Courts
Pfaff criticizes “13-second” special session on abortion rights
No surprise in Madison. Republicans, who run the Wisconsin Senate, quickly shut down a special session on Wednesday, which Governor Tony Evers had called to deal with the state’s 173-year-old abortion law.
GOP lawmakers have routinely ended special sessions in only seconds, in defiance of Evers, saying that the governor calls the sessions for political gain.
State Sen. Brad Pfaff (D-Onalaska) said Wednesday during a news conference that Republicans ignoring the session sets Wisconsin back more than a century.
“It took the State Senate Republicans 13 seconds in order to gavel us in and gavel us out,” Pfaff said, after returning to La Crosse from Madison. “And, if the U.S. Supreme Court, as expected, rules next week on Roe v. Wade, it’ll set back reproductive health care a 173 years in this state.”
Abortion restrictions passed in 1849 in Wisconsin — the year after it became a state — will be enforced again if the 1973 Roe ruling is reversed by the Supreme Court. Pfaff supported the governor’s call to have the state’s abortion ban repealed.
Pfaff was accompanied by his wife Betty and 19-year-old daughter Lizzie, who is a college student in Madison. The Senator says Lizzie was born a few weeks premature, and he recalled talking with Betty about their two children, and whether they should have more kids.
“Our doctor told us, made it very clear to both of us, but especially to Betty, the challenge that it would be to have more children,” Pfaff said. “This isn’t just an easy black or white conversation.”
Pfaff added that calling a special session was the only method available to the governor to get lawmakers to repeal the 1849 abortion law before a Supreme Court ruling.
Richard Lepsch
June 23, 2022 at 6:19 am
One again our idiot governor calls a special secession at a great waste to the tax payers who are suffering enought because of the Biden regime of terror on the American people failed policies. Stolden elections have consequences usually bad even for the democrat fools who voted democrat, but you can sure bet the elitist democrat politicians are not suffering.
Heidi
June 23, 2022 at 6:48 am
13 seconds is still better than running out of state to avoid any discussion at all. And maybe 13 seconds is all it takes to shut a ludicrous discussion down.
R head
June 23, 2022 at 10:36 am
Looks like Evers and Pfaff take in the ass again life is good they properly need to take a ride in the short around Madison and cry about it!!!!!!!
Charlene K Joyce
June 23, 2022 at 2:34 pm
It’s a good thing that the special session was gaveled in and then out right away. We don’t need a law that says it’s okay to kill babies, in case anyone still doesn’t know what abortion really is.