Judge Brett Kavanaugh has spent the better part of a week being grilled by senators from either side of the aisle as he undertakes the grueling process being confirmed as the newest Supreme Court justice. In his latest controversial moment, Kavanaugh appeared to refer to emergency contraception such as the “Plan-B” pill as “abortion-inducing drugs.”
Answering questions posed by Sen. Ted Cruz regarding his judgment in Priests for Life v. the U.S. Department of Human and Health Services, Kavanaugh explained the reasoning behind his controversial ruling.
The 2015 case, held at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, involved Kavanaugh siding with a religious organization that refused to provide contraception for employees under its insurance policy. Priests for Life argued the Affordable Care Act covered all forms of contraception, and thus they would have to provide employees with drugs that they believed induced the early termination of life.
Supreme Court justice nominee Brett Kavanaugh refers to birth control as "abortion-inducing drug" https://t.co/sI1w0Si5mr pic.twitter.com/nCmIPCUhsZ
— TIME (@TIME) September 7, 2018
“Under the religious freedom restoration act, the question was this a substantial burden on the religious exercise,” Kavanaugh told Sen. Cruz. “It seemed to me quite clearly that it was. It was a technical matter of filling out a form. They said that filling out a form would make them complicit in the abortion-inducing drugs that they were, as a religious matter, objected to.”
The phrase “abortion-inducing drugs” was how Priests For Life described the contested contraceptive methods during the 2015 case. As you can imagine, Kavanaugh’s words caused outrage from the pro-abortion lobby.
Sen. Diane Feinstein, who has been heavily involved in grilling Kavanaugh this week, said that his response “was about insurance coverage for contraceptives” and thus served as “further proof of Kavanaugh’s hostility toward women’s reproductive freedom.”
Pro-choice Sen. Elizabeth Warren took a similar stance:
Newsflash, Brett Kavanaugh: Contraception is NOT abortion. Anyone who says so is peddling extremist ideology – not science – and has no business sitting on the Supreme Court. #WhatsAtStake #StopKavanaugh https://t.co/gaZA3AnIcE
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) September 6, 2018
Many of those who, despite Kavanaugh’s insistence to the contrary, are convinced he will help overturn Roe v. Wade if confirmed, felt that his remarks only confirmed their suspicions.
If you think birth control is nothing but a bunch of "abortion inducing drugs," you're probably going to overturn Roe v. Wade.
— Devin Duke (@sirDukeDevin) September 7, 2018
Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court confirmation enters its fourth day today.