Early on in President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address, he introduced Americans to Latorya Beasley, a social worker from Birmingham, Alabama, whose recent experiences deserved the national spotlight.
“Fourteen months ago, she and her husband welcomed a baby girl thanks to the miracle of IVF. She scheduled treatments to have that second child, but the Alabama Supreme Court shut down IVF treatments across the state, unleashed by a Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade. She was told her dream would have to wait. What her family got through should never have happened.”
The incumbent Democrat added, “Unless Congress acts, it could happen again, so tonight, let’s stand up for families like hers. To my friends across the aisle, don’t keep this waiting any longer. Guarantee the right to IVF. Guarantee it nationwide.”
Republicans, whose actions on in vitro fertilization don’t quite match their rhetoric, didn’t exactly rush to applaud Biden’s comments.
But as it turned out, the president’s comments were not the only notable rhetoric the public heard on the issue. Hours earlier, House Speaker Mike Johnson — a co-sponsor of the far-right Life At Conception Act, which would almost certainly curtail access to IVF treatments — was asked by CBS News’ Tony Dokoupil whether he believes destroying or disposing of embryos constitutes murder.
“Um, it’s something that we’ve got to grapple with,” the Louisiana Republican said. “You know, it’s a brave new world. IVF’s only been invented, I think, in the early 70s.”
Of course, part of that message was at odds with the conclusion: If in vitro fertilization has been around for a half-century — spanning roughly all of the House speaker’s lifetime — then it’s not exactly a “brave new world.”
American society already “grappled with” the issue and concluded that the treatments deserve support and protections. The debate, to the extent that one existed, about whether IVF…
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