For some reason unbeknownst to me, Twitter likes to continuously remind me that I follow Susan Sarandon, and because of this I unfortunately have to come across tweets like the one pictured above which includes a ridiculous criticism that people like this like to use anytime President Trump does anything terrible - which is pretty often.
If you haven’t heard, women’s reproductive rights are quite literally under attack in several US states, including Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi and Ohio and women are being faced with jail time. HB 481 in Georgia would reportedly allow for women to be given a jail sentence of 10-30 years if she is found to be culpable of miscarrying through her own conduct (although this is extremely vague).
Snopes have written an excellent piece about HB 481 and have given a “Unproven” rating for the claim that abortion will result in jail sentences for women. They also state that the state of Georgia currently prohibits “criminal abortion” (16-12-140 in the Georgia code) which is defined as when he or she (a doctor or nurse) administers any drugs, medicine or other substance to any woman or when he or she uses any instrument or other means upon any woman with the intent to produce a miscarriage or abortion and part (b) of that code states: a person convicted of the offence of criminal abortion shall be punished by imprisonment for not less than one nor more than ten years. This implies that Georgia already has laws on the books to punish abortion providers.
Back to Sarandon, in late 2017, she stated that Hillary would have been a “very dangerous” president, and that the US would be involved in a major war. There’s some problems with Sarandon’s statement, America has been “at war” for 222 years of its 239 in existence and to the best of my knowledge the US is engaging in bombing campaigns in seven countries (Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Pakistan) - are we to believe Hillary wouldn’t have continued this? Of course she would have.
Sarandon’s statement, to put it simply, has been distorted and exaggerated. When Sarandon made this claim back in 2017, people like Tom and the most fervent of Hillary Clinton’s supporters immediately jumped all over it, screaming about how deranged the Left are. Several news outlets such as Newsweek, New York Post and The Tylt all made Sarandon a punching bag - with the latter even going as far to say that Sarandon was fortunate enough to be able to use her “white privilege”, given Donald Trump’s harsh line on issues such as immigration that almost exclusively impact people of colour.
However, this implies that issues where Clinton and Trump are somewhat opposed on, such as deportation, were relatively benign during the Obama years. A March 2019 article by the Wall Street Journal shows that while Trump-era deportations are rising due to the President’s tough stance, by comparison Obama still reigns supreme in this area. WSJ reports: in the 2018 fiscal year, which ended on September 30th, 256,085 immigrants were deported, compared to the Obama-era 2012 peak of 409,849 immigrants being deported, with 55% of those having a criminal conviction.
Anyway, you may be questioning why we’re bringing up topics such as deportation or military intervention and it’s because these are the issues in which we’re told that there are vast differences between the two main political parties, which there isn’t. Are both parties similar in every way, shape and form? No, of course not. However there are many instances where they are, or at least issues in which the gap isn’t as pronounced as we’re led to believe.
As for how Sarandon is to blame for Republican-led states imposing abortion bans, I honestly don’t know. Whether we have President Clinton or President Trump has no bearing on a state such as Alabama’s abortion law. There are only two ways in which a state law can be rendered void:
- If a federal court determines that the state law is in violation of the federal constitution or of relevant federal law and orders that it be disregarded; or
- By any means that exists within the governing law of a specific state.
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