Democratic Presidential Candidates Accused of Misleading Hispanics on Abortion
by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
July 3, 2003
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) — The Democratic presidential candidates make no bones about the fact they support abortion on demand.
All of the major contenders attended a January NARAL event in an attempt to shore up their pro-abortion credentials. Congressmen Richard Gephardt (D-MO) and Dennis Kucinich both abandoned their pro-life positions to support abortion when their ambitions led them to run for higher office. Though he later recanted and admitted he was wrong, Sen. John Kerry was so eager to make his pro-abortion stance known, he told attendees at several campaign events that his first speech on the floor of the U.S. Senate backed abortion.
Yet many Hispanics are wondering why the Spanish-language version of the web sites of some Democratic presidential candidates mention nothing about abortion, while the English versions tout their pro-abortion positions.
The Spanish-language site of Gephardt’s makes no mention of abortion, whereas his English site has an "issues" section where "Right to Choose" is one of the categories, and also has a link to a January speech titled "One thing must be certain: The freedom to choose."
A Gephardt spokeswoman confirmed that the site doesn’t currently have any reference to abortion.
Kim Molstre of the Gephardt campaign claimed the lack of abortion references on the candidate’s Spanish site is simply because not all the English items have been translated.
The Spanish site of pro-abortion Sen. Joe Lieberman — which is much less extensive than Gephardt’s — also makes no mention of abortion. Jano Cabrera, a spokesman for Lieberman, also claimed the omission is because not all the English content has been translated.
Rai Rojas, the Hispanic outreach coordinator for National Right to Life, told LifeNews.com "as Hispanics, most of us come from cultures where abortion is legally and morally unacceptable."
From 1990 to 2000, over two million abortions were performed on Hispanic women in the United States. This made up 15.2% of all abortions performed in the U.S. While Hispanic women only represented 12.8% of the child-bearing population during the year 2000, the Hispanic abortion rate had risen to 20.1% of all abortions performed.
"The loss to our communities is more than just the numbers or population," Rojas explained. "Abortion means the loss of Hispanic teachers, artists, political leaders, doctors, scientists, athletes, engineers, businessmen and businesswomen."
Rojas called the decision to exclude the information "crass" and said the decision follows another decision by abortion advocates that has upset Hispanics, namely blocking Miguel Estrada, Bush’s nominee to the U.S. Court of Appeals.
"It is outrageous that the first Hispanic ever nominated to the nation’s second highest court is being blocked by Democratic senators simply because he will not take an oath to support abortion on demand," Rojas said.
On June 18, the Census Bureau announced that Hispanics are now the largest minority group in the country.
President George W. Bush, who will seek re-election next year, has made a strong push to gain support among Hispanic voters and garnered 35 percent of the Hispanic vote in 2000.
