Conservative Judge Who Just Ruled Against Birth Control

BY IAN MILLHISER/Think Progress

Nine years ago, the California Supreme Court upheld a state law similar to the Affordable Care Act’s rules requiring most employers to include birth control coverage in their employee health plans. The sole dissent in that case was Justice Janice Rogers Brown. Nearly a decade later, Brown got her revenge. Though no longer a member of California’s highest court — President George W. Bush appointed her to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit over the strenuous objections of Democrats — Judge Brown is now the author of a 2-1 opinion holding that religious employers can ignore the federal birth control rules. What was once a fringe view held by a lone holdout is now the law in the second most powerful court in the country.

Judge Brown’s opinion barely conceals her contempt for progressive legislation. Prior to her nomination to the D.C. Circuit, Brown labeled the New Deal a “socialist revolution,” and she likened Social Security to a kind of intergenerational cannibalism — “[t]oday’s senior citizens blithely cannibalize their grandchildren because they have a right to get as much ‘free’ stuff as the political system will permit them to extract.” Since joining the federal bench, she authored a concurring opinion suggesting that all labor, business or Wall Street regulation is constitutionally suspect. The very first sentence of her birth control opinion labels the Affordable Care Act a “behemoth.”

So there was never any doubt how Brown would vote on this particular challenge to women’s access to birth control. Her opinion was joined by Judge A. Raymond Randolph, a conservative George H.W. Bush appointee. Carter-appointed Judge Harry Edwards dissented.

Coincidentally, Brown’s opinion comes just one day after Senate Republicans reignited the filibuster wars by filibustering the first of three Obama nominees to her court. Currently, the D.C. Circuit is evenly divided between Democratic and Republican active judges, but a large number of Republican judges in partial retirement allow the GOP to dominate the court. Senate Minority Whip John Cornyn wrote in a Fox News op-ed that Republicans should prevent any of Obama’s nominees from being confirmed to this court to prevent Democrats from gaining a majority. Although federal appeals courts typically hear cases via randomly drawn three-judge panels, the court’s rules permit a majority of the court’s active judges to displace any decision reached by a three-judge panel.

Senate Democrats waged an unsuccessful effort to filibuster Judge Brown’s nomination during the Bush Administration — largely because of her strident opposition to programs such as Social Security — but that filibuster was eventually defeated after Republicans threatened to invoke the so-called “nuclear option” to eliminate filibusters of judicial nominees. The deal that allowed Judge Brown to be confirmed also paved the way for Judge Priscilla Owen’s nomination. Yesterday evening, Judge Owen authored an opinionreinstating a Texas anti-abortion law blocked by a lower court judge.

There is a lesson here for Democrats trying to decide whether to invoke the nuclear opinion in the D.C. Circuit fight that Senate Republicans started this week. When Republicans had the courage to demand what they wanted and put a serious threat behind it, they got two of the most conservative judges in the country. If Senate Democrats follow suit — either by forcing Republicans to cave or by carrying through on a threat to nuke the filibuster — they will also win their fight to get President Obama’s nominees confirmed.

Conservative Judge Who Just Ruled Against Birth Control

BY IAN MILLHISER/Think Progress

Nine years ago, the California Supreme Court upheld a state law similar to the Affordable Care Act’s rules requiring most employers to include birth control coverage in their employee health plans. The sole dissent in that case was Justice Janice Rogers Brown. Nearly a decade later, Brown got her revenge. Though no longer a member of California’s highest court — President George W. Bush appointed her to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit over the strenuous objections of Democrats — Judge Brown is now the author of a 2-1 opinion holding that religious employers can ignore the federal birth control rules. What was once a fringe view held by a lone holdout is now the law in the second most powerful court in the country.

Judge Brown’s opinion barely conceals her contempt for progressive legislation. Prior to her nomination to the D.C. Circuit, Brown labeled the New Deal a “socialist revolution,” and she likened Social Security to a kind of intergenerational cannibalism — “[t]oday’s senior citizens blithely cannibalize their grandchildren because they have a right to get as much ‘free’ stuff as the political system will permit them to extract.” Since joining the federal bench, she authored a concurring opinion suggesting that all labor, business or Wall Street regulation is constitutionally suspect. The very first sentence of her birth control opinion labels the Affordable Care Act a “behemoth.”

So there was never any doubt how Brown would vote on this particular challenge to women’s access to birth control. Her opinion was joined by Judge A. Raymond Randolph, a conservative George H.W. Bush appointee. Carter-appointed Judge Harry Edwards dissented.

Coincidentally, Brown’s opinion comes just one day after Senate Republicans reignited the filibuster wars by filibustering the first of three Obama nominees to her court. Currently, the D.C. Circuit is evenly divided between Democratic and Republican active judges, but a large number of Republican judges in partial retirement allow the GOP to dominate the court. Senate Minority Whip John Cornyn wrote in a Fox News op-ed that Republicans should prevent any of Obama’s nominees from being confirmed to this court to prevent Democrats from gaining a majority. Although federal appeals courts typically hear cases via randomly drawn three-judge panels, the court’s rules permit a majority of the court’s active judges to displace any decision reached by a three-judge panel.

Senate Democrats waged an unsuccessful effort to filibuster Judge Brown’s nomination during the Bush Administration — largely because of her strident opposition to programs such as Social Security — but that filibuster was eventually defeated after Republicans threatened to invoke the so-called “nuclear option” to eliminate filibusters of judicial nominees. The deal that allowed Judge Brown to be confirmed also paved the way for Judge Priscilla Owen’s nomination. Yesterday evening, Judge Owen authored an opinionreinstating a Texas anti-abortion law blocked by a lower court judge.

There is a lesson here for Democrats trying to decide whether to invoke the nuclear opinion in the D.C. Circuit fight that Senate Republicans started this week. When Republicans had the courage to demand what they wanted and put a serious threat behind it, they got two of the most conservative judges in the country. If Senate Democrats follow suit — either by forcing Republicans to cave or by carrying through on a threat to nuke the filibuster — they will also win their fight to get President Obama’s nominees confirmed.

Ann Romney Refuses To Answer Questions About Birth Control

By Tara Culp-Ressler/Think Progress

In an interview with KWQC-TV6 today, Ann Romney refused to comment on the issues stemming from the ongoing War on Women, declining to address whether she believes women should have access to contraception through their employer-based insurance plans. Such questions are irrelevant, Romney said, because this election is not going to be about birth control:

KWQC TV6: Do you believe that employer-provided health insurance should be required to cover birth control?

ANN ROMNEY: Again, you’re asking me questions that are not about what this election is going to be about. This election is going to be about the economy and jobs.

KWQC TV6: Well, a Pew research poll shows those issues are very important to women, ranking them either “important” or “very important. [...]

ANN ROMNEY: Listen, I’ve been across this country, I’ve been for a year-and-a-half on the campaign trail. I’ve spoken with thousands of women and they are telling me, they’re telling me a couple of things, one they say they’re praying for me which is really wonderful, and then they’re saying, ‘please help, please help. We are so worried about our jobs.’ So really if you want to try to pull me off of the other messages it’s not going to work because I know because I’ve been out there. [...]

I’m going to talk to you about the economy and about job creation and about how my husband is the right person for the right time. This is going to be an election that is very important for women, and we are going to make sure that their economic prosperity is more certain under a President Romney.

Despite Romney’s attempt to pivot to the economy, her claim that birth control is “off message” ignores the real economic situation of women across America. In fact, women’s access to reproductive health services is inextricably linked to the economic issues that countless women face. For example, the Obamacare provision that requires employer-based coverage for contraception — which Ann Romney sidestepped after the interviewer brought it up twice — attempts to address the fact that one in three American women report having struggled to afford birth control at some point in their lives. And when women risk pregnancy without reliable access to contraception, they strain their own finances with the expensive addition of a dependent, as well as incur millions in taxpayer costs for medical care.

Sen. Johnson’s Advice To Women Who Can’t Afford Contraception: Google ‘What If I Can’t Afford Birth Control?’

By Scott Keyes/Think Progress

MILWAUKEE, Wisconsin — A Tea Party senator had a curious piece of advice for the millions of women across the country who can’t afford contraception coverage: go online and Google how to get birth control.

ThinkProgress spoke with freshman Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) about the matter this weekend at the Americans For Prosperity’s Defending the American Dream Summit in Milwaukee. Johnson has been vociferous in his attacks on the new regulation that requires insurance companies to cover birth control.

Given his opposition, we asked the Wisconsin senator what advice he would have for women in the country who can’t afford the cost of contraception. (A recent survey found one in three American women voters have struggled with to afford birth control.) Johnson’s advice: go online and type in, “what if I can’t afford birth control?” “If you can’t afford it, you can get birth control in this country,” Johnson explained. When we asked for clarification, he said, “You can get it. Go online, type it in. It’s easy to get.”

KEYES: What do we say to the millions of women who can’t afford access to birth control?

JOHNSON: My wife actually went online here in Wisconsin and typed in, “what if I can’t afford birth control?” Came up, bam. If you can’t afford it, you can get birth control in this country. That’s a straw-dog argument. There’s no conservative who’s trying to deny women health care or contraceptives. We’re just saying this is an issue of religious freedom. [...]

KEYES: What do you mean, “if you can’t afford it you can get it?”

JOHNSON: You can get it. Go online, type it in. It’s easy to get.

Watch it:

ThinkProgress went online and Googled “what if I can’t afford birth control?” The very first linkexplained that the entire process, from the initial exam to a follow-up to the pills themselves, can cost upwards of $210 the first month. The rest of the first-page results included two sites informing women that if they can’t afford contraceptives, “don’t have sex,” four sites attacking Georgetown Law student Sandra Fluke, and one site explaining how birth control is a lot more expensive than many believe.

Romney To Women Voters: ‘Vote For The Other Guy’ If You Want Greater Access To Birth Control

By Igor Volsky/Think Progress

Mitt Romney found himself in hot water over his opposition to expanding women’s access to contraception, less than a week after suggesting that he would “get rid of” Planned Parenthood, among other programs, to reduce the deficit. During a town hall in Illinois Monday evening, the former Massachusetts governor told a voter to “vote for the other guy” if she wanted access to “free birth control” and said that the federal government should not subsidize women’s health care through Planned Parenthood:

Q: I’m just wondering where you would suggest that the millions of women who receive their health services, such as mammograms, and HPV vaccines go?

ROMNEY: Well, they could go wherever they’d like to go — this is a free society. But here is what I say, which is the federal government should not tax these people to pay for Planned Parenthood. There are a lot of things that we have in our society that we may like, that we might not like, but that government should not be paying for.

Watch it:

Despite expanding health care to women as governor of Massachusetts — and even attending a Planned Parenthood fundraiser in 1994 as a Senate candidate — Romney has come out against helping women find affordable reproductive health services since announcing his presidential candidacy.

Beyond simply threatening Planned Parenthood, which provides necessary health care for millions of women, Romney has also called for cutting funds for Title X — the only federal program devoted to family planning — from the federal budget. He endorsed the so-called Blunt amendment to allow any employer to drop health insurance coverage for contraception and other health services on moral grounds, and spoke out against requiring employers and insurers to provide birth control coverage in their health care plans at no additional cost. Given that track record, many women and health advocates may indeed be inclined to “vote for the other guy.”

Romney Sets Off Furor on Contraception Bill

By MICHAEL BARBARO and ERIK ECKHOLM/New York Times

Either way, Mitt Romney created a new tempest when he told an Ohio news station that he was opposed to a Senate amendment, favored by conservatives and under debate in Congress on Wednesday, that would allow employers and insurers to limit coverage of contraceptives if they have religious or moral objections.

 “I’m not for the bill,” Mr. Romney said, but then added, “the idea of presidential candidates getting into questions about contraception within a relationship between a man and a women, husband and wife, I’m not going there.”

Mr. Romney seemed to be further distancing himself from the hard-edged social conservatism of his chief Republican rival, Rick Santorum, who has argued that contraception is damaging to society.

But in an apparent misunderstanding, Mr. Romney instead roused the momentary ire of many social conservatives, who already doubt his commitment to their cause.

Mr. Romney and his aides quickly corrected his remarks, saying he strongly supports the Senate amendment, and had not properly understood the question. (The slip followed a series of off-key comments about his wife’s Cadillacs and friends who own Nascar teams.)

The episode began when Mr. Romney was asked about his view of the sweeping amendment, sponsored by Senator Roy Blunt, Republican of Missouri, that would permit employers and insurers to refuse to offer health coverage that violated their beliefs.   

The bill has been championed by leading social conservatives, who describe President Obama’s effort to require religiously affiliated institutions, like hospitals or universities, to offer contraceptive coverage as an assault on religious liberty.

 Mr. Obama’s supporters call it a vital step for women’s health and say that Mr. Blunt’s amendment is a dangerous intrusion between doctors and their patients. 

Despite the initial confusion over the Blunt amendment, Mr. Romney’s original response offered a clear alternative to Mr. Santorum’s often-stated views on contraception.

Mr. Santorum, a conservative Roman Catholic who says he does not personally believe in using contraception, has repeatedly said that the wide availability of birth control has had negative moral and social impacts on the country.  

In an interview in October, he promised,  “One of the things I will talk about, that no president has talked about before, is, I think, the dangers of contraception in this country.”

Mr. Romney has sought to portray himself in recent days as a more measured candidate than Mr. Santorum, declaring that he would not “light my hair on fire” to court conservatives.

His interview on ONN, an Ohio television station, set off a scramble among his staff members to quell an online storm. Mr. Romney immediately called in to a conservative Boston radio show and said, “Of course, I support the Blunt amendment.”

Referring to the ONN reporter who had interviewed him, Mr. Romney said, “I thought he was talking about some state law that prevented people from getting contraception.”

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, an evangelical Christian group, expressed surprise that Mr. Romney, in his television interview, had not immediately jumped on what Mr. Perkins described as the “red-hot issue” related to contraception — the threat to religious freedom posed by the Obama mandate.

“When he talked about the issue as being a matter of contraception between husband and wife — that’s not what the issue today is about,” Mr. Perkins said. “Either he’s so focused on going after Santorum, or he’s been asleep for the last month.”

POLL: Democrats Have Advantage In Medicare, Contraception Debates

By Amanda Peterson Beadle/Think Progress

More people agree with Democrats that the U.S. needs to maintain a defined set of benefits in traditional Medicare, according to a new survey from the Kaiser Family Foundation. Seventy percent of respondents, including 53 percent of Republicans, said they want to keep Medicareas it is. This come ahead of the introduction of the Republicans’ proposed budget later this spring, which is likely to include Rep. Paul Ryan’s (R-WI) plan to transform the program into a “defined contribution” structure that would provide seniors with a voucher to purchase insurance from an exchange of private plans.

On contraception coverage, 63 percent of people agree with President Obama’s position that employer-provided insurance plans should cover it at no cost. Most people also agreed with the Democrats’ agrument that the contraception debate is about women’s rights, and 49 percent said they most trusted Democrats on the issue, with 33 percent saying they trusted Republicans.

The Senate will vote on the Blunt amendment, which would undermine the contraception mandate by allowing any employer to deny coverage of health services to their employees on the basis of their personal moral objections.

Santorum Cites Racist Author To Defend His Views On ‘The Dangers Of Contraception’

By Ian Millhiser/Think Progress

At last night’s GOP presidential candidates debate, former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA) was asked why he’s promised to address “the dangers of contraception in this country” if elected president. In response, he cited a particularly unfortunate author:

What I was talking about is, we have a society — Charles Murray just wrote a book about this and it’s on the front page of the New York Times two days ago — which is the increasing number of children being born out of wedlock in America, teens who are sexually active. What we’re seeing is a problem in our culture with respect the children being raised by children, children being raised out of wedlock, and the impact on society economically, the impact on society with respect to drug use and a host of other things, when children have children. And so, yes, I was talking about these very serious issues. and, in fact, as I mentioned before, two days ago on the front page of the New York Times, they’re talking about the same thing.

Watch it:

First of all, Santorum’s decision to justify his skepticism of contraception by citing the problem of unwed mothers is like something out of the Bizarro Planet. Here in the actual world, contraception is the solution to the problem of unplanned pregnancies, not the cause.

Likewise, Santourm’s decision to rely on Charles Murray is no less distressing. Murray co-authored The Bell Curve, which argues that black people score lower on IQ tests because they are genetically inferior to whites. To reach this conclusion, Murray relied on studies backed by the Pioneer Fund, whose original mission was to pursue “race betterment” for people “deemed to be descended predominantly from white persons who settled in the original thirteen states prior to the adoption of the Constitution.”

Murray’s latest book, Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010, is a similarly rigorous work of scholarship. In the words of former George W. Bush speechwriter David Frum, Murray’s latest opus proves that the racially-challenged author is unwilling “to submit his politics to the check of uncongenial evidence” and instead would “prefer[] to avoid encountering the evidence that might shake his politics.” Sadly, this description also applies to Santorum.

Top Santorum donor: Women could use aspirin ‘between their knees’

By Stephen C. Webster/Raw Story

In a startling outburst Thursday, the multimillionaire who’s given most to a super PAC supporting former Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) for president remarked that universal contraception coverage for women shouldn’t be needed because, “Back in my day, they used Bayer aspirin for contraceptives.”

“The gals put it between their knees and it wasn’t that costly,” he told MSNBC host Andrea Mitchell.

The comment comes by way of Foster Friess, the 71-year-old multi-millionaire former investment manager who’s become the largest donor to the Red, White and Blue fund, which supports the Pennsylvania Republican.

In a startling outburst Thursday, the multimillionaire who’s given most to a super PAC supporting former Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) for president remarked that universal contraception coverage for women shouldn’t be needed because, “Back in my day, they used Bayer aspirin for contraceptives.”

“The gals put it between their knees and it wasn’t that costly,” he told MSNBC host Andrea Mitchell.

The comment comes by way of Foster Friess, the 71-year-old multi-millionaire former investment manager who’s become the largest donor to the Red, White and Blue fund, which supports the Pennsylvania Republican.

Democratic Women Boycott House Contraception Hearing After Republicans Prevent Women From Testifying

By Igor Volsky/Think Progress

This morning, Democrats tore into House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) for preventing women from testifying before a hearing examining the Obama administration’s new regulation requiring employers and insurers to provide contraception coverage to their employees. Republicans oppose the administration’s rule and have sponsored legislation that would allow employers to limit the availability of birth control to women.

Ranking committee member Elijah Cummings (D-MD) had asked Issa to include a female witness at the hearing, but the Chairman refused, arguing that “As the hearing is not about reproductive rights and contraception but instead about the Administration’s actions as they relate to freedom of religion and conscience, he believes that Ms. Fluke is not an appropriate witness.”

And so Cummings, along with the Democratic women on the panel, took their request to the hearing room, demanding that Issa consider the testimony of a female college student. But the California congressman insisted that the hearing should focus on the rules’ alleged infringement on “religious liberty,” not contraception coverage, and denied the request. Reps. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) and Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) walked out of the hearing in protest of his decision, citing frustration over the fact that the first panel of witnesses consisted only of male religious leaders against the rule. Holmes Norton said she will not return, calling Issa’s chairmanship an “autocratic regime.”

Watch a compilation of the heated exchange:

A picture of the witness table:

Issa also dismissed the Democrats’ woman witness as a “college student’ who does not “have the appropriate credentials” to testify before his committee.