Virginia's Attorney General Cuccinelli Attacks Womens Rights. Are Transgender, Bisexuals, Lesbians & Gay Men Next?

Tell Gov. McDonnell not to allow his Board of Health to shut down abortion providers. We knew this was coming. Ken Cuccinelli has launched his first attack on reproductive choice as attorney general! On a week when the rest of us are commemorating the 90th anniversary of the 19th Amendment and women’s suffrage in the United States, Virginia’s Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli is trying to take rights away from the women of the Commonwealth. We learned yesterday that Attorney General Cuccinelli has issued a legal opinion, at the request of state Senator Ralph Smith, saying that Virginia’s Board of Health should have broad authority to impose strict new regulations on abortion providers. Abortion providers in Virginia are already regulated and held to high state and federal standards, and legal abortion is among the safest medical procedures in the United States. This new policy would single out abortion clinics and burden them with onerous and unnecessary restrictions that could force them to close their doors to women. This move has nothing to do with upholding the law or protecting women’s health, and everything to do with politics. Attorney General Cuccinelli is trying to accomplish through the brute force of executive power what he couldn't accomplish through the democratic process in his time as a state senator – restricting women’s access to reproductive-health care by shutting down abortion providers. These targeted regulations of abortion providers (TRAP) laws have nothing to do with safety and have everything to do with ideology. So what does this mean for women in Virginia? Virginia currently has 21 abortion providers but if the Board of Health chooses to follow this opinion and forces clinics to jump through unnecessary regulatory hoops in order to stay open, 17 of those could be forced to stop providing abortion services or shut down altogether. This comes at a time when 86 percent of Virginia counties already do not have an abortion provider!  Abortion providers in Virginia are already regulated in the same way as other medical facilities that provide outpatient procedures. This opinion is clearly a solution in search of a problem, and a blatant attempt to chip away at women’s ability to access reproductive-health care.   He has gone too far. Help us stand up to Attorney General Cuccinelli and tell him to stop using his office as a platform to restrict the rights of Virginia’s women by calling his office today at (804) 786-2071. You can also email Governor McDonnell and tell him not to allow his Board of Health to issue restrictions on abortion providers that the legislature has refused to approve for the past eight years. For Choice, Tarina Keene Executive Director