Biden Slammed After Picking Pro-Abortion 'Extremist' for Crucial Role
By Jack Davis
Published December 7, 2020 at 10:25am
California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, who has called abortions “pers onal healthcare choices,” is the wrong person to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, one of the nation’s top pro-life groups said Sunday.
Presumptive President-elect Joe Biden announced Becerra’s appointment on Monday.
Becerra in April was a leader of state attorney generals who challenged a Mississippi law that sought to ban abortions after a fetus is 15 weeks old.
At the time, he said the law was “unjust, unlawful, and unfair.”
“Laws like Mississippi’s are a systematic attempt to undo a woman’s constitutional rights under Roe v. Wade,” he said. “I will continue to stand up for safe access to reproductive care and defend these rights for all women.”
Such actions led the Susan B. Anthony List to zing Becerra on Twitter for his embrace of abortion and his antipathy to the pro- life movement.
“Far from ‘uniting’ the country, Biden has proven yet again he is an extremist on abortion,” the group’s president, Marjorie Dannenfelser, said in a statement.
“Becerra is aggressively pro-abortion and a foe of free speech,” she said. “As attorney general of California, he continued what his predecessor Kamala Harris started by persecuting citizen journalists who exposed Planned Parenthood’s role in baby parts trafficking.
“Not only that, he went all the way to the Supreme Court to try to force California’s pro-life pregnancy centers to advertise and refer for abortion — a policy the Court rejected as unconstitutional. In Congress, he even voted in favor of partial-birth abortion.”
Dannenfelser said the Becerra move reinforces the need to keep the Senate in Republican hands as a check on radical policies.
“This pick underscores the importance of winning in Georgia to prevent pro-abortion forces from taking control of the U.S. Senate. Republican senators must stand firm and stop this unacceptable nomination from going forward,” she said.
Biden has said during the campaign that as president he would seek to have legislation passed that would ensure no Supreme Court could overturn the Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion.
Becerra became California’s attorney general in 2017, following the election of Kamala Harris — Biden’s running mate — to the U.S. Senate. As attorney general, he has battled the Trump administration in court in support of sanctuary cities.
The choice of Becerra, a Mexican-American, would help fulfill Biden’s campaign pledge that race and diversity would be major factors in selecting his Cabinet.
The former 12-term congressman was a strong supporter of Obamacare, according to the Los Angeles Times.