“Decades of attacks on women’s health can’t be erased by a last-minute ploy”
Phoenix, AZ – After suffering mounting criticism from women across Arizona for his sustained support for Donald Trump — who was caught on camera condoning sexual assault — John McCain is attempting to minimize his abhorrent record on women’s health. McCain is facing a tight reelection against Ann Kirkpatrick. Planned Parenthood Advocates of Arizona today issued a harsh rebuke of McCain’s recent political pander: a newly formed group “Women for McCain.”
McCain’s record includes having voted against at least 55 pieces of women’s health legislation, despite health care access in Arizona being among the worst in the country.
Quote from Bryan Howard, President, Planned Parenthood Advocates of Arizona
“John McCain can’t airbrush his year-long support of Donald Trump and the Presidential candidate’s disgusting behavior towards women. Nor can McCain airbrush his own record of voting repeatedly against women’s health and safety. John McCain has voted to defund Planned Parenthood at least eight times, pushed extreme bills that use religion as a reason to allow employers to deny women health care coverage, and voted over and over again to make it harder for women to obtain safe, legal abortions.
“Women can’t afford Trump’s abhorrent behavior towards women nor a Senator who let Trump’s behavior slide for over a year. This year at the ballot box women will hold John McCain accountable for working against Arizona’s women.”
McCain has stood resolutely against allowing women to make their own health care decisions, and thereby stands in the way of women’s ability to gain education, progress in jobs, and provide for their families.
In 2015, Sen. McCain worked to advance an extreme proposal to cut off federal funds that enable Planned Parenthood Arizona health centers to provide life-saving cancer screenings, birth control, and sexually transmitted infection testing and treatment. In 2014 he voted to prevent the Senate from considering whether to prevent employers from excluding birth control from workplace health insurance plans. He has even voted against teen pregnancy prevention efforts.
In July of this year, the Planned Parenthood Action Fund (PPAF) endorsed Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick in her challenge to Sen. McCain’s decades-stale seat in the Senate. At the time, Planned Parenthood Action Fund President Cecile Richards stated,“Planned Parenthood Action Fund is proud to endorse Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick for U.S. Senate. It’s time that all Arizona women had someone like Ann in their corner, standing strong for reproductive freedom. Arizonans are tired of John McCain’s stunning disregard for women’s health, having voted to block patients from care at Planned Parenthood six times and voted against nearly every single women’s health initiative for over two decades. As McCain sounds more out of touch — and more like Donald Trump — every day, Arizona women are seeing right through his agenda to block patients from getting care at Planned Parenthood, let a woman’s boss deny her access to birth control, and sacrifice lifesaving Zika relief in order to target Planned Parenthood.”
Voters trust the Planned Parenthood Action Fund and Planned Parenthood Advocates of Arizona because the groups fight to ensure Arizonans’ access to up-to-date sexual and reproductive health care will never be interrupted, despite efforts by out-of-touch politicians like John McCain.
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Planned Parenthood‘s advocacy and political arm in Arizona, Planned Parenthood Advocates of Arizona (PPAA), is the state’s largest nonpartisan advocacy organization dedicated to protecting access to women’s health care. PPAA is fighting for every woman’s freedom and right to make reproductive choices, enjoy sexual health and wellbeing, and build healthy, strong families. advocatesaz.org
Contact: Tayler Tucker, 602-263-4225, media@ppaz.org