Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez slams Texas governor's 'deep ignorance' of 'biology 101'

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez slams Texas governor’s ‘deep ignorance’ on abortion law & ‘biology 101’

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has slammed Texas governor Greg Abbott’s “deep ignorance”, after he defended the state’s extreme abortion law, by incorrectly claiming that survivors of rape and incest would have time to get an abortion before the six-week mark, if they wished to do so.

When asked by a reporter why the state is forcing individuals to carry pregnancies to term in cases of rape and incest, the Texas governor said, “It doesn’t require that at all, obviously, it provides at least six weeks for a person to be able to get an abortion.”

Speaking to Anderson Cooper on CNN, Ocasio-Cortez rebuffed the governor’s comments, saying he evidently does not understand basic biology when it comes to a person’s menstrual cycle.

“I don’t know if he is familiar with a menstruating person’s body, in fact, I do know that he’s not familiar with a female or menstruating person’s body, because if he did, he would know that you don’t have six weeks,” Ocasio-Cortez said.

“I’m sorry we have to break down biology 101 on national television, but in case no one has informed him before in his life, six weeks pregnant means two weeks late for your period. And two weeks late on your period, for any person with a menstrual cycle, can happen if you’re stressed, if your diet changes, or for really no reason at all. So, you don’t have six weeks.”

Ocasio-Cortez speaking to Anderson Cooper on CNN.

Ocasio-Cortez also responded to Abbott’s comments about how the Texas government will “work tirelessly to make sure that we eliminate all rapists from the streets” by “aggressively going out and arresting them and prosecuting them”.

“The second part of this,” Ocasio-Cortez said, “where he talks about going after rapists and this language that he uses about getting rapists off the streets — the majority of people who are raped and who are sexually assaulted are assaulted by someone that they know.”

“These aren’t just predators that are walking around the streets at night. They are people’s uncles, they are teachers, they are family friends. And when something like that happens, it takes a very long time, first of all, for any victim to come forward.”

“And second of all, when a victim comes forward they don’t necessarily want to bring their case into the carceral system. They don’t want to retraumatise themselves by going to court, they don’t necessarily want to report a family friend to police precinct, let alone in the immediate aftermath of the trauma of a sexual assault.”

Ocasio-Cortez said this kind of misogynistic thinking is also the same culture that informed Texas’ abortion law, and to pretend otherwise is ignorant.

“This idea that we’re going to ‘end rape’ when this same type of, frankly, rape culture and this same type of misogynistic culture that informs this abortion law to begin with — those beliefs are held by the governor himself and the Texas State Legislature,” she said.

“Frankly, there are many people in power, as we know from the #MeToo movement, that commit sexual assault, that help their friends cover up these crimes. And some of them even serve in these same state legislatures that are voting on these anti-choice bills. It’s awful. And he speaks from such a place of deep ignorance. It’s not just ignorance. It’s ignorance that’s hurting people across this country.”

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