Texas Senator Ted Cruz was spewing more nonsense about birth control and further confirming that he is absolutely clueless about women’s health. During Amy Coney Barrett’s Supreme Court confirmation hearings on Oct 13, Senator Cruz referred to birth control pills as ‘abortion inducing drugs.’ His birth control comment occurred while discussing implied so-called “threats” to religious freedom. Barrett joining the Supreme Court is a threat to people who are capable of getting pregnant in the US as she’s pro-life and against safe and legal access to abortion.
He was specifically referencing the Supreme Court case of The Little Sisters of the Poor Saints Peter and Paul Home v. Pennsylvania. The Little Sisters of the Poor, a Catholic convent of nuns, had asked for an exemption from the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act that requires health plans to cover all FDA-approved contraceptive methods. The Supreme Court ruled that organizations could opt out of this requirement for religious and moral reasons which is despicable in a country where we’re supposed to have a separation of church and state—sexual health shouldn’t concern employers.
In the hearing, Cruz said that the “Obama administration litigated against the Little Sisters of the Poor, seeking to fine them in order to force them to pay for abortion-inducing drugs, among others.” There is nothing factual about that statement. The Little Sisters of the Poor were not asked to pay for abortions. Birth control pills do not induce abortions. Misdefining birth control is misleading. Plan B also doesn’t induce abortion.
It’s jarring that a senior member of the US government and former presidential candidate has no qualms against spreading messages that are factually incorrect and could place people who use birth control in danger. Planned Parenthood was quick to correct Cruz on Twitter saying that “Ted Cruz hasn’t learned” and that “Birth control can’t cause an abortion. But both abortion and birth control ARE health care.”