During last night’s failed vote to invoke cloture on the Women’s Health Protection Act, only one Democrat — West Virginia senator Joe Manchin — voted against the legislation. The bill, which passed the House last fall with the support of all but one Democrat, would “codify” Roe v. Wade, legislate a supposed fundamental right to abortion, and nullify state pro-life laws.
While it’s little surprise that nearly every Democrat backed the legislation, one particular Democrat stands out for his support of the bill: Bob Casey Jr. of Pennsylvania.
Casey is, after all, one of that not-so-rare breed, the Catholic Democrat, who calls himself personally “pro-life” while voting for legislation that expands access to abortion. He told Politico in 2018, when he was last up for reelection, that it’s no falsehood to call him pro-life, insisting that he opposes Roe v. Wade but considers it “highly unlikely” that the decision could ever be overturned, adding:
I think it’s clear to most people that the description of pro-life Democrat is accurate. I’ve been very consistent. What it means is I try to support policies that help women and children both before and after birth. Part of that is making sure you are honest about differences but also at the same time trying to focus on ways to reduce both the number of abortions and the number of unwanted pregnancies, and I think my record reflects that.
The trouble for Casey is that his record doesn’t reflect that at all. For one thing, as Politico noted in 2018, Casey has voted with Planned Parenthood 75 percent of the time since 2011 and with NARAL Pro-Choice America 100 percent of the time in 2016 and 2017.
Meanwhile, voting for the WHPA — which not only affirms Roe but explicitly nullifies existing pro-life laws across the country and forbids new ones from taking effect — does nothing to reduce either the number of abortions or the number of “unwanted” pregnancies. No one who wishes to portray himself as “pro-life” can realistically back a bill so extreme.
Meanwhile, how can Casey continue to claim that he opposes Roe after having voted for a bill that codifies the ruling in the event that it’s ever weakened or walked back? It’s one thing to assume Roe is here to stay, though Casey’s assessment on that point seems to have been wrong. It’s another to affirmatively support its entrenchment through the legislature.
In his statement ahead of the WHPA cloture vote, Casey attempted to draw a distinction between voting in favor of the bill and voting in favor of proceeding to debate on the bill, which he claims is all he was doing. But given that Democrats knew they had nowhere near the 60 votes needed to proceed to debate, the vote on cloture was obviously a proxy vote on the content of the legislation, a matter on which Casey attempted to demur. His statement reiterated his claim that he has “long worked to reduce the number of unintended pregnancies and abortions,” but a vote for WHPA does no such thing.
Casey’s father, the late Pennsylvania governor and truly pro-life Democrat Bob Casey Sr. said it best in 1992, shortly before he was prevented from speaking at the Democratic National Convention because of his pro-life stance: “By embracing abortion, the Democratic Party is abandoning the principle that made it great: its basic commitment to protecting the weakest and most vulnerable members of the human family.”