NARAL Pro-Choice America Reveals New Information about Anti-Choice Nominee Michael Boggs; Urges Senate Judiciary Committee to Reject Nomination

Today, as reports surface about Judge Michael Boggs’ omission of his dismal record on reproductive, civil, and LGBT rights, NARAL Pro-Choice America released new research on Boggs’ past actions to limit women’s reproductive rights.

Boggs will likely face the Senate Judiciary Committee very soon and NARAL Pro-Choice America has launched a campaign asking its members to call their senators and demand that they question him about the latest information about his anti-choice record in Georgia.

“New information has come to light that provides further evidence as to why Michael Boggs has no business being on the federal bench,” said Ilyse Hogue, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America. “Our judicial branch is too important to risk appointing someone whose record and stated values are out of line with our nation’s commitment to women’s fundamental rights. The Senate Judiciary Committee should question aggressively the nominee about his anti-choice record or risk further eroding the constitutional rights that so many American have fought to realize.”

The new findings released by NARAL Pro-Choice America, show that while serving in the state legislature:

• Boggs voted in favor of an anti-choice amendment that would have required internet-accessible profiles of doctors to include the number of abortion procedures the doctor had provided in the previous 10 years. The Democratic leader of the state House at the time warned that the effects of such a measure could put physicians at risk.¹
• Boggs voted in favor of an amendment that would create a committee—composed of state politicians and the executive director of Georgia Right to Life—to study the effects of “post-abortion syndrome,” a supposed psychological phenomenon that has never been shown to exist by any legitimate scientific or medical study and, indeed, has been disproven by a long line of credible, scientific research. The amendment also misleadingly described studies examining the link between abortion and increased rates of breast cancer as “inconclusive.” In fact, expert medical and health organizations have concluded that abortion is not associated with breast cancer.²
• Boggs voted twice in favor of amending a bill on criminal penalties for child abuse to define children as “both born and unborn.” The effect of this amendment would lay the groundwork to give a pregnancy legal “personhood” rights by recognizing an embryo or fetus as a separate victim of a crime. Although the amendment ultimately failed, it could have built a record that grants pregnancies legal “personhood” rights everywhere possible, toward the eventual purpose of challenging a woman’s right to choose.³

1. Chad Roedemeier, Bill to Give Patients More Info About Doctors Goes to Governor, Associated Press, Mar.21, 2001. The amendment originally was adopted without a recorded vote. Journal of the House, 2001 Ga. Gen. Assem. Feb. 8, 2001, at 595-600. After Senate consideration of the bill, the House agreed to the Senate’s changes, and considered the amendment again; this time it failed. Journal of the House, 2001 Ga. Gen. Assem. March 21, 2001, at 3386-3396.
2. Journal of the House, 2002 Ga. Gen. Assem. Apr. 12, 2002, at 5637-4640.
3. Journal of the House, 2003 Ga. Gen. Assem. Apr. 25, 2003, at 3383-3389.