Source: News & Observer
Republican U.S. Rep. Dan Bishop (NC-09) spent his time at a House Judiciary Committee hearing on abortion access last month proving once again that he’s woefully unqualified for his position as a congressman.
According to The News & Observer, Bishop used his time during the hearing to try and score cheap political points instead of actually taking the matter at hand seriously in any way.
Bishop, who is anti-choice and has been endorsed twice by ex-President Donald Trump, could have used his time at the hearing to ask critical but fair questions about the future of abortion access in this country…but instead, he repeatedly asked a doctor and an abortion-rights advocate testifying at the hearing to tell him the definition of a woman.
“I noticed in your written testimony you said that you use ‘she/her’ pronouns. You’re a medical doctor. What’s a woman?” Bishop asked Dr. Yashica Robinson, an OB-GYN who is the medical director of Alabama Women’s Center, according to The N&O.
While attempting to explain the importance of using inclusive language, Bishop talked over Robinson, interrupted her, and then asked her to define a woman at least five more times.
After deciding he had badgered Robinson enough, he turned his attention to Aimee Arrambide of abortion advocacy group Avow Texas. Bishop then asked Arrambide the same question and also asked her if she believed that men can get pregnant and have abortions, The N&O reported. She said yes.
Bishop also questioned both about whether or not they condemned the leak of the Supreme Court draft opinion that would overturn Roe v. Wade.
Bishop’s questions did not shed any new light on the future of abortion access in the U.S. and informed no one, but it did get him some retweets on Twitter and got him an appearance in the MAGA media over on FOX News.
During his primetime appearance on FOX News, Bishop said his questions helped “expose” Democrats and the so-called “radical folks who are arguing over abortion today,” according to The News & Observer. “I expected something strange, and she performed.”
As if wasting everyone’s time during a critically important hearing wasn’t bad enough, Bishop saying that a Black female doctor “performed” for him at the hearing could, for some, evoke memories of this country’s much-too-recent history of racism and denigration of Black people and other people of color.
None of this should come as a surprise for anyone who knows anything about Bishop, a man who is no stranger to conspiracy theories and other mind-numbingly stupid positions and beliefs.
Bishop has shown during his time in Congress that he has no problem with a government full of division and dysfunction and based on his words and actions, he seems to be intent on weakening American democracy.
Just as a quick summary, Bishop:
- Voted against certifying the election for President Joe Biden, accusing Democrats of “carr[ying] out a highly coordinated, massively financed, nationwide campaign to displace state regulation of absentee ballots by means of a flood of election-year litigation” and “weaken[ing] ballot security, undermin[ing] positive identification of voters, and provid[ing] opportunities for post-election ballot-box stuffing.”
- On the House floor, called the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol that left five people dead “the worst example of an insurrection in the history of mankind.”
- Voted against the impeachment or conviction of Donald Trump for inciting an insurrection, calling the impeachment article “unconstitutional” and a race “toward impeachment without a care for the law or precedent.”
- Wasted time on a non-issue, calling critical race theory “a poison to the psyche of our nation” and a “destructive ideology [that] has no place in America’s institutions” while introducing legislation called the “Stop CRT Act” and the “Combatting Racist Training in the Military Act.” The Stop CRT Act would ban federal funds from being used to promote and teach CRT and the Combatting Racist Training in the Military Act would “ensure that CRT is not found in the training of our men and women in uniform.”
- In 2017, while still a state Senator, he compared Black Lives Matter and Antifa to white supremacists – in the week following the neo-Nazi “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, that left one woman dead and multiple people injured.
Bishop is up for reelection this November. He currently serves the 9th Congressional District but is now running to represent the 8th Congressional District. Bishop beat Democrat Cynthia Wallace 55-44 in 2020. He will face off against Scott Huffman this fall. Huffman lost his 13th District race against Ted Budd 68-32 in 2020.
