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Alabama Governor Kay Ivey.
The election-year political scramble over IVF
Last week, Axios reported that a half dozen swing-district House Republicans were signing onto a resolution in support of continuing access to fertility treatment as other prominent national Republicans struggled to settle on a GOP message on the subject. In response, first lady Jill Biden invited an Alabama woman seeking IVF services as a guest at last night’s State of the Union address. To double down on the point, Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA) invited 42-year-old Elizabeth Carr, the world’s first “test-tube baby” to attend the speech.
Alabama Republicans quickly decided to get in front of the controversy. On Wednesday, the Alabama State Legislature passed a bill that grants civil and criminal immunity for in vitro fertilization service providers and receivers, and Republican Gov. Kay Ivey signed the bill into law less than an hour later. The move allows both patients and clinics to restart IVF treatments in the state without fear they could be prosecuted if embryos are damaged or destroyed during the procedure. It also highlights the election-year political stakes surrounding all aspects of reproductive rights, one of America’s most controversial political issues.
Press conference on the Alabama Supreme Court Ruling on IVF, and the need to safeguard IVF access nationwide, at the US Capitol in Washington, DC.
What does Alabama’s embryo ruling have to do with Canada?
Barely a week after the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos are “extrauterine children,” putting the future of in vitro fertilization (IVF) at risk throughout the state and, potentially, other parts of the nation, there are concerns the decision’s effects will creep north into Canada.
This week, the Alabama State Senate and House introduced bills moved to protect IVF providers as the state faced immediate backlash for the ruling. The court decision was a major win for anti-choice activists, which also has Canadians worried.
Under Canadian law, embryos are not considered persons — and that’s unlikely to change. But many Canadians seek IVF treatment in the US, which means stateside rulings could affect them. Plus, the transnational anti-choice movement — including its Canadian members — will be emboldened by the outcome.
While abortion in Canada is legal nationwide, access is limited by geographical barriers and a lack of clinics in some regions of the country, particularly Atlantic Canada. In the US, where a majority of Americans support abortion, lawmakers are proposing and passing abortion bans in states throughout the country in the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. But pro-choice supporters are also fighting back.
On Wednesday, Democratic Sen. Tammy Duckworthtried to pass a quick bill to protect IVF throughout the country, but was blocked by Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith. The setback notwithstanding, the federal effort to secure fertility treatment rights won’t end there.
Lessons from US midterm primaries in Georgia, Texas, and Alabama
Jon Lieber, head of Eurasia Group's coverage of political and policy developments in Washington, discusses Tuesday's primaries.
What happened in Tuesday's primaries?
Several states held primary elections on Tuesday of this week with the most interesting elections in Georgia, Texas, and Alabama. In Georgia, two incumbent Republicans who were instrumental in certifying the results of President Joe Biden's victory in 2020 won the nomination for governor and secretary of state against two Trump-backed opponents. The sitting governor who Trump had been targeting for months over his role in the 2020 election won by over 50 points, a sign that while Republican voters still love Donald Trump, his hold over the party is not absolute. This is going to create an opening for challengers in the 2024 presidential election cycle.
In Alabama, a primary for who will take the seat of retiring Senator Richard Shelby is going to a runoff between Shelby's chosen replacement, his former chief of staff, and a very controversial House member who President Trump had endorsed but then unendorsed when he was thought to be too weak a candidate. He now has a shot at the nomination with a runoff election in June and if he wins, he will be one of the first full throated deniers of Joe Biden's election results to serve in the United States Senate.
In Texas, the most conservative house Democrat, who is a bete noir of progressive activists, again held off a challenge from a progressive activist running to his left. The incumbent had been endorsed by House leadership while his challenger had been endorsed by national progressives like Bernie Sanders. But she was unable to unseat the incumbent in a very Hispanic district. Elsewhere in Texas, a son of the Bush political dynasty lost his race for attorney general to the sitting attorney general, who has recently struggled with ethical problems.
Finally, one of the biggest stories of the night was turnout in Georgia, which broke previous records for midterm primaries, despite worries that had been pushed by Democrats about a new election law that they claim would suppress minority votes. We'll never know the counterfactual, how many people might have voted in the absence of this new law but the fact that the turnout was so high will take some of the political sting over accusations of voter suppression for a lot of new Republican laws that had passed and which several American corporations have reacted to very strongly in the wake of the 2020 election controversy.
Breitbart Views with Charlie Spiering
Across Alabama, across the United States, and across the world many people breathed a sigh of relief that Roy Moore fell short winning a Senate seat. But not all people.
This week Ian Bremmer talks with Breitbart News White House Correspondent Charlie Spiering about the roughly one third of Americans who remain fervently behind the likes of Roy Moore, Steve Bannon and, of course, President Trump himself.