President Joe Biden’s Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen suggested Tuesday to a black senator raised by a single mother that black women need abortions in order to succeed.
“What we are talking about is whether or not women will have the ability to regulate their reproductive situation in ways that will enable them to plan lives that are fulfilling and satisfying for them,” Yellen said Tuesday.
The Biden official said that one aspect of a satisfying life is to “feel that you have the financial resources to raise a child, that the children you bring into the world are wanted, and that you have the ability to take care of them.”
“In many cases,” she continued, “abortions are teenage women, particularly low income, and often black, who aren’t in a position to be able to care for children, have unexpected pregnancies, and it deprives them of the ability, often, to continue their education to later participate in the workforce.”
Senator Tim Scott (R-SC) finally interrupted Yellen to tell her, “I’ll just simply say that, as a guy raised by a black woman in abject poverty, I am thankful to be here as a United States senator.”
And here's Yellen explaining to @SenatorTimScott, the black son of a single mother who grew up in poverty, that it's especially important for black women to have abortion access because they are often poor.
Scott responds powerfully: "I am thankful to be here as a U.S. Senator" pic.twitter.com/Ab3Miw7gfW
— Dylan Housman (@Dylan_Housman) May 10, 2022
The exchange comes as the nation grapples with news that Roe v. Wade may be soon overturned following the leak of a draft Supreme Court opinion last week.
While pro-abortion activists often make the argument that abortion is a vital stepping stone for minority and impoverished women, pro-life activists argue that it is insulting to suggest that black women need to abort their babies in order to succeed.
“I think to myself, had it not been for her sacrifice, her perseverance, her resilience, I would not be where I am today,” Scott said last year of his mother, who raised her two sons on her own while she worked as a nurse’s assistant. “For me, there has been no better witness, no more powerful force than Frances Scott.”
“I know what you had inside of you and what you were capable of doing, so, therefore, I couldn’t give up,” the senator’s mother told him.