October, 18 2013, 01:41pm EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Christina DiPasquale, 202.716.1953, Christina@fitzgibbonmedia.com
Molly Haigh, 907.750.1999, molly@fitzgibbonmedia.com
NARAL Pro-Choice America and RH Reality Check Call on Nebraska to Investigate Judge Bataillon
This week, NARAL Pro-Choice America and RH Reality Check urged their members to sign a petition demanding that Nebraska investigate Judge Peter Bataillon his outrageous statements in connection with his ruling that denying a young woman's request for an abortion because, in his words, it would "kill the child inside" her. The complaint, supported by the petition of members of NARAL Pro-Choice America and RH Reality Check, was filed at the Nebraska courthouse with the assistance of local family-practice attorney Sue Ellen Wall.
NEBRASKA
This week, NARAL Pro-Choice America and RH Reality Check urged their members to sign a petition demanding that Nebraska investigate Judge Peter Bataillon his outrageous statements in connection with his ruling that denying a young woman's request for an abortion because, in his words, it would "kill the child inside" her. The complaint, supported by the petition of members of NARAL Pro-Choice America and RH Reality Check, was filed at the Nebraska courthouse with the assistance of local family-practice attorney Sue Ellen Wall.
NARAL Pro-Choice America released the following statement from president Ilyse Hogue:
"When Judge Peter Bataillon told the young woman - in foster care because of an abusive home - seeking permission to have an abortion that doing so would 'kill the child inside' her, it was clear he had no intention of giving her desperate pleas a fair hearing. Holding a young woman's life in your hands requires an unimpeachable respect for constitutional rights and an impartial ability to judge the case on its merits. This judge threw both of those principles out the window when his statements from the bench proved his desire to put his own personal beliefs above the welfare of the minor.
"Peter Bataillon is entitled to help Operation Rescue activists -- whose slogan is 'If you believe abortion is murder, act like it's murder' -- beat criminal charges and he's entitled to serve as president of Omaha Right to Life. However, when Judge Bataillon dons his robes and steps up the bench, the citizens of Nebraska deserve a representative who holds his responsibility to the law of the land higher than his personal beliefs. Anything less is an affront to the judicial branch of our government.
"That's why NARAL Pro-Choice America activists around the country joined forces with a family practice attorney in Nebraska to file a complaint asking officials to sanction this judge for holding this young woman hostage to his ideology. Doing so would send a clear message that judges are not above the rule of law that makes our country great."
RH Reality Check released the following statement from Jodi Jacobson, President and Editor-in-Chief:
"This is judicial activism at its worst. Judge Batallion should be immediately removed from the bench for substituting his personal ideology for the impartial legal judgment he is bound by law and ethics to employ in a court of law. His decision to harm to a 16 year old girl, by literally forcing her to bear a pregnancy against her will in service of his own ideology and personal political affiliations, is unconscionable. Women cannot afford one more day of a 'judge' like Batallion. That is why we are joining a formal complaint calling on the Nebraska Supreme Court to remove him from the bench."
View the petition here: https://www.prochoiceamerica.org/get-involved/nejudge-srvy-naral.html.
For over 50 years, Reproductive Freedom for All (formerly NARAL Pro-Choice America) has fought to protect and advance reproductive freedom at the federal and state levels—including access to abortion care, birth control, pregnancy and post-partum care, and paid family leave—for everybody. Reproductive Freedom for All is powered by its more than 4 million members from every state and congressional district in the country, representing the 8 in 10 Americans who support legal abortion.
202.973.3000LATEST NEWS
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"So if you're wondering if Donald Trump is trying to kill your kids, yes, yes he is," said one critic.
Dec 13, 2024
Public health advocates, federal lawmakers, and other critics responded with alarm to The New York Timesreporting on Friday that an attorney helping Robert F. Kennedy Jr. select officials for the next Trump administration tried to get the U.S. regulators to revoke approval of the polio vaccine in 2022.
"The United States has been a leader in the global fight to eradicate polio, which is poised to become only the second disease in history to be eliminated from the face of the earth after smallpox," said Liza Barrie, Public Citizen's campaign director for global vaccines access. "Undermining polio vaccination efforts now risks reversing decades of progress and unraveling one of the greatest public health achievements of all time."
Public Citizen is among various organizations that have criticized President-elect Donald Trump's choice of Kennedy to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, with the watchdog's co-president, Robert Weissman, saying that "he shouldn't be allowed in the building... let alone be placed in charge of the nation's public health agency."
Although Kennedy's nomination requires Senate confirmation, he is already speaking with candidates for top health positions, with help from Aaron Siri, an attorney who represented RFK Jr. during his own presidential campaign, the Times reported. Siri also represents the Informed Consent Action Network (ICAN) in petitions asking the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) "to withdraw or suspend approval of vaccines not only for polio, but also for hepatitis B."
According to the newspaper:
Mr. Siri is also representing ICAN in petitioning the FDA to "pause distribution" of 13 other vaccines, including combination products that cover tetanus, diphtheria, polio, and hepatitis A, until their makers disclose details about aluminum, an ingredient researchers have associated with a small increase in asthma cases.
Mr. Siri declined to be interviewed, but said all of his petitions were filed on behalf of clients. Katie Miller, a spokeswoman for Mr. Kennedy, said Mr. Siri has been advising Mr. Kennedy but has not discussed his petitions with any of the health nominees. She added, "Mr. Kennedy has long said that he wants transparency in vaccines and to give people choice."
After the article was published, Siri called it a "typical NYT hit piece plainly written by those lacking basic reading and thinking skills," and posted a series of responses on social media. He wrote in part that "ICAN's petition to the FDA seeks to revoke a particular polio vaccine, IPOL, and only for infants and children and only until a proper trial is conducted, because IPOL was licensed in 1990 by Sanofi based on pediatric trials that, according to FDA, reviewed safety for only three days after injection."
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Ayman Chit, head of vaccines for North America at Sanofi, told the newspaper that development of the vaccine began in 1977, over 280 million people worldwide have received it, and there have been more than 300 studies, some with up to six months of follow-up.
Trump, who is less than six weeks out from returning to office, has sent mixed messages on vaccines in recent interviews.
Asked about RFK Jr.'s anti-vaccine record during a Time "Person of the Year" interview published Thursday, the president-elect said that "we're going to be able to do very serious testing" and certain vaccines could be made unavailable "if I think it's dangerous."
Trump toldNBC News last weekend: "Hey, look, I'm not against vaccines. The polio vaccine is the greatest thing. If somebody told me to get rid of the polio vaccine, they're going to have to work real hard to convince me. I think vaccines are—certain vaccines—are incredible. But maybe some aren't. And if they aren't, we have to find out."
Both comments generated concern—like the Friday reporting in the Times, which University of Alabama law professor and MSNBC columnist Joyce White Vance called "absolutely terrifying."
She was far from alone. HuffPost senior front page editor Philip Lewis said that "this is just so dangerous and ridiculous" while Zeteo founder Mehdi Hasan declared, "We are so—and I use this word advisedly—fucked."
Ryan Cooper, managing editor at The American Prospect, warned that "they want your kids dead."
Author and musician Mikel Jollett similarly said, "So if you're wondering if Donald Trump is trying to kill your kids, yes, yes he is."
Multiple critics altered Trump's campaign slogan to "Make Polio Great Again."
U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) responded with a video on social media:
Without naming anyone, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), a polio survivor, put out a lengthy statement on Friday.
"The polio vaccine has saved millions of lives and held out the promise of eradicating a terrible disease. Efforts to undermine public confidence in proven cures are not just uninformed—they're dangerous," he said in part. "Anyone seeking the Senate's consent to serve in the incoming administration would do well to steer clear of even the appearance of association with such efforts."
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"It's a big slap in the face for us once again," Amanda Lorah—who was sentenced by Conahan to five years of juvenile detention over a high school fight—toldWBRE.
Sandy Fonzo, whose son killed himself after being sentenced to juvenile detention, said in a statement: "I am shocked and I am hurt. Conahan's actions destroyed families, including mine, and my son's death is a tragic reminder of the consequences of his abuse of power."
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Others have called on Biden—who earlier this month pardoned his son Hunter Biden after promising he wouldn't—to grant clemency to people including Indigenous activist Leonard Peltier and environmental lawyer Steven Donziger.
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As Israel continues to decimate the Gaza Strip with American weapons, 77 Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives this week demanded that the Biden administration "provide a full assessment of the status of Israel's compliance with all relevant U.S. policies and laws, including National Security Memorandum 20 (NSM-20) and Section 620I of the Foreign Assistance Act."
Reps. Jason Crow (D-Colo.), Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.), and Chrissy Houlahan (D-Pa.) spearheaded the Thursday letter to Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, with less than six weeks left in President Joe Biden's term.
Since Biden issued NSM-20 in February, his administration has repeatedly accepted the Israel government's assurances about the use of U.S. weapons, despite reports from journalists and human rights groups about how they have helped Israeli forces slaughter at least 44,875 Palestinians and injure another 106,454 people in the besieged enclave over the past 14 months.
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House Democrats' letter begins by declaring support for "Israel's right to self-defense," denouncing the Hamas-led October 2023 attack, and endorsing the Biden administration's efforts "to broker a bilateral cease-fire that includes the release of hostages," noting the deal recently negotiated for the Israeli government and the Lebanese group Hezbollah.
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