Kasich Didn’t Bring People Together, He Flat-Out Insulted Women a Day After Blocking Access to Women’s Health in Ohio
For Immediate Release: March 3, 2016
Kasich Thanked Women for Leaving “Their Kitchens” to Campaign for Him
Washington, DC –– Tonight, in the Fox News Republican debate, Kasich claimed he “brought people together, Democrats and Republicans.” But just two weeks ago he insulted women across America by thanking them forleaving “their kitchens” to help knock on doors for his campaign.
Earlier that week, Kasich hadsigned a bill to “defund” Planned Parenthood — which blocks thousands of Ohio women frominfant mortality prevention programs, domestic violence prevention, HIV testing, and breast cancer screenings. And as Governor, he has led a quiet campaign to ban abortion in Ohio, enacting more measures to do so than Texas.
Earlier on the campaign, Kasich had ablatantly offensive exchange with a young University of Richmond student who was exercising her civic duty byasking Kasich a question about his policies. When calling on her,Kasich said, “I’m sorry, I don’t have any tickets for Taylor Swift or anything.” At another campaign stop in Iowa,Mic reported that, while discussing the fiscal responsibilities of elected officials, Kasich singled out a woman in the audience and asked her, "Have you ever been on a diet?"
Kasich’s repeated disrespect for women shows in his policy agenda, too. As Governor, he has done everything in his power torestrict access to reproductive health care, enacting 17 measures to ban abortion, andshuttering nearly half of the abortion providers in the state. Kasich has appointed anti-abortion extremists to oversee Ohio’s health care agency, enacted laws that subject women to forced ultrasounds, and he even voted against women having access to birth control.
ICYMI: Kasich is no Moderate; Has Been Making Life Hell for Women in Ohio
Politico: On abortion, Kasich is no moderate
- “John Kasich is hoping for a candidacy-saving showing in New Hampshire on Tuesday by positioning himself as a pragmatic GOP budget-balancer, more moderate than his rivals. But on abortion, the Ohio governor is anything but moderate, signing a slew of restrictive laws that have closed nearly half his state’s clinics.”
- “Laws signed by Kasich prohibit almost all abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy, mandate ultrasounds before a woman can get an abortion and require abortion clinics to establish formal written agreements with local hospitals about emergency care — a provision that has been repeatedly modified to be even more restrictive and make it harder for clinics to comply. Several other states have enacted similar laws — and the Supreme Court this year will decide how far states can go with such restrictions.”
Mother Jones: How Ohio Gov. John Kasich Is Making Life Hell for Women Seeking Abortions
- “During his first term as governor, Kasich was outspoken in his anti-abortion rhetoric. In 2011, aftersigning the Late-Term Abortion Ban, a bill that required physicians to test the viability of an unborn child if the mother sought an abortion at 20 weeks or later in her pregnancy, Kasich released a statement saying, ‘Life is a gift from God and one way that we express our ongoing gratitude for it is by respecting it. This bill does that in a very fundamental way and I'm proud to have signed it into law.’"
- “In October 2012, Kasichappointed Michael Gonidakis, the Ohio Right to Life President, to the state medical board.”
- “Hidden within [Kasich’s] final budget were a number of provisions that would drastically limit a women's right to choose. In addition to cutting Planned Parenthood funds and threatening to cut funding to rape crisis centers that offered advice on terminating pregnancies, the budget included provisions that greatly affect how abortion clinics operate today. In clinics that receive state funding, women seeking abortions are now required to pay for and receive a medically unnecessary ultrasound to check for a fetal heartbeat. Physicians are also required to read a script, written by conservative Ohio legislators, about the "fetal heartbeat" to any woman seeking the procedure.”
FiveThirtyEight: John Kasich’s Quiet Campaign To Cut Abortion Access
- “Since entering office in January 2011, John Kasich, Ohio’s governor and now a GOP presidential hopeful, has signed every abortion and women’s reproductive health provision that has landed on his desk. In four and a half years he has enacted 16 [now 17] legislative proposals related to family planning funding and abortion access across the state.”
- “And although Ohio is seen as a wild success story for anti-abortion advocates, the details of Kasich’s hard-line stance are often obscured.”
- “As governorhe concealed his administration’s role in the creation of several anti-abortion measures, and now he isviewed as one of the most moderate candidates in a GOP race that tips far to the right.”
- “Since Kasich entered office, half of the state’s surgical abortion clinics have stopped providing abortion services, including Center for Choice.... No state,other than Texas, with nearly 6 million women of reproductive age, has lost so many clinics in this span of time.”