Wendy Davis: Late term abortion rights "sacred ground"

Wendy Davis hasn’t yet finished playing out her losing hand in Texas yet.  The state Senator that unsuccessfully filibustered a bill banning late-term abortions that had the support of 62% of Texas voters says she might run for governor next year — in part to get a change from “very partisan” leadership:

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State Sen. Wendy Davis, D-Fort Worth, said Monday that she will either run for re-election or for Texas governor, and that she’s working hard to make her decision.

Speaking at a National Press Club luncheon, Davis said those were the only two options, and that she’s not considering joining the lieutenant governor’s race. She did not indicate when she’ll make up her mind.

“People do feel we need a change from the very fractured, very partisan leadership we’re seeing in Texas right now,” she said.

Ah, yes … because nothing says bipartisanship like blocking a bill barring late-term abortions that 62% of voters — and 61% of women (page 416 of crosstabs) — supported.  Independents supported the 20-week ban by a 61/29 margin.  How does Davis explain that kind of stubborn positioning in light of her commitment to changing the “very partisan” leadership in Texas?  By quoting Nancy Pelosi, of course!

During a speech and press conference today, pro-abortion Texas lawmaker Wendy Davis said she would consider running for governor. The abortion activist also pulled a page from Nancy Pelosi’s playbook by calling defending late-term abortions “sacred ground.”

“I’ll seek common ground – we all must – but sometimes you have to take a stand on sacred ground,” Davis said during her press conference — referring to her filibuster to stop a bill to ban abortions after five months.

Reporters asked Davis if she supported any limits on abortions and she responded that she did not — saying she supports current federal law.

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Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think any Democrat is going to win a statewide election in Texas by quoting Nancy Pelosi on abortion, especially given the polling in the state before and during the battle over the late-term abortion ban. If Davis had any sense of self-awareness, I’d assume this was intended to be irony.  Instead, it’s simply farce.

Update: Speaking of self-awareness, here’s the bipartisan warrior on the Kermit Gosnell case, which prompted the legislation in Texas to ban abortions after 20 weeks and require abortion mills to meet the same requirements as all other ambulatory surgical centers:

THE WEEKLY STANDARD: The supporters of these bans, they argue that there really isn’t much of a difference between what happened in that Philadelphia case with abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell [killing born-alive infants] 23 weeks into pregnancy and legal late-term abortions at 23 weeks. What is the difference between those two, between legal abortion at 23 weeks and what Gosnell did? Do you see a distinction between those two [acts]?

SEN. WENDY DAVIS: I don’t know what happened in the Gosnell case. But I do know that it happened in an ambulatory surgical center. And in Texas changing our clinics to that standard obviously isn’t going to make a difference. The state of the law obviously has to assure that doctors are providing safe procedures for women and that proper oversight by the health and human services department is being given. It sounds as though there was a huge gap in that oversight, and no one can defend that. But that’s not the landscape of what’s happening in Texas.

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It happened in an ambulatory surgical center where the state refused to enforce its laws, as the grand jury concluded, because of the politics involved.  And without that enforcement, there’s nothing to prevent it from happening in Texas, either.  At least putting those requirements into law will give Texas the means to prevent a Gosnell in Texas; whether or not they use those means depends in large part on who gets elected as Governor.  Clearly, if that’s Davis, those regulations will remain unenforced, and butchers could go for several years without fear of apprehension.

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