i can only gather or guess that this is really an attempt to appeal to a narrow base that is against rights for women in america. on the issue of the rape and incest exemption, that is not there was no rape or incest exemption when this went through the committee process. and that was changed by the republicans i understand. sort of. sort of. by their own design on friday. after they resisted that for a long time, that s what led to congressman franks saying what he did about low incidence of rape-caused pregnancy. seeing the fight over this, particularly in wisconsin, where the opponents of the bill there were so eloquent in arguing about why you shouldn t assume that women are lying about being raped, you shouldn t make them assume that it s a lie unless it s reported to the police. that is the way this exemption is worded. do you plan to i plan to talk about it.
the incidence of rape causing pregnancy. congresswoman zoe lofgren joins us. fogood to be here, rachel. how did your republican colleagues on the committee respond when he said what he did? they didn t say very much and i think they quickly realized he had a todd akin moment and certainly the chairman shortly thereafter recessed the committee hearing. so i think so they could figure out what to do next. and, of course, as we know, he tried to walk back the statement after the recess, but, i mean, he said what he said and i thought it was an absurd statement and not true but really an indication of a real problem on the other side of the aisle when it comes to respecting women. congresswoman marsha blackburn is going to be handling this measure tomorrow for the floor vote instead of congressman franks.
you said his statement was astonishing to you. how did your republican colleagues on the committee respond when he said what he did? they didn t say very much and i think they quickly realized he had a todd akin moment and certainly the chairman shortly thereafter recessed the committee hearing. so i think so they could figure out what to do next. and, of course, as we know, he tried to walk back the statement after the recess, but i mean, he said what he said, and i thought it was an absurd statement and not true, but really an indication of a real problem on the other side of the aisle when it comes to respecting women. congresswoman marsha blackburn is going to be handling this measure tomorrow for the floor vote instead of congressman franks. they ve taken it out of his hands. republican aides have told nbc
news tonight that we should expect a good showing a republican women on the floor tomorrow arguing for the bill. they say that is by design. what do you think is going on there with trent franks sort of being having this taken away from him and them branding it the way that they are on the other side? well, there aren t very many women in the house. just 78 out of the 435. three-quarters of the women are democrats, and almost all of them are pro-choice. almost all of the republican women are anti-choice. so the fact that there is a republican woman arguing for this bill doesn t mean that the bill isn t anti-choice and disrespectful to the rights of american women. congresswoman blackburn has a long record of she s a co-sponsor of the bill and, you know, she has the same view as congressman franks as to whether this bill should be passed. and we ll have, i hope, a civilized discussion. but passage of the bill is wrong. it s wrong policy for the
that was change by the republicans i understand. sort of. by their own design on friday. after they resisted that for a long time. that s what led to congressman franks saying what he did about low incidence of rape-caused pregnancy. seeing the fight over this, particularly in wisconsin, where the opponents of the bill there were so eloquent in arguing about why you shouldn t assume that women are lying about being raped. you shouldn t make them assume that it s a lie unless it s reported to the police. that is the way this exemption is worded. we have every year 25,000