Ivf in Vitro Fertil
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Fox News host misleads on Trump, the GOP, and IVF
No, Fox News, Donald Trump is not a “leading advocate” of IVF
Special ProgramsAbortion Rights & Reproductive Health
Written by Helena Hind
Published 09/12/24 MMA
Following Donald Trump’s performance in the September 10 presidential debate — which observers seem to agree he lost — a Fox News host implausibly claimed that Trump is a “leading advocate” of in vitro fertilization, despite his party’s long-standing support for policies that would put the treatment in the crosshairs.
On the September 11 edition of The Story with Martha MacCallum, Fox host Howard Kurtz laid into ABC’s debate moderators for supposedly failing to fact-check Vice President Kamala Harris’ claim that families have been denied IVF treatments since the 2022 Dobbs decision threw reproductive care into chaos.
The GOP’s push for “fetal personhood” laws has indeed imperiled access to IVF — most notably in February, when the Alabama Supreme court ruled that frozen embryos are legally children, causing some providers to halt treatments and prompting loud backlash.
:{Video
CitationFrom the September 11, 2024, edition of Fox News' The Story with Martha MacCallum
Kurtz retorted, “Actually, Trump has been a leading advocate of IVF treatments, even saying they should be free.”
Fox News has buried anti-IVF stories unfavorable to Republicans before. In June, the pro-Trump network aired only one segment about the Southern Baptist Convention’s passage of a resolution stating that “embryos are human beings from the moment of fertilization.” Contributor Kellyanne Conway claimed the vote failed to prove that Republicans want IVF on the chopping block — right before Senate Republicans voted to kill a bill that would have guaranteed IVF access nationwide.
Several Project 2025 partner organizations — including the Heritage Foundation, which called the Alabama Supreme Court ruling an “unqualified victory” even after Trump tried to disavow it — have also publicly criticized IVF, with some opponents likening the procedure to eugenics.
Additionally, after the GOP’s& Trump-approved 2024 platform was revealed in July, Project 2025 partners and anti-abortion groups claimed that the platform’s language signals support for fetal personhood, threatening both IVF and hormonal birth control.
In August, Trump tried to further distance himself from the right-wing anti-IVF crusade by claiming he would mandate free IVF coverage if reelected, which many of his strongest supporters in Congress publicly denounced, in part due to ideology and in part due to costs.
Washington Post columnist Catherine Rampell recently pointed out how transparently ridiculous Trump's approach is:
In response to all this bad PR, Trump did what he often does: He made a promise he has no intention of carrying out. If reelected, he pledged, he’d “mandate” fertility-care coverage for all Americans.
It can be futile to spend more time analyzing a Trump “proposal” than Trump himself has spent thinking about it. He offered no eligibility criteria, no budget score, none of the supportive analysis a political campaign would normally be expected to release. Trump couldn’t even identify who would provide this (very expensive) coverage. Would it be the government or private insurers under a mandate? Yeah, sure, one of those options, he said.
Even so, we can assess how Trump’s proclamation fits in with his prior record as president. The answer: It doesn’t.
An insurance mandate for fertility coverage would effectively be an expansion of essential health benefits. These are the categories of services, set nationwide by Obamacare, that insurance plans are legally mandated to cover, such as prescription drugs, ambulatory services, maternity care and substance-abuse treatment.
But as president, Trump repeatedly tried to weaken or eliminate the very existence of such mandates.
A September 12 Politico piece explores the dynamic; as it notes, Trump's plan would require congressional approval. And even then, it's unclear if Trump-stacked courts would allow it to proceed. One anti-IVF opponent invoked the legal battles of the right against contraception, telling Politico, "You’re going to require faith-based organizations to carry insurance that covers IVF against their conscience?”
Trump’s supposed support of guaranteeing access to IVF is hard to take at face value when his campaign promotes the support of pundits like Daily Wire host Michael Knowles, who has called IVF a “crime,” “evil,” and “immoral,” and suggested that providers be prosecuted.
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Alabama Supreme Court chief justice spreads Christian nationalist rhetoric on QAnon conspiracy theorist's show
Chief Justice Tom Parker’s recent concurring opinion in a case granting rights to embryos drew criticism for invoking religious language
Special PROGRAMSABORTION RIGHTS & REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH
WRITTEN BY PAYTON ARMSTRONG
:{PUBLISHED 02/21/24
During a recent interview on the program of self-proclaimed “prophet” and QAnon conspiracy theorist Johnny Enlow, Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Tom Parker indicated that he is a proponent of the “Seven Mountain Mandate,” a theological approach that calls on Christians to impose fundamentalist values on all aspects of American life.
Enlow is a pro-Trump “prophet” and leading proponent of the “Seven Mountain Mandate,” a “quasi-biblical blueprint for theocracy” that asserts that Christians must impose fundamentalist values on American society by conquering the “seven mountains” of cultural influence in U.S. life: government, education, media, religion, family, business, and entertainment.
Enlow has also repeatedly pushed the QAnon conspiracy theory, sometimes even connecting it to the Seven Mountain Mandate. Per Right Wing Watch, Enlow has claimed that world leaders are “satanic” pedophiles who “steal blood” and “do sacrifices” and that “there is presently no real democracy on the planet” because over 90 percent of world leaders are involved in pedophilia and are being blackmailed.
On February 16, the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos are people, with the same rights as living children, and that a person can be held liable for destroying them, imperiling in vitro fertilization treatment in the state. In a concurring opinion, Parker quoted the Bible, suggested that Alabama had adopted a “theologically based view of the sanctity of life,” and said that “human life cannot be wrongfully destroyed without incurring the wrath of a holy God.”
In the interview on Enlow’s program — which was uploaded the same day as the ruling was issued — Parker claimed that “God created government” and said it’s “heartbreaking” that “we have let it go into the possession of others.” Parker then invoked the Seven Mountain Mandate, saying, “And that's why he is calling and equipping people to step back into these mountains right now.”
Parker suggested a familiarity with Enlow’s work, telling him, “As you've emphasized in the past, we've abandoned those Seven Mountains and they've been occupied by the opposite side.”
Video file
CitationFrom the February 16, 2024, edition of Restore Seven's Someone You Should Know
Parker discussed his “call” to what Enlow called the “mountain of government,” and later told Enlow that he appreciates what he’s done by “giving us the overview and the vision that allows us to really contemplate what God is calling each of us to for our role on those Seven Mountains.”
Enlow praised Parker, telling him he’s “in such a key place that we don't want to have any conversations that hurt you in any kind of way, but we appreciate who you are, who you are in the kingdom.”
Parker also claimed that God “is equipping me with something for the very specific situation that I’m facing,” and responded affirmatively when Enlow asked if “the holy spirit is there” when he’s “arbitrating a session” and performing his job as chief justice.
Parker’s ties to extreme right-wing Christian and “prophetic” media figures extends beyond the interview with Enlow.
Last year, Christian nationalist media figure Sean Feucht said Parker had invited him into the court’s chambers for a worship session. Parker also joined a prayer call in March 2023 with supposed prophets and apostles, and he prayed that “there will be a growing hunger in the judges of Alabama, and around the nation for more of God. And that they will be receptive to his moves toward restoration of the judges, so that they can play their forecast role in revival in this nation.”
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