In a 50-49 vote Thursday, the Senate confirmed an “unqualified” lawyer with a “far-left ideology, Xavier Becerra, to manage Health and Human Services.
It was Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell who condemned Becerra’s “partisan warfare and his far-left ideology” and Carol Tobias, president of National Right to Life, who described him as “unqualified.”
“His confirmation shows just how far the pro-abortion Democrats are willing to go to support abortion on demand and the demands of pro-abortion groups,” she said. “Xavier Becerra has no health care experience but plenty of abortion advocacy and he is being rewarded by the Biden administration for that extremism.”
Becerra said he’s “humbled by the task, and I’m ready for it.”
The Associated Press reported Becerra is “filling a key position in the Biden administration’s coronavirus response and its ambitious push to lower drug costs, expand insurance coverage, and eliminate racial disparities in medical care.”
But he built his reputation on none of those issues while serving as California’s attorney general and as a congressman.
Tobias said Becerra’s “lack of health-care experience clearly disqualifies him from leading the nation’s health-care agency.”
Becerra, who sued the Trump administration 124 times, is known for his extreme defense of abortion. He prosecuted the two journalists who exposed the abortion industry’s profiting from the sale of the body parts of unborn children.
Tobias noted the two most recent HHS secretaries, Alex Azar and Dr. Tom Price, had health-care experience.
“The nation needs a secretary with the public health experience necessary to help put an end to the COVID-19 pandemic,” said Tobias. “Becerra’s confirmation looks more and more like a deal with abortion groups to confirm an activist because Xavier Becerra brings no healthcare experience to the position but plenty of abortion advocacy.
In fact, Planned Parenthood Action has lauded Becerra for his pro-abortion activism. He also was endorsed by the radically pro-abortion NARAL Pro-Choice America.
Further, Tobias said, Beceerra has been “hostile” to the pro-life movement.
For example, he defended California’s efforts to force pregnancy resource centers to advertise abortion, a move that the Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional. And he routinely opposed in court pro-life legislation.
He urged the Food and Drug Administration to drop restrictions on the abortion drug mifepristone.
As a member of Congress, he voted against abortion restrictions based on the pain felt by the unborn child. He voted against a law to prevent the interstate transportation of minors to get abortions, against protections for infants who survive abortions, against making it a crime to harm an unborn child and against a ban on partial-birth abortions.
Abby Johnson, the noted former Planned Parenthood manager who fled the abortion industry, described Becerra’s hiring as “perhaps the most devastating consequence of Biden’s time in office thus far.”
“This man has made it his mission to be a radical activist during his time in office,” she said. “It’s not enough for Xavier Becerra to disagree with groups of people – he has demonstrated he wants to obliterate them.”
Evangelical leader James Dobson warned before the vote: “One need only look at his work in California as the attorney general to discern that a Becerra-led HHS will work swiftly to advance the legalization of abortion through all stages of development (and force you and me to pay for the murder of innocent children through taxpayer dollars), compel medical professionals to participate in horrific procedures that violate their consciences, and require churches and religious organizations to provide insurance coverage for abortifacients.”
He said: “Do you remember when Joe Biden pledged to be a president for all Americans? What a monumental lie! This is another flagrant example of President Biden’s radical Left and pro-death agenda—one that destroys life, compels citizens of a free nation to violate their consciences, and devalues women and girls.”
Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the pro-life Susan B. Anthony List, said: “Becerra is infamous in the pro-life movement, well known for his record of attacking pro-life policies protecting unborn life, as well as assaulting the conscience rights of pro-life Americans. President Biden could not have picked a more eager and enthusiastic partner to destroy pro-life policy and expand abortion on demand.”
Thomas Glessner, president of NIFLA, the organization of pro-life centers Becerra sought to deprive of constitutional rights, said Becerra’s “fanatical support of abortion resulted in the state-sponsored persecution of female-founded organizations like the Little Sisters of the Poor and pregnancy centers.”
“He fought these small nonprofits all the way to the Supreme Court,” he said. “Becerra’s bullying and bigotry were on display for all to see in the so-called Reproductive FACT Act, which targeted pro-life pregnancy centers and medical clinics by forcing them to promote abortion.”
Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, said it’s disappointing the Senate handed the job to “a man with zero training in medicine, science, pharma, or the health care world.”
“The only real experience he has with the industry is suing hospitals, pregnancy care centers, and other entities that aren’t pro-abortion enough for his liking,” he said.
“As Sen. James Lankford noted, President Biden could have chosen a better Secretary of Health and Human Services using LinkedIn. Instead, the man he chose is less than qualified for anything but aggressively targeting political adversaries. Biden promised to unite the country, and then he assigned the most radical advocate for the Left’s pro-abortion, anti-First Amendment agenda he could find to lead the nation’s largest executive agency.”
Kristen Waggoner of the Alliance Defending Freedom said Becerra “holds little regard for the rights of conscience or protecting vulnerable human life.”
She said Becerra “will continue his attack on the civil liberties of those with whom he disagrees.”
A statement from First Liberty Institute called Becerra a “dangerous ideologue.”
“President Biden has sent a clear message that people of faith are not respected under his administration.”
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