• by Jessica Pieklo
• 2015

Well, if the Todd Akin mess has shown anything, it’s that any talk of abortion restrictions being passed in the name of “protecting” or “helping” women is just that.

There is nothing helpful about forced pregnancy and birth, yet that is the precise position of the Republican party. And as if Akin’s statements that rape exceptions are not needed in abortion bans because women don’t get pregnant in the case of “legitimate” rape weren’t bad enough, Rep. Steve King (R-IA) made the case that Republicans don’t believe statutory rape is legitimate rape.

As Talking Points Memo reports, King told an Iowa reporter he’s never heard of a child getting pregnant from statutory rape or incest.

“Well I just haven’t heard of that being a circumstance that’s been brought to me in any personal way,” King told KMEG-TV Monday, “and I’d be open to discussion about that subject matter.”

By Akin’s logic, a logic shared by Mike Huckabee, Steve King, Ron Paul and countless others in the Republican party, this lack of evidence of conception means that an exception to an abortion ban in the cases of statutory rape are not needed.

A 1996 report by the Guttmacher Institute found that at least half of all babies born to minor women are fathered by adult men.

That, by definition, is childbirth as a result of statutory rape. But most importantly is the big picture here. These are not isolated, unhinged comments by the fringe of the Republican party. This is their platform.