The author writes GOPers have continually sought to restrict women's health care. Foul play: War on women is real

Suppose it’s the championship basketball game and one player is committing foul after foul. Each time, he denies he’s committed any offense.

Eventually, he fouls out. But even as he heads to the bench, he’s protesting that he did nothing wrong.


That’s what we’re seeing today from Republicans who claim there is no “war on women.” The Republican National Committee chairman likened it to a “ war on caterpillars.” The Senate Republican leader claims it’s all manufactured – even as female members of his caucus warn about the growing backlash against the GOP from women.

But whether it’s sports or politics, denials don’t change the facts. So let’s look at them.

House Republicans have introduced more than 30 bills that would restrict a woman’s reproductive health care. Those same Republicans, who decry an all-too-powerful government, have no problem deciding what health care is right for our daughters, or sisters or mothers.

Legislators in 39 states have introduced almost 500 measures that tell women what type of health care they can or cannot have. Republicans introduced roughly 90 percent of these measures.

Here in Congress, 116 Republicans in the House and 19 Republicans in the Senate are co-sponsors of “personhood” legislation, which would criminalize abortion with no exceptions for the mother’s life or health. The bill could also outlaw in vitro fertilization and many common forms of birth control. It could even bar doctors from providing life-saving care to women with dangerous ectopic pregnancies.

The Republican governor of Wisconsin recently signed a law passed by Republicans to repeal the state’s Equal Pay Enforcement Act, which protected women’s equality in the workplace.

While Republican Mitt Romney’s campaign had to “ get back” to a reporter last week on whether the candidate supported equal pay for equal work, President Barack Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act as his first bill. In the Senate, we passed that bill with 56 Democrats, while 36 Republicans voted no.

No one should forget last spring, when Republicans nearly shut down the federal government in their efforts to defund the nation’s family planning program and zero out Planned Parenthood, which provides health care to nearly 3 million women, men and teens. That’s the same Planned Parenthood that Romney now proudly says he plans to “get rid of.”

The Republicans’ attack on birth control – an issue settled decades ago – will never be forgotten as we watched a House panel on women’s health that was missing – you guessed it – women.

I was so proud of Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) and Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.) for leading a walkout of that hearing. I was also proud of the Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke for her bravery – standing up to be heard even as she was called some of the crudest words in the English language by the GOP’s leading outside voice, Rush Limbaugh.

Who can forget Virginia’s Republican legislators who felt they were more knowledgeable about a woman’s health than her doctor — by seeking to force women to undergo a transvaginal ultrasound? Or the law signed last week by Arizona’s Republican governor, stating that life begins two weeks before conception?

It doesn’t end there. Republicans in Congress blocked an international treaty – the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women – even though the only other nations refusing to ratify it are Iran, Sudan, South Sudan, Somalia, Palau and Tonga.

They also oppose increasing the minimum wage — when women make up about two-thirds of all workers now earning minimum wage or less. Not one Republican is a cosponsor of the Equal Rights Amendment.

Republicans voted against the Violence Against Women Act, which helps protect women from domestic violence, when the bill was in the Senate Judiciary Committee. They voted to repeal the health care law – including the part that says no more gender discrimination in the pricing of health insurance policies and the part that offers free preventive services like mammograms, STD screening, well-woman visits and birth control.

The facts are the facts. The Republicans have launched a war on women. Despite all the denials, women get it — and so do the men who care about them.

Just like in that basketball game, the Republicans are hearing the whistle blow. Too many fouls and you’re out.

Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) chairs the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee and the Senate Select Committee on Ethics.

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