By Maria V. Gallagher, Legislative/PAC Director, Pennsylvania Pro-Life Federation
Just a little while after condemning a Texas court ruling trying to protect women and their babies from the dangerous abortion pill, U.S. Senator Bob Casey announced he is running for re-election.
The Pennsylvania Democrat has a dismal voting record, voting pro-life only 17 percent of the time, according to the latest National Right to Life legislative scorecard.
Over the years, Casey has become increasingly radical on the abortion issue. While national public opinion polls have consistently shown that most people oppose most abortions, the Senator has run in the opposite direction.
His frightening evolution on the issue of the cause of life is particularly alarming to those who remember his courageous and heroic father, the late Governor Robert Casey, Sr. The elder Robert Casey consistently stood up to this party in defending the right to life. He signed into law the time-tested Abortion Control Act, which has saved countless lives through parental consent, informed consent, a 24-hour waiting period, and protections against late-term abortions.
In his book, Fighting for Life, Robert Casey, Sr. recalled the 1992 U.S. Supreme Court case, Planned Parenthood v. Casey, which was fought over the Abortion Control Act. He remembered seeing dozens of TV cameras and mikes and wondering what he would say.
“I tried to lay aside all the familiar arguments in the debate and ask the one question I believed to be at the heart of the issue: ‘In this debate, who speaks for the child? Today I’ve come here to say that Pennsylvania speaks for the child.”
Sadly, Senator Bob Casey no longer speaks for the child. With more than 33,000 abortions occurring in Pennsylvania in a given year, his silence on the subject of the preborn child is deafening.