In abortion bill veto, an issue for 2017 campaigns

Feb. 22--Gov. Terry McAuliffe vetoed legislation Tuesday meant to defund Planned Parenthood, an outcome long promised and never in doubt but with political ramifications for the state's coming gubernatorial election.

McAuliffe, a Democrat, promised throughout his successful 2013 campaign to be "a brick wall" for women's reproductive rights. He's vetoed a number of abortion-related bills during his three-plus years in office, as well as rolled back Board of Health regulations on clinics, which passed under his predecessor.

With a Republican majority likely to keep hold of the General Assembly in 2017, just which party controls the governor's mansion will make a big difference on some of the most divisive issues that come before the legislature, including abortion, gun control and LGBTQ issues.

McAuliffe has vetoed more than 70 bills passed by the GOP's legislative majority, with more to come as this session wraps up this week. Republicans don't have the numbers they need to overturn and that's guaranteed to hold after the 2017 elections, since Senate seats won't be up until 2019.

McAuliffe held Tuesday's veto ceremony outside of the governor's mansion, and he said the symbolism should be clear.

"The governor's mansion is the brick wall," he said.

House Bill 2264 dealt with relatively little state money: Less than $30,000 destined for Planned Parenthood's five centers around the state. But the defunding also could have affected federal eligibility, which would have been "unspeakably devastating," Virginia League for Planned Parenthood President and CEO Paulette McElwain said.

Bill supporters said they want that money spread around to health clinics that don't offer or counsel abortions. Planned Parenthood supporters focused on the group's other roles Tuesday, including the availability of subsidized birth control.

Three women from Richmond spoke before the governor vetoed this bill, including one who said she works with refugees and knows two women who were able to attend community college because of this service.

"If it wasn't for the subsidized birth control ... they would be raising children for the next 20 years and would be completely dependent on their husbands' limited income," Laura Quisenberry said.

Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam and Attorney General Mark Herring also spoke at the veto ceremony. Northam, McAuliffe's preferred candidate for governor, said he's fought "legislation after legislation" on abortion, including Virginia's trans-vaginal ultrasound bill.

These bills may be pitched as safety measures but are "intended to shame our women," Northam said.

Former U.S. Rep. Tom Perriello is also seeking the Democratic nomination in the governor's race, and he, too, has "vowed to veto harmful Republican efforts to restrict women's access to health care, including defunding Planned Parenthood," spokesman Ian Sams said in an email. Sams said the same promise holds on rolling back abortion restrictions and opposing a 20-week abortion ban.

Perriello took heat from the left for voting for the 2009 Stupak Amendment, which was meant to bar federal subsidies from going toward insurance plans that include abortion coverage. The vote was part of the process of passing the Affordable Care Act, and 64 Democrats backed the amendment.

Perriello has since distanced himself from that vote, and from support he once enjoyed from the National Rifle Association. A Google search on "Perriello abortion" Tuesday turned up an advertised link to a piece Perriello wrote declaring his bona fides on abortion rights and saying that he regrets the vote.

On the Republican side, all four gubernatorial candidates have at least "made verbal nods" toward supporting conservative legislation on abortion, Family Foundation President Victoria Cobb said Tuesday. Some have been more clear than others, she said, but the campaign's debate season has just begun.

Cobb and other bill supporters rallied, quietly, Tuesday outside the fence that separates the governor's mansion from the rest of Capitol Square. Some were told they could not enter the otherwise public ceremony, Cobb said, and some were told they simply could not bring their pro-life signs onto the mansion grounds.

Del. David LaRock, a co-sponsor of the bill that McAuliffe vetoed, said he was told that he could enter, but that he would have to leave his poster behind. He declined to enter.

Cobb complained of a double standard.

"They allowed in anyone they thought was with them," she said.

Cobb also bashed McAuliffe for vetoing the bill, tying his actions to campaign contributions he received from pro-choice groups and abortion providers.

"We're disappointed that the governor continues to do the bidding of the abortion industry," she said.

Eighteen Democratic legislators joined the governor for the ceremony, including Del. Marcia "Cia" Price, D-Newport News.

"It's important that the governor be someone who's willing to stand up and protect women's access to health care," she said.

Fain can be reached by phone at 757-525-1759.

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