‘It’s Always About Control’: South Carolina Abortion Ban Fails After Female GOP Legislators Join Filibuster
South Carolina’s state Senate failed to pass a ban on abortion Thursday after three female GOP lawmakers joined the chamber’s one female independent and one female Democratic lawmaker to filibuster the restrictive legislation.
The bill, which was brought to a vote for a third time this week, would ban abortion from the time of conception, with exceptions for rape, incest, and to save the life of the mother.
The female senators filibustered for three days before the bill was voted down on Thursday in a razor-thin 22-21 vote.
Republican Sen. Sandy Senn tore into Majority Leader Shane Massey (R) during her floor speech.
“The abortion laws have always been, each and every one of them, about control. It’s always about control, plain and simple. And in the Senate, the males all have control,” Senn began, adding:
We, the women, have not asked for, as the senator from Orangeburg pointed out yesterday, nor do we want your protection. We don’t need it. We don’t need it. There is not a single thing that I can do when women such as me are insulted, except to make sure that you get an earful and you need to blame this earful on following that leader blindly off the cliff for the third time on abortion. And I’m sure you get an earful if you’re being honest from your wives, from your children, from your grandchildren. You cannot tell me that you are not. I know you are.
The Washington Post added that Senn’s speech “likened” the abortion ban “to the dystopian novel The Handmaid’s Tale, in which women are treated as property of the state.”
Independent Sen. Mia McLeod used her time on the floor to tear into GOP leaders pushing an abortion ban over proposed legislation making South Carolina the 49th state to have hate crimes laws.
“Just as rape is about power and control, so is this total ban,” McLeod said Thursday. “Those who continue to push legislation like this are raping us again with their indifference, violating us again with their righteous indignation, taunting us again with their insatiable need to play God while they continue to pass laws that are ungodly.”
Watch the clip above via The Hill.
