moral law.
Photo of Beto O’Rourke: Gage Skidmore
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Warren Mass has served The New American since its launch in 1985 in several capacities, including marketing, editing, and writing. Since retiring from the staff several years ago, he has been a regular contributor to the magazine. Warren writes from Texas and can be reached at [email protected].