Analysis, Health and Fitness

The Doomsday Scenario for Reproductive Rights if Trump is Elected


NEW YORK–(ENEWSPF)–November 7, 2016

By ZawnVillines

It’s easy to complain on social media that Clinton isn’t liberal enough (or is too liberal), that she can’t be trusted, that she should have managed her emails differently. When it’s time to cast a ballot, though, it takes a truly warped moral compass to judge Trump less corrupt, more trustworthy, and less worthy of a jail sentence than Clinton. Fact checkers have determined that 91% of what comes out of the admitted sexual assailant’s mouth is false.

What’s really scary is what will happen to reproductive rights if Trump is elected. Reproductive rights are about much more than abortion. They include the right to use birth control, to have (or not have) a child, and the right to be free from discrimination based on your status as a parent. Trump has made it quite clear that he thinks reproductive rights should not exist. So what will happen if he gets elected?

No More Birth Control

Think the party that opposes abortion would support birth control? Think again. Republican lawmakers have long offered support to limitations on access to birth control. Some even support banning hormonal birth control. With a Trump Supreme Court and Republican congress, birth control might become a precious commodity.

Even if birth control survives, women can forget about insurance coverage for hormonal contraceptives—even when they use such drugs to address medical issues, or to avoid potentially life-threatening pregnancies. Republicans have long demanded that insurance plans not be required to cover birth control. With Trump in office, they’ll finally get their chance to force women to bear the full financial costs of safer sex.

An End to Roe vs. Wade

Trump will get to make one immediate Supreme Court nominee, and probably at least two more after that. With a Republican congress, his nominee will sail through the nomination process. The nominee has made it clear he will only select nominees who oppose Roe vs. Wade. That means states could immediately begin banning abortion, even in cases of rape or incest. In a true nightmare scenario, Congress could pass a federal law outlawing abortions even when the woman’s life depends on the procedure—as it does in the 1 in 50 ectopic pregnancies that will inevitably kill both mother and baby if left unchecked.

An end to abortion rights doesn’t just affect women. Men would be forced to support children both they and their partners did not want. And with birth control in short supply under a Trump administration, the risks of consensual sex between two adults might no longer be worth it.

Getting Fired for Being Pregnant (or a Parent, or a Woman, or Unattractive…)

Trump has said that breastfeeding is disgusting and that women should just put up with sexual harassment in the workplace. These views are perfectly acceptable to the Republican party that seems keen to vote him into office. Moreover, Republican lawmakers have long advocated for an end to laws designed to protect women workers.

If Trump gets a few Supreme Court nominees, the Civil Rights Act—which bans sexual harassment, gender discrimination, pregnancy discrimination, and other forms of workplace harassment—could be gutted. Employers could even fire women for becoming pregnant. With abortion banned in a Trump pregnancy, women’s ability to safely work would be greatly diminished.

No Health Care Coverage for Reproductive Care

You might think that a party that claims to be “pro-life” would want to make it possible for women to fund their pregnancies. Nope. Republicans have stridently opposed any attempt to force insurers to cover maternity care. Indeed, this opposition was a centerpiece of their opposition to the Affordable Care Act. Trump has already promised to kill the ACA, and with it the maternity coverage mandate.

The Takeaway: A Scary World for Both Women and Men

Parenthood is expensive and time-consuming. A trump administration wants to make things even worse. Thanks to reduced access to birth control, unplanned pregnancies will become more common, and abortion will no longer be an option. Women and the men who impregnate them will then be left to cover the full costs of the pregnancy without insurance assistance, and may face overt discrimination at school and work for having a child. Trump stands ready to create a true dystopia for parents, couples, and any fertile person who is interested in ever having sex again.

Some particularly entrenched Clinton haters have speculated that a vote for Trump is really a vote for Mike Pence. Trump is bound to be impeached, the thinking goes, so he can only cause minimal chaos.

According to any reasonable measure of reproductive freedom, Pence would be even worse than Trump. Pence’s attitudes toward reproduction are so regressive that he tried to force women to bury the remains of miscarried fetuses. For more examples of Pence’s war on reproductive freedom, click here. Pence’s deadly serious insistence that women are inferior to men is the perfect complement to Trump’s sexually predatory behavior and words. Check out these terrible things he’s said about women if you have any doubt.

Source: http://dailykos.com

 


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