Scott Walker’s war on Wisconsin’s women

Late last week, Republican Gov. Scott Walker (pictured, right) signed into law a series of bills with very little fanfare, with his office announcing Gov. Walker had signed the bills into law via a Friday press release. No doubt the press release was issued on a Friday in hopes the news would be quickly forgotten over the holiday weekend, but there’s been no shortage of folks who’ve noticed that some of the bills Gov. Walker signed last week make it clear he’s declared war on Wisconsin’s women.

Among the bills Gov. Walker signed into law was SB 202, which repealed the 2009 Equal Pay Enforcement Act. The 2009 Equal Pay Enforcement Act was meant to deter employers from discriminating against certain groups by giving workers more avenues via which to press charges. Contained in that bill were provision that allowed individuals to plead their cases in the less costly, more accessible state circuit court system, rather than just in federal court.

Last Thursday afternoon Gov. Walker also quietly signed SB 306 into law without any pomp and circumstance. According to the Wisconsin Medical Society, SB 306 would not only infringe on the physician-patient relationship, but would expose physicians who fail to follow the bill exactly to a Class I felony charge. SB 306 mandates that physicians speak privately with a woman seeking an abortion to determine whether she had been “coerced” and to conduct an exam before providing abortion-inducing drugs, which they then must do in person. It also requires that doctors consult women face-to-face and not by video conference, which opponents of the bill had argued had been used in rural areas in other states but has not been used in Wisconsin.

What’s more, Gov. Walker also quietly signed SB 237 into law. SB 237 repeals the Healthy Youth Act, which had mandated sex-ed curriculum in schools, opening the door for school districts to teach ineffective “abstinence only” policies.

In response to Gov. Walker having made it clear he doesn’t stand on the side of Wisconsin’s women, Democratic State Rep. Chris Sinicki and 16 of her Democratic colleagues issued a statement expressing their disapproval of Gov. Walker’s war on Wisconsin’s women.

“By signing these bills into law, Gov. Walker has opened up another front in the Republican war on women. The governor has made it clear that he believes women do not deserve equal pay for equal work, that women cannot be trusted to make their own health care decisions and that the government should be dictating the curriculum to local school districts.

“This extreme Republican agenda is reversing important advances we have made on women’s health care and workplace equality. And the fact that Gov. Walker chose to sign these bills in private, behind closed doors and right before a holiday weekend, is especially shameful.”

To be honest, I’m shocked it took Scott Walker as long as it did to get around to opening up a front in the Republican Party’s war on women here in Wisconsin, but I’m not shocked that Gov. Walker has made it clear that while he’s no fan of government mandates when it comes to providing health insurance coverage to all Wisconsinites, he’s most certainly a fan of government mandates when it comes to what’s going in a woman’s uterus.

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2 thoughts on “Scott Walker’s war on Wisconsin’s women

  1. “Contained in that bill were provision that allowed individuals to plead their cases in the less costly, more accessible state circuit court system, rather than just in federal court.”

    Any data on that?

    It’s been my experience that the opposite is true. The Federal Courts are much more efficient and a less costly venue for litigation. For example, in Milwaukee county its not uncommon to have a 2 to 3 year calendar in a civil case. Federal Courts usually run half that time.

  2. Women are really much more likely to be coerced into getting pregnant than getting an abortion. Of course you would only know this is you actually talked with women in an honest and open way — not making them feel like they might get the slut tag lobbed at them anytime they spoke up. Plus, we sure wouldn’t want to start those future wives off with a good education about sex and reproduction because that might just make them feel like they, and not their future husbands, could control their bodies and minds……while they’re at it they might as well reinforce all this male dominance with good old fashioned monetary control. Take women’s choices, restrict their education and keep them financially dependent on men – what next? Mandatory corsets and stiletto heels for all women under 30?

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