Current Events > Ohio governor and wife accused of 'gaslighting' about abortion amendment

(+) Yeah! (+)

Theyre lying. Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine and wife Fran cut a homey anti-Issue 1 ad with warm lighting and soft music that features the couple as honest-to-goodness people with heart-felt concerns about the abortion rights amendment on the ballot Nov. 7. Then the lovely pair proceed to lie through their teeth.

Everywhere we go, folks tell us theyre confused about Issue 1, begins the governor. (Thats because Ohioans just voted for another Issue 1 three months ago deliberately labeled by Ohio Republicans to confuse voters in an attempt to undermine the original Issue 1 on Nov. 7.) DeWine skips that inconvenient truth and presses on.

So, Fran and I have carefully studied it. (Trust the anti-choice extremist who vowed to go as far as we can to prohibit reproductive rights in Ohio for fair assessment.) Frans takeaway of the constitutional amendment that essentially restores the pre-Dobbs protections Ohio women enjoyed before June 24, 2022 is heavy on fear-mongering and fabrication.

Issue 1 would allow an abortion at any time during pregnancy, she intones, knowing full well the proposed amendment allows for the same reasonable abortion restrictions after fetal viability that now exist with exception for incredibly rare cases that threaten the life or health of the pregnant patient. She leans into the late-term anti-abortion fallacy to suggest that Issue 1 could lead to full-term infanticide in the state.

Simply lies created to push a false narrative, countered Ohio House Rep. Anita Somani, a practicing OB-GYN for 31 years. This is her take:

Late-term abortions is actually not a term used in medicine. However, the gestational ages they are referring to make up less than 1% of abortions and all of those are before 22 weeks. In fact, you wont find data showing abortions after this age because those are deliveries and are recorded as such with birth or death certificates. If there is a birth defect that is incompatible with life or a maternal condition that is life threatening, labor is induced and the child is then given comfort care. If the child is viable (i.e., after 24 weeks) neonatal care is provided.

Back to the governors missus. And more deception. It [Issue 1] would deny parents the right to be involved in their daughters making the most important decision of her life. No it wouldnt, Fran. Nothing in the amendment, providing constitutional protections for abortion access in the state, even addresses parental rights, concluded Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost. (The same phony arguments about minors were raised before Michigans nearly identical abortion rights amendment passed with its parental consent laws intact.)

DeWine closes his commercial against Issue 1 with patronizing father-knows-best drivel. I know Ohioans are divided on the issue of abortion, but whether youre pro-life or pro-choice, Issue 1 is just not right for Ohio. But a draconian six-week abortion ban DeWine immediately imposed on Ohio women as soon as the Supreme Court rescinded half a century of protected reproductive freedom in the country is??

Frans sign-off is blunt. Issue 1 just goes too far. But a near total ban on access to abortion, with no exceptions for rape or incest which forced a pregnant, 10-year-old rape victim to seek out-of-state emergency medical care after it was prohibited in her home state doesnt?? The grotesque gaslighting by the DeWines is, unfortunately, not an anomaly in the concerted disinformation campaign running to deny women a constitutional right to abortion and other reproductive health care in the state.

Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose, the sinister partisan who tried to subvert voters majority rights in the August election and who flagrantly distorted ballot language on the upcoming abortion rights amendment to defeat it, called Issue 1 a sinister plot of the abortion industry that was shrouded in the clever mask of reproductive freedom.

The slippery elections chief also falsely claimed the amendment would green-light taxpayer-funded abortion throughout pregnancy and long after viability when the unborn child would survive outside the womb. Piling on the deceptive innuendos of legalized infanticide were extremists in the Ohio Senate who posited the ballot initiative will allow the worst atrocities imaginable, including the dismemberment of fully conscious children, in an adopted resolution.

The bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Cleveland tied all the prevailing lies about Issue 1 together and preached it will put women at risk, it will take away parental rights, and it will allow for late-term abortions of fully-formed babies in the womb. Not true. None of it. Read the full text of the proposal to amend Article 1 of the Ohio Constitution for yourself.

The 211-word amendment, simply titled The Right to Reproductive Freedom with Protections for Health and Safety, is pretty straightforward. Issue 1 asks voters to reinforce the right of every individual to make their own deeply personal and difficult decisions about their own bodies without politicians, anti-abortion lobbyists, the Catholic Church or the governor and wife butting in.

It doesnt change parental consent laws, doesnt cover sex-change surgery, doesnt force underaged girls into unwanted abortions. Those who disseminate those myths or misleading messaging that imply a suspended abortion ban isnt a court ruling (or defeated ballot initiative) away are lying through their pearly whites.

Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose, the sinister partisan who tried to subvert voters majority rights in the August election and who flagrantly distorted ballot language on the upcoming abortion rights amendment to defeat it, called Issue 1 a sinister plot of the abortion industry that was shrouded in the clever mask of reproductive freedom.

doesnt cover sex-change surgery

The amount of chuds around here that keep claiming that it does is absurdly high. My neighborhood app is full of these assholes. They did it for the most recent issue 1 as well, which was literally voting for the right to vote on things.

https://youtu.be/GiuTEWve3gY?si=BuIGs-Sg_vd_rNDx

The ad in case anyone was curious. I saw it that other day and just laughed at that BS.

patronizing father-knows-best drivel.

https://youtu.be/GiuTEWve3gY?si=BuIGs-Sg_vd_rNDx

The ad in case anyone was curious. I saw it that other day and just laughed at that BS.

Lmao these people look like the most Ohioan folksy folk you could draw up. It's insane.

They did the same thing in Kansas. The "value them both" amendment was advertised as the only way to put "reasonable restrictions" on abortion, even though there are already dozens of restrictions on the books. And it was advertised that voting no would make Kansas an "abortion destination" like California and abortions would be happening 39 and 40 weeks into pregnancy.

I do take issue with the fact that the people voting to codify abortion rights into the state constitution also vote heavily republican, for the same people they're voting to codify these rights because of.