US elected officials who have aborted emotionally defend the right to abortion
Washington |Three elected US democrats said Thursday with emotion, together and publicly, the conditions in which they aborted, in order to defend this individual right protected by the Constitution, but threatened by an "coordinated" offensive of the conservative states.
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Barbara Lee, elected African-American of California aged 75, said before a congress commission how she found herself pregnant at the age of 16, without understanding what happened to her.
"I was going to a Catholic school and of course, there was no sex education," she said.
So she had an abortion in a "clandestine clinic" in Mexico, with the support of her mother."She never ordered me to do it or forced me, but she understood that it was my decision".
She pointed out that she was "lucky", recalling that in the 1960s the abortions carried out clandestinely and in precarious health conditions were the leading cause of death of African-American women.
"People deserve the right to make their own decisions about their lives, their bodies and their future," she said before elected officials.
The Americans have a constitutional right to have an abortion since the historic judgment of the Supreme Court Roe V.Wade in 1973, but anti-abortion activists were constantly limited its field of application.
"Shameter"
Since September 1, a Texas Law has been forbidden to have an abortion once the heartbeat of the embryo are detectable, about six weeks of pregnancy when most women still ignore being pregnant.
This law is part of a "coordinated national strategy to eliminate access to abortion and provide an opportunity to break or limit the ROE V judgment.Wade, "said the elected Democrat Judy Chu, member of the Commission.
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According to the Guttmacher Institute, which defends this right, 862,000 abortions were made in 2017, a drop of 19% compared to 2011.
The African-American parliamentarian of Missouri, Cori Bush, 45, said how she felt "disturbed, embarrassed and shameful" when a 20-year-old had abused her in the summer of 1994 when shewas 17 years old.
After realizing that she was nine weeks pregnant, "I was broken, I felt so alone, I blocked myself for what had happened to me, but I knew that I had other options", a-she said, sobs in her voice.
She recalled "pain, bleeding, nausea" and the feeling of "having something less" after making "the most difficult decision I have ever taken".
Pramila Jayapal had already broken the taboo in 2019, after being killed for years so as not to hit his parents, Indian immigrants.
AFPCori Bush"Not your business"
At 56, she again told her depression and her suicidal thoughts after the birth of her premature great daughter, who was not supposed to survive.
Despite the use of contraceptive means, it again pregnant with the prospect of another risk pregnancy."I really wanted other children, but I just couldn't imagine revive this," she said.
"The choices we make about our body are not your business," she said by denouncing laws voted by mainly male assemblies.
Some stars like Uma Thurman, Madonna, Nicki Minaj or Whoopi Goldberg have dared to break the taboo, but it is still very rare to talk about your abortion in the United States, a country still anchored in religion.
Almost 40% of the population still thinks that abortion should be illegal in most cases, according to the Pew Institute.
"What does it matter if a pregnancy is desired or not, even if it results from horrible circumstances, put an end to the life of a child by abortion to protect the + freedom + of a mother is not the answer", said the elected republican Virginia Foxx, calling for fighting "this national sin".
Democrat Gerry Connolly underlined him "the irony" of this Texan law, voted in a state which refuses the wearing of the compulsory mask against the COVID-19 in the name of individual freedoms, and which imposes on women "one of the lawsThe most restrictive on the most sacred autonomy, control of its own body ”.
