Republican US senator Tommy Tuberville of Alabama seemingly struggled to grasp the contradictory situation women have been placed in after his state’s supreme court ruled that frozen embryos are children.
Asked at a conservative conference on Thursday what he would say to women currently denied the fertility treatment, the former college football coach replied: “Yeah, I was all for it. We need to have more kids, we need to have an opportunity to do that, and I thought this was the right thing to do.”
But then when he was pressed on whether the ruling would negatively affect people who are trying to have conceive, Tuberville said: “Well, that’s, that’s for another conversation. I think the big thing is right now, you protect – you go back to the situation and try to work it out to where it’s best for everybody. I mean, that’s what – that’s what the whole abortion issue is about.”
As a result of the ruling in question in Alabama, at least three IVF providers in the state have suspended services.
“That’s a hard one,” Tuberville said when asked about IVF availability in Alabama. “It really is.”
Tuberville said: “I’d have to look at what they’re agreeing to and not agreeing to. I haven’t seen that.”
But he said that it was “unfortunate” if the women would not be denied the procedure.
Tuberville’s spokesperson Hannah Eddins later sought to clarify the senator’s remarks, saying he had been “emphasizing his support for life at all stages”.
“In addition to being pro-life and believing life begins at conception, Senator Tuberville is also pro-family,” Eddins said. “He believes strong families are instrumental to our country’s success.”
Eddins added that Tuberville was “in no way” supporting the decision by clinics to halt IVF procedures.
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The Alabama court’s decision, released earlier this week, came in response to a lawsuit by a group of IVF patients whose frozen embryos were destroyed in December 2020 when a patient removed the embryos from a cryogenic storage unit and dropped them on the ground.
With the ruling, Republican anti-abortion politicians are now in a bind between opposing abortion and supporting treatments that promote conception.
Tuberville’s spokesperson said that the senator supported the US supreme court’s ruling that overturned the federal abortion right previously established by Roe v Wade. The court’s decision returned the issue of abortion rights back to individual states, many of which have outlawed the procedure in most cases.
Tuberville’s remarks on Thursday came after his decision in December to end a months-long blockade of US military promotions over his opposition to a Pentagon policy that facilitates abortions for service members and dependents.
Source: US Politics - theguardian.com
