Ryan Strong Opponent of Abortion

Ryan’s level of support outdoes House colleague Todd Akin, who’s under pressure from party leaders to end his Senate bid in Missouri after saying that “legitimate rape” rarely leads to pregnancy. Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney yesterday called on Akin to quit the race.

The cosponsorships include bills that would restrict government funding and declare that states have the right to protect life beginning at fertilization.

Though their records are similar, Ryan hasn’t been out front the way Akin has, said Tom McClusky, a senior vice president at the Washington-based Family Research Council Action, the political arm of the group that opposes abortion and gay marriage.

“He’s co-sponsored a lot of great bills but he hasn’t introduced one,” McClusky said in a phone interview. “Akin is someone you would call a pro-life leader, so that’s where your difference would be. He’s introduced bills.”

Since voters in Wisconsin’s 1st District, south of Milwaukee, first elected him in 1998, Ryan hasn’t voted against any bills backed by the National Right to Life Committee. The group gives him a lifetime voting score of 100 percent.

Fellow Cosponsors

The group scored Akin at 90 percent support during one of his six terms and at 100 percent for the rest of his tenure. Akin cosponsored every abortion bill supported by Ryan in the almost 12 years the two Republicans have served together in Washington.

Ryan hasn’t authored any abortion-related bills during his time in Congress, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

“He’s certainly a reliable pro-life vote,” Eric Scheidler, executive director of the Chicago-based Pro-Life Action League, said in a phone interview. “Everyone in the pro- life movement is really excited about Paul Ryan’s vice presidential candidacy. We can expect a Romney administration to reverse many of the anti-life, pro-abortion policies that have been implemented by President Obama.”

That contrasts in part with the Romney campaign’s position.

“A Romney-Ryan administration would not oppose abortion in instances of rape,” Romney spokeswoman Amanda Henneberg said in an Aug. 20 statement.

Opposition Tally

Advocates on the other side of the issue have counted 59 votes that Ryan has cast on abortion and other reproductive rights issues during his 13 years in the House. The tally by the abortion-rights group NARAL Pro-Choice America includes votes on procedural motions and amendments, neither of which have cosponsors.

The group classifies all 59 votes as “anti-choice.”

Among the bills Ryan cosponsored was a measure to require a woman to undergo an ultrasound before she could receive an abortion. As chairman of the House Budget Committee, he drafted a budget blueprint that sought to end federal dollars for Title X, the national family-planning program.

He also cosponsored legislation that would have barred abortions after 20 weeks gestation in the District of Columbia, with no exception for cases of rape or incest.

Two bills that he cosponsored last year would have restricted the definition of rape. The measures sought to prohibit federal funds from being used for abortion, except under certain conditions, with both bills as introduced using the term “forcible rape” as an exception to the funding ban.

Original Cosponsors

While the legislation didn’t explain the difference between rape and forcible rape, the word “forcible” was removed from each bill in committee by amendments from Republicans following criticism from Democratic lawmakers and reproductive-rights groups. Ryan and Akin signed on to the bills before the language was changed.

Republican lawmakers and officials this week have urged Akin to quit the U.S. Senate race in Missouri after Aug. 19 remarks in which he said abortion shouldn’t be allowed in rape cases, in part because pregnancy was unlikely to result.

“From what I understand from doctors, that’s really rare,” Akin, who has served in the U.S. House since 2001, said in an interview that aired on a Fox affiliate in St. Louis. “If it’s legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.”

Akin later apologized and said he meant to say “forcible rape,” and said that pregnancy can result from rape. He has resisted pressure from Romney and party elders to drop out of the Senate race.

The Republican Party’s position on abortion hasn’t changed.

Platform drafters yesterday reaffirmed the party’s support for a constitutional amendment banning abortions with no exceptions. The plank calling for the constitutional amendment banning abortions in all circumstances, including pregnancies caused by rape and when the life of the mother is at risk, is the same as in the party’s 2004 and 2008 platforms.

The bills from the current session of Congress are H.R. 3, H.R. 358, H.R. 3803, H.R. 3805.

--With assistance from James Rowley in Tampa, Florida. Editors: Katherine Rizzo, Bennett Roth

To contact the reporters on this story: Timothy R. Homan in Washington at [email protected]; Steve Walsh in Washington at [email protected]

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Katherine Rizzo at [email protected]