U.S. Rep. Jared Polis, the Democratic candidate for governor, suggested Thursday that women would die at a faster rate if his opponent Walker Stapleton wins the November election.
“If Walker Stapleton was elected, mortality for women would likely go up with these policies he’s advocating, the HIV infection rate would go up,” he said, flanked by employees and volunteers at Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains.
Polis made the comments after an employee from Planned Parenthood Votes Colorado, a political arm of the health care organization, suggested maternal mortality was extremely high in Texas due in part to a lack of access to clinics such as Planned Parenthood.
However, a reporting error is partly to blame for the sharp increase in Texas, a new report found. In the same report, researchers said there were likely many causes for the spike, including an increase in chronic diseases.
The Polis campaign was at the northeast Denver health clinic to discuss women’s health and abortion rights. Health care is expected to be a top issue in the fall race to succeed Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper.
Abortion rights have long been a political flashpoint in partisan politics. The gubernatorial candidates’ positions fall along traditional party lines. Polis supports access to abortion. During The Denver Post’s Republican gubernatorial primary debate, Stapleton said he would be “a pro-life governor.”
Michael Fortney, Stapleton’s campaign manager, responded to Polis’ comment.
“As a husband and a father who reads to his two young girls every night before they go to sleep, it’s disgusting to see Jared Polis sink to such outlandish and false attacks in an attempt to scare women into voting for him,” Fortney said. “Jared Polis should be ashamed of himself and this revolting comment should be condemned by Coloradans across the political spectrum.”
Polis spoke just days before the U.S. Senate is scheduled to begin hearings on President Donald Trump’s newest Supreme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh. If approved, Kavanaugh is expected shift the court to the right. Since his nomination, supporters of abortion rights have raised concern that he could provide a crucial fifth vote to overturn the landmark ruling Roe v. Wade.
Kavanaugh has said that he believes Roe v. Wade is settled law. His critics, including Polis, aren’t taking him for his word.
Polis said Thursday he’d lead the way in enshrining abortion rights into Colorado law.
“Truly, we will lose the national backdrops of protections we have,” he said of a possible Kavanaugh confirmation. “We would look forward to enshrining reproductive choice into law so that women can be assured that nine judges in Washington — five judges in Washington — aren’t taking away their rights.”
