Senator Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) on Monday claimed that access to abortion is “about the functioning of our Democracy and accused “right-wing extremists” of using voter suppression to have an outsized influence on the issue.
Warren told Teen Vogue that the ability of individuals to make their own decisions is “part of the heart” of democracy. She added that abortion and voting access are related to one another “from the perspective of respect for the individual, and also from a political point of view.”
Asked if voting rights and abortion rights are “key issues” in protecting an individual’s freedoms, the progressive senator replied: “Both voting and access to abortion are basic. They’re about the functioning of our democracy and about the protection of personal autonomy.”
She added: “Protection of the vote means your voice gets heard in government. Protection of access to basic health care means your autonomy as a human being is fully respected by the law. That you will make the decisions about yourself.”
“To me, that’s part of the heart of what all of this is about. This is where the two big fights are shaping up right now. And each intersects with the other. Both from the perspective of respect for the individual, and also from a political point of view,” she said. “The right-wing extremists know that if they can keep people from voting, they’ve got a better chance to impose their views about abortion on an unwilling nation.”
She claimed that the GOP is openly admitting it can only “hang on to power” by keeping many Americans from voting because pro-life policies are largely unpopular. She did not offer any evidence for her accusations against the Republican Party.
The Massachusetts lawmaker said that pro-life Americans are a “small but intensely focused group of people who want to impose their will on the majority of this nation.” She cited a 2018 NBC-WSJ poll that found 71 percent of registered voters believed that Roe v. Wade should not be overturned.
However, Warren failed to acknowledge that many Americans support restrictions on abortion after the first trimester.
An Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll released in June showed that while 61 percent of Americans believe abortion should be legal in most or all circumstances during the first trimester, 65 percent of Americans believe abortion should almost always be illegal in the second trimester. Eighty percent of respondents said abortion should almost always be illegal in the third trimester.
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