U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert appeared on Ross Kaminsky’s radio program last Thursday and claimed the federal government should “get the heck out of” legislating abortion access. Boebert’s remarks were in response to Kaminsky asking Boebert for her thoughts on U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham’s (R-SC) proposed 15-week abortion ban.
“I think the courts got it right to send it back to the state, get the federal government out of this,” said Boebert. “Of course, I would love anything that protects life, that protects those individuals in the womb, but I think the court’s got this right to send it back to the states and let the voters decide. I’m absolutely pro-life. I have a 100% pro-life voting scorecard voting record, and this is something that I’m very passionate about, as a mother of four boys. You know, it’s sad and interesting — you look at the difference between rural and urban communities, and unfortunately, in urban communities, we see pretty much the same rate of teen pregnancies, but much higher abortion rates. In rural communities, we see a lot of teen pregnancies. But that teen motherhood is up dramatically and those abortion rates are down because there’s just a value of life there that interested.”
Boebert’s comments on the rural/urban divide in abortion access, which in addition to being a common racist dog whistle used by anti-abortion activists who compare abortion to slavery and refer to abortion as a “Black genocide,” speaks more to the disparity in access to abortion for rural, poor, or minority patients than to a moral or values difference between the communities.
“I think the courts got it right,” said Boebert, of the Supreme Court’s recent Dobbs decision. “I think the federal government should get the heck out of this. I want to limit federal government. You know, we have a lot of lawmakers who are just trying to create as many laws as possible while they’re up here. We’re absolutely over regulated. At the same time, I want to defend life. That is the most precious thing that we have and that is the first thing that is listed in the Bill of Rights. We have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. So I’ll look at his bill when it comes to the House and see where we are with that.”
The right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness is described in the Declaration of Independence, not the Bill of Rights.
Boebert’s remarks echo the actions of many Republicans this election cycle attempting to walk back or erase mentions on their websites of their radical anti-abortion stances. A July 1 press release from Boebert’s office offers more insight into her position than her remarks to Kaminsky reveal.
“The radical left believes in abortion at all costs,” said Boebert. “AOC, Sen. Warren, and the rest of the Genocide Squad will not rest until every baby in America is at risk. Democrats want Americans to visit the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, see the wonders of God’s creation, and then after a day of hiking stop by an abortion mill and kill their baby. It is beyond disgusting and absurd that these Leftists want to build abortion facilities on America’s public lands in states where abortion is now restricted. America’s unborn sons and daughters, who are our future, should be protected.”
Boebert also discussed a recent Denver Post article that described her as a “Christian nationalist” following her appearance at Andrew Wommack’s Truth and Liberty Conference in Woodland Park earlier this month.
“I do not need a qualifier for my faith,” said Boebert. “I am a Christian. I am an American. I am a conservative. I am a mother. I am a lot of things, but to to go on this attack of ‘Christian nationalists’ and have that define whatever they mean, whether it’s a threat to democracy or whatever they want to define it as on this day, I don’t need that. I am a Christian and my faith does not need a qualifier.”
The other speakers at Wommack’s event included Lance Wallnau, who has popularized the concept of the “Seven Mountain Mandate,” which posits that all seven spheres of influence in secular society should be under the control of the Christian church, David Barton, the faux-historian who pushes the idea that the United States was founded to be a Christian nation, the 1797 Treaty of Tripoli be damned, and anti-abortion activist Janet Porter Folger, who pioneered the concept of “heartbeat bills.”
“When talking about the separation of church and state, I don’t want a theocracy,” Boebert told Kaminsky. “I don’t want to institute a national religion. A national church. A state church. That’s the last thing that I would want to have happen.What I don’t like is when people are in positions and they start talking about their faith, that somehow there’s this big wall and they say, ‘Oh, separation of church and state. You can’t talk about that.’ Well, we open Congress every session day with a prayer. We honor God. Here we are in honor of the Christian Judeo values that our country was founded on. To have churches who are not able to talk about politicians, elected officials, the same elected officials who can come in and shut their churches down and refuse the First Amendment right, to infringe that First Amendment right of assembly and freedom of religion is absolutely wrong.”
