By Juan Montoya
If it was up to Texas State Senator Eddie Lucio no woman in Texas - or in the United States for that matter - would have a choice to terminate a pregnancy regardless of whether it was the result of incest or rape.
Lucio, who has bucked the Democratic Party and supported Republican-championed bills as long as anyone can remember, just recently helped pass a measure (SB 22) that would prohibit state and local governments from partnering with agencies that perform abortions, even if they contract for services not related to the procedure.The bill prevents municipalities from contracting with Planned Parenthood to address public health crises like Zika, HIV and STD outbreaks. State Sen. Donna Campbell, who sponsored the bill, shot down an amendment that would create an exception for these cases and Lucio happily went along with her.
That was just one of a long list of bills supported by Lucio and some of the South Texas legislative delegation which has joined theri Republican colleagues to steadily chip away at the Supreme Court guaranteed right of a woman to decide what she wants to do with her body.
Yvonne Gutierrez, executive director for Planned
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Parenthood Texas Votes told a group of local supporters of PP services Friday at the Half Moon Saloon that she also worried that the language of SB 22, which would limit “transactions” between the government and abortion providers, and was too broad.
Campbell, a New Braunfels Republican, singled out one key target during the bill's hearing: Planned Parenthood’s $1-per-year rental agreement with the city of Austin.
Sen. Bill 22 passed in the initial vote 20 to 11 with Democrat Lucio bucking his party to support the bill.
Lucio is the author of another anti-abortion bill, which forces abortion providers to physically hand a controversial pamphlet detailing alternatives to abortion to women seeking the procedure. In a final vote, the Senate passed the bill 20 to 11, with Lucio again supporting the measure.
“Planned Parenthood is an important part of providing care for many Texas women and their facilities offer services that are essential to maintaining their health,” he said. “If we want to — and I believe all of us want to prevent abortions — the issue should be that we should prevent unwanted and unplanned pregnancies.”
Planned Parenthood of South Texas has had 33,918 visits to their clinics in 2017, and only 5 percent were related to abortion services, according to Sen. Menendez.
Present at the PP legislative update in Brownsville was Sara Stapleton, who has announced that she will challenge Lucio for his senate seat next year.
It's funny how Lucio has regressed in his view of women's rights. In the 1970s, when Ray Ramon was Cameron County Judge, one of the services that he brought to local residents was Planned Parenthood health services and for women. Before, county officials were content to neglect health care and reproductive rights of local women and leave it up to the churches to provide charity and health care.
Now he has come full circle and is only too happy to restrict access to those services based on his archaic views on women's health issues.