Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) and former Rep. Gabby Giffords (D-Ariz.) spoke about their past fertility struggles to emphasize the importance of alternative pregnancy options, which they say are under threat from politicians .
In a personal essay published Thursday in People Magazine, Kelly and Giffords described how a gunman in 2011 took away their dreams of having a child together and their concern that politicians would do the same for Americans.
In 2011, Giffords was shot at a political event in Tucson, Arizona, which left six other people dead and several others injured. Two days after the shooting, Giffords and Kelly were scheduled for an appointment at the Washington facility where Giffords was receiving in vitro fertility treatments.
The couple, married since 2007, noted that they married “a little later” in life, but wanted the chance to have children together. Kelly has two daughters from a previous marriage.
“We wanted to grow our family together and were fortunate to be able to pursue the only option for us: IVF or IVF. Gabby never attended that appointment,” Giffords and Kelly wrote. “In recent months, we have seen reproductive freedoms increasingly under attack in the absence of human rights protections.Roe v. Wade,Our hearts break for the couples who suddenly can’t decide for themselves how and when to start a family.”
Although IVF treatments are expensive and invasive, the couple noted that they are the “safest” and sometimes the only way for some couples to have children.
Kelly and Gifford, who retired from Congress in 2012 to focus on their recovery, pointed to several landmark court rulings and legislative efforts that have put in vitro fertilization in the political spotlight in recent months.
In Alabama, the state Supreme Court ruled in February that the frozen embryos were children and that those who destroyed them could be held responsible for their deaths. IVF services have mostly been halted in the state, although lawmakers quickly passed legislation to address the civil and criminal liability of IVF providers, prompting some to resume services.
In Arizona, Gifford and Kelly’s home state, the legislature passed a bill in 2023 that would make child support payments retroactive to the date of a positive pregnancy test. Democratic Governor Katie Hobbs, whenvetoing legislationwrote that it “directly threatens the reproductive rights of Arizonans.”
On Capitol Hill, more than 130 House Republicansco-sponsored the Life at Conception Act, which would guarantee personality from “the moment of fertilization, cloning” or any other creation mechanism. Meanwhile, all but two Senate Republicans voted against a motion to force a vote on legislation that would make women’s access to in vitro fertilization a national right.
“Despite this real threat, Republicans in Congress have repeatedly blocked legislation in recent weeks that would protect access to IVF and contraception for all Americans. The truth is that there is a real danger of our country going backwards – even further than we have already gone backwards,” the essay stated.
The recent back-and-forth over IVF and other reproductive rights is not “happening by chance,” Giffords and Kelly argued, criticizing former President Trump and his judicial appointments.
Trump is credited with overturning Roe v. Wade. Wade by the Supreme Court through the appointment of three conservative justices to the court.
“Donald Trump said thatHe broke”Roe v.,who lefta series of attacksabout reproductive freedoms,” the essay stated. “Twenty states now ban abortion,including Arizonawhere our state has been in crisis between two abortion bans, both of which endanger women’s health and threaten doctors with prison time.”
Kelly, 60, is serving his first term in the Senate, which is expected to last until 2029.
This story originally appeared on thehill.com read the full story
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