Image by Sen Joni Ernst via Facebook
CV NEWS FEED // A Republican senator who attacked Sen. Tommy Tuberville’s, R-AL, efforts to end abortion in the military is now pulling a “pro-life stunt” to save face, critics say.
“Republicans in the U.S. Senate voted to trick the American people Tuesday,” the Heritage Foundation’s Eric Teetsel wrote in The Daily Signal the following day. “The Senate voted on a motion to table an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act [NDAA].”
“Theoretically, if the vote had passed, Sen. Joni Ernst, [R-IA], would have then proposed her own amendment dealing with pro-life policy, but the vote was never going to pass,” Teetsel explained. “Everyone knew that. Everyone was in on the game.”
“Why go through such a vote?” Teetsel speculated. “Republican senators want you to think they are fighting for life even though most of them aren’t.”
Last week, both houses of Congress removed pro-life protections from the NDAA. These protections would have ended the Pentagon’s policy that uses taxpayer dollars to pay for service members’ abortions.
Last month, Ernst called Tuberville’s holds on military promotions in protest of this pro-abortion policy “abhorrent.”
“We have men and women who deserve to be promoted,” she stated on the Senate floor. “That is dishonorable, and it’s abhorrent.”
Ernst was part of a group of five Republican senators who attempted to derail Tuberville’s protest on multiple occasions. The other members of this breakaway coalition included Sens. Lindsey Graham, R-SC, Mitt Romney, R-UT, Dan Sullivan, R-AK, and Todd Young, R-IN.
This is not the first time critics have accused Ernst of pulling a “stunt” to “cover” for her fierce opposition to a colleague’s pro-life stand.
CatholicVote reported last month:
[F]ive days after she condemned Tuberville on the Senate floor, Ernst issued a statement and signed a letter both slamming the Biden administration for funding abortions for minors at the border.
In the “background” section of her statement Ernst’s office highlighted that “earlier this year, she introduced legislation to end” the same DoD policy she denounced Tuberville for protesting.
“Sen. Ernst’s position reflects the majority of the GOP conference who rhetorically oppose the Biden abortion policy but have no intention of solving it,” said CatholicVote Director of Governmental Affairs Tom McClusky this week.
“It’s disappointing,” he stressed. “We lost this fight when Mitch McConnell gave the green light to other Republicans to attack Sen. Tuberville.”
“What’s dishonorable is pretending to fight for life,” Teetsel wrote at the end of his piece in The Daily Signal. “What’s stupid is believing you can get away with it.”
