Sam Brown, the Republican nominee for Senate in Nevada, has been backpedaling as fast as he can from his political history as an anti-abortion activist, trying to convince the pro-abortion-rights state that it’s Democratic Sen. Jacky Rosen who’s the extremist.
His latest effort is an op-ed in the Las Vegas Sun, published this past Sunday, in which he pledges to oppose a national abortion ban if it comes before Congress. However, he goes on to say that the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision overturning Roe v. Wade was good for Nevada—where abortion is legal until the 24th week of pregnancy—because the ruling “strengthened Nevada’s protections for abortion by confirming this choice is decided by states.”
The people of Nevada aren’t convinced their abortion rights are safe, though. Last Friday, state officials declared that a measure to enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution will appear on the ballot in November, after a successful push by abortion-rights organizers. Their petition drive collected more than 200,000 signatures to get the measure on the ballot, easily surpassing the 103,000-signature threshold for qualifying. And if that weren’t clear enough, recent polling shows that 76% of Nevadans support the right to abortion in most or all cases—among the highest support in any state.
In his op-ed, Brown also warns that Rosen “supports allowing the federal government to impose new rules on abortion, rules that have the potential to go further than Nevadans may desire.” This is, unsurprisingly, a lie. Rosen supports the Women’s Health Protection Act, which would codify Roe protections into law.
Brown built his political career in Texas as an extreme anti-abortion activist. While running for office there, he staunchly supported what was then the strictest abortion ban in the country, calling the abortion ban “nonnegotiable.” And after moving to Nevada, he served as chairman of the executive board for Nevada Faith and Freedom Coalition, an anti-abortion group that has backed a federal ban and called Roe v. Wade a “moral atrocity.”
This is a candidate whose campaign website has a section labeled “resources for women” that lists crisis pregnancy centers—the health care “clinics” that “use misleading and deceptive resources … [aiming] to prevent or deter a person from seeking certain reproductive healthcare options, including abortion,” according to Medical News Today. That’s what he considers a resource for women.
Brown also insists on his website that he has a litmus test for federal judges, and will vote only for those “who understand the importance of protecting life.”
What seems likelier? Brown disavowing a political lifetime of anti-abortion extremism and activism, or him cynically pretending he’s on the side of women to win in this pro-abortion-rights state?
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