Iowa Republicans seek to halt Medicaid funded abortions for rape victims

By Eric W. Dolan/Raw Story

The American Civil Liberties Union of Iowa and other groups have condemned a petition requesting the state deny Medicaid reimbursements for abortions resulting from rape, incest, or a devastating fetal health diagnosis.

Forty-one Republican state lawmakers filed the petition last month with the Iowa Department of Human Services. The lawmakers said that government funding for abortions was “in conflict with the express language and intent of the laws enacted by the General Assembly and signed by the Governor.” The agency has until August 10 to dismiss the petition or initiate the rulemaking process.

“The petitioners ask the department to withhold medical coverage from women who have been raped or whose pregnancy has taken a catastrophic turn,” Ben Stone, ACLU of Iowa Executive Director, said on Monday. “It doesn’t get more mean-spirited than that.”

“Their petition asks the department for a procedural run-around that violates Iowa law about how administrative agencies can make rules,” he added. “Iowa law is very clear about when emergency rulemaking is allowed, and when it’s inappropriate.”

The proposal to prohibit Medicaid-paid abortions could threaten Iowa’s entire Medicaid budget. The Hyde Amendment of 1976 allows states to prohibit federal funds for abortion, but not when a mother’s life is in danger or in cases of rape or incest.

In fiscal year 2012, there were 22 Medicaid-paid abortions performed in Iowa. Fifteen of those abortions were the result of severe fetal anomalies, five were performed to save the mother, and two were for pregnancies that were the result of rape.

“It is shockingly callous that these politicians would try to compound the trauma of rape or incest by depriving a woman who becomes pregnant the ability to make the best decision for her circumstances, whether that decision is raising a child, adoption, or abortion,” Stone said.

Conservative Women’s Group Applauds Senate Decision To Deny Military Rape Victims Abortion Coverage

By Marie Diamond/Think Progress

The Senate decided last week to keep in place a policy that denies abortion coverage for military rape victims who became pregnant as a result of their sexual assault. Female service members who fight and die for their country are not extended the same rights as civilian government employees, who can use their government-funded insurance to pay for abortion if they’re victims of rape or incest, or evenrape survivors in prison who receive government-funded abortion coverage.

Rape is rampant in the military, with nearly one in three women sexually assaulted while serving. Yet the Senate declined to vote on Sen. Jeanne Shaheen’s (D-NH) amendment that would restore abortion coverage and give military rape victims the same options as civilians and prisoners.

Anti-abortion activists are cheering the decision, and the conservative group Concerned Women for America had some particularly infuriating things to say about the Senate’s inaction:

Concerned Women for America (CWA) revealed exactly how little concern they have for actual women, much less for America, this week when they sent out a letter attacking women who defend our country for having the nerve to believe they deserve full medical care after being raped.

The mind-bogglingly vicious swipe at female soldiers had a couple of doozies, including the claim that allowing raped service members to access abortion “serves as a political distraction” from national security, as if it’s in the interest of national security to subject raped service members to forced childbirth. [...]

But in a letter dripping with congratulatory faux concern and naked disregard for female service members who have been raped, the most attention-grabbing quote was this: Women deserve better than simply being given abortion as a ‘cure-all.’

CWA also described being raped and forced to bear a rapist’s child as merely “difficult circumstances” requiring “compassion and support.”

The Senate’s cowardice in refusing to even bring the amendment to a vote is also disappointing. Declining to vote on a measure is a sneaky tactic that effectively kills the amendment, but allows senators to avoid going on the record denying rights to service members. Earlier this year a Republican-led House committee also shot down a Democratic measure like Shaheen’s.

According to very conservative Defense Department numbers, fewer than 20 percent of military sexual assaults are reported, and only 8 percent of assailants are prosecuted — in no small part because of the military’s pervasive blame-the-victim culture.

Fox Contributor: ‘Cult of victimology’ around rape stifles debate

By Megan Carpentier

Kirsten Powers, a Fox News and Daily Beast contributor and former Clinton Administration official, became the latest women to jump on the anti-"Slutwalk" bandwagon following pop singer Rebecca St. James' assertion that women are "asking for sex if they’re dressed immodestly” and should refrain from doing so if they don't wish to be raped.

Powers, who also accused feminists of ignoring the needs of trafficked women by advocating against sexual violence with their "Slutwalk" protests, joined via Twitter this morning. Her beef: the use of the word "slut" -- which, actually, stemmed from the police officer who started the outcry.

In January, Toronto Police Service constable Michael Sanguinetti gave a speech to York University law students explained what he thought was one of the best ways to prevent rape: "You know, I think we're beating around the bush here. I've been told I'm not supposed to say this - however, women should avoid dressing like sluts in order not to be victimised."

Sanguinetti was likely told not to say that not just because it's un-PC, but because it's untrue: studies show that rapists picked victims they deem "vulnerable," not "slutty"; most rapists attack acquaintances and do so more than once; and most rapists are fully aware that their victims were not consenting to sexual activity. In other words, rapists don't target their victims because they expect, due to their victims' clothes, that they will consent; they choose to victimize people because they wish to rape them.

Sanguinetti's words caused an uproar and led to the Slutwalk protests: like earlier "Take Back The Night" protests against sexual violence, the women who organized it did so to fight back against sexual violence and the perception that it was women's responsibility (rather then men's or the judicial system's) to prevent rape. The goal is to raise awareness of sexual violence and work to counteract stereotypes about its victims in order to aid in prevention.

Powers, however, is not a fan. This morning she Tweeted:

At which point, this writer responded: "Uh, actually, it was being told by cops that dressy slutty gets you raped. But way to jump on the bandwagon there."

She replied:

So this writer responded, again: "So, a little 101 here: 'slut' is a way to denigrate women, regardless of the facts of their sexuality or history or dress," adding "When the dude broke into my apartment to rape me, he didn't care what I was wearing. But the cops did. Both are problematic."

She responded, as she did to many others, with a link to this article, in which Australian protest organizer Lauren Clair told a reporter "I'm not going to be ashamed," for how she looks or because she had sex, which the reporter characterized as an effort to "reclaim" the word "slut." Notably, the protests started in Canada and spread to the U.S. before going to Australia -- and, reportedly, aren't coordinated by one specific source.

After some more testy back and forth, Powers Tweeted this to her followers:

She then suggested that this writer should attempt to be less "juvenile" and "sarcastic" in her responses, without acknowledging that the debate started with her attempts to suggest what language anti-rape protesters should choose to employ in their efforts (or the fact that choosing the term "Slutwalk" brought it more attention than sexual assault awareness protests have had in more than a decade).

Then she Tweeted this after having been informed that this writer was a survivor of sexual assault:

Though first she denied addressing this writer directly when confronted about her statement, she eventually Tweeted "the 'cult' refers to modern feminist movement not rape victims. But i think you knew that." and finally added:

She added, belatedly:

[Disclosure: The author was the victim of a sexual assault in 2008.]

M.C.L Comment: It's clear Ms.Powers wasn't hired for her brains. 

GOP Anti-Abortion Bill Will Force IRS Agents To Audit Abortions Of Sexual Assault Victims

By Tanya Somanader

The GOP’s H.R. 3, or the No Taxpayer Funding For Abortions Act, is quickly racking up a number of unprecedented offenses against a woman’s right to choose. Starting with the redefinition of rape, H.R. 3 also torpedoes the GOP anti-tax pledge by changing the tax code to raise taxes on women and small businesses that provide health insurance covering abortions. Now, as Mother Jones’s Nick Baumann reports, this tax code provision would turn the Internal Revenue Service into “abortion cops” who “investigate whether certain terminated pregnancies were the result of rape or incest.”

In the House Ways and Means Committee hearing on H.R. 3 Wednesday, the nonpartisan Joint Tax Committee’s chief of staff Thomas Barthold testified that because the bill bans using tax credits or deductions to pay for abortions or insurance, a woman who used such a benefit would have to prove, if audited, that her abortion “fell under the rape/incest/life-of-the-mother exception, or that the health insurance she had purchased did not cover abortions.” Rep. Mike Thompson (D-CA) asked Barthold point blank “if a woman were audited, would IRS agents be at her house demanding court documents or affidavits proving that her pregnancy was the result of rape or incest?” Barthold confirmed what former IRS official Marcus Owens told Baumann — a woman would have to give “contemporaneous written documentation” that it was “incest, or rape, or [her] life was in danger” that compelled her abortion:

Barthold replied that the taxpayer would have to prove that she had complied with all applicable abortion laws. Under standard audit procedure, a woman would have to provide evidence to corroborate facts about abortions, rapes, and cases of incest, says Marcus Owens, an accountant and former longtime IRS official. If a taxpayer received a deduction or tax credit for abortion costs related to a case of rape or incest, or because her life was endangered, then “on audit [she] would have to demonstrate or prove, ideally by contemporaneous written documentation, that it was incest, or rape, or [her] life was in danger,” Owens says. “It would be fairly intrusive for the woman.”

Not everyone has “contemporaneous written documentation” that a pregnancy was the result of rape or incest. And, as Owens notes, adults sometimes pay for abortions for their children. If H.R. 3 becomes law, parents could face IRS questions about whether they spent pre-tax money from health savings accounts on abortions for their kids. “It would seem there would have to be a question about that [in an audit] and maybe even a question on the tax return,” Owens says.

Asking a woman to provide a receipt of her intense emotional and physical trauma goes beyond “intrusive;” it’s destructive to a woman’s health and well-being and abusive of federal authority. Indeed, the bill “contains no instructions for how the IRS should enforce” the provision despite the inclusion of a whole section entitled “Prohibition on Tax Benefits Relating to Abortion.” But despite this ambiguity, 221 House members have sponsored H.R. 3 and, because only 218 votes are needed for passage, the bill is expected to “sail through” the House.

NARAL Pro-Choice America president Nancy Kennan called on the 221 members to “explain to their constituents why they want to give the IRS authority to audit rape survivors.” And with 54 percent of the American people supporting abortions in all or most cases and 56 percent viewing creating jobs as the most important focus of the federal government, they may have trouble explaining how this “comprehensive and radical assault on women’s health” is suddenly a “top priority.”