Source: United States Senator for Connecticut – Chris Murphy
May 08, 2022
WASHINGTON–U.S. Senator Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) on Sunday joined Fox News Sunday with Bret Baier to discuss the Supreme Court’s draft opinion to overturn Roe v. Wade, Republican attacks on LGTBQ kids, and student loan debt.
On Republicans’ focus on the leak instead of the substance of the SCOTUS decision, Murphy said: “Well, I don’t like the way that this decision came out. But the outrage here should be about what’s going to happen to women and families in this country. The fact that women and doctors are going to be sent to jail immediately when this opinion becomes a reality if in the states with trigger laws all of a sudden, abortion under any circumstances, even under rape and incest, becomes illegal and criminalized. So I don’t love how the decision ultimately was made public and I hope we figure out what happened, but I think it’s interesting that many of my Republican friends are putting their focus on the process here because they really don’t want to talk about the fact that abortion becoming criminalized is something that a sort of small minority of the country supports.”
On the Senate’s upcoming vote to codify Roe v. Wade into law next week and Republicans’ ultimate goal of a nationwide abortion ban, Murphy said: “I think it’s important that we put senators on record, because let’s be clear, Lindsey says this is about the decisions being made at the state level – that’s not what’s going to happen here. If Republicans get control of the House and the Senate and the White House, which certainly could happen in the next three years, they are absolutely going to pass a national ban on abortion that will affect every single family, every single woman in this country. And so it’s important right now that we get every senator on the record. Do you support a woman’s right to make decisions over their own body or do you think that the government should be in charge? Because this is soon not going to be about state legislatures, pretty soon this is going to be an effort to pass a federal ban everywhere on abortions in this country.”
On the hateful, divisive attacks Republicans have waged against LGBTQ kids, Murphy said: “I mean, I am very concerned about sort of very quick, hateful, divisive turn that the Republican Party has taken. This effort in Florida to target gay kids in schools I just think is mean spirited and something that I had not seen from the Republican Party when I first started out in politics 20 years ago.
Murphy continued: “You don’t think that those kids don’t take a message from a ban on the discussion of their identity suggests that they are not worthy of existence in that school? Half of trans kids in this country have contemplated suicide, and that’s because of the effort to bully them for their identity by adults in this country. So I absolutely do think that there’s a message sent to these kids when you suggest that a conversation about their identify is somehow threatening the education of kids in our schools.”
On student loan forgiveness and the need for higher education accountability, Murphy said, “I’m one of the few members of the Senate that still has student debt. I don’t need my debt forgiven. I also think that this focus on debt excuses the colleges for this dramatic increase in tuition. I sometimes think that our party spends a little bit too much time talking about the debt, and not enough time talking about the cost of the degree, because that’s where the real problem is. We’re going to be in a perpetual cycle of having to forgive debt if college continues to spiral upwards to $100,000 a year, so I think the limited debt forgiveness proposal is legal. I would support it, but I think it is a mistake to put all our eggs in that basket.”
Click here to view the entirety of Murphy’s interview.
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