Fox News host confronts Republican senator about voting against IVF

Fox News host Shannon Bream on Sunday confronted Sen. Katie Britt, an Alabama Republican, for voting against a bill that would protect access to in vitro fertilization (IVF) at the federal level.

Republicans again rejected the bill last week, sponsored by Senator Tammy Duckworth, an Illinois Democrat, as the issue of reproductive rights remains a top issue for voters ahead of the November election.

After the Supreme Court overturned the ruling, Democrats have pushed to establish protections for reproductive health procedures Roe v. Wade in 2022, ending the constitutional right to abortion. Last week’s bill would have protected access to IVF and required insurance companies to cover the procedure and other fertility treatments.

Senators voted 51-44, meaning the measure fell short of the 60-vote threshold needed to overcome a filibuster. Two Republicans, Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, joined Democrats in supporting the bill.

In an interview on Fox News SundayBream asked Britt if she voted against the measure: “So you voted against a measure that was proposed by the Democrats on IVF in the Senate there, and they continue to point to that to say that the Republicans are protecting IVF “Don’t support it.” Why did you vote no?”

Britt, a supporter of former President Donald Trump, took aim at Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer when she claimed the bill was a “show vote” and added that he should have put other funding bills on the floor instead.

“This is politics at its worst. If you think about what Chuck Schumer is doing, instead of putting funding bills on the table that are so important to actually doing our job for the American people… instead of putting any of these bills on the table.” “He decided to put an artificial insemination bill on the floor to display that extends to human cloning. This bill does not protect religious freedom, we agree this is a bipartisan issue,” Britt responded.

The senator added: “Outside of (former) President Trump, there has probably been no more vocal advocate than myself when it comes to ensuring we have nationwide access to IVF. It was just a show vote, it was never intended to get through.”

Newsweek Britt and Schumer’s office emailed for comment.

However, Schumer continues to advocate for the protection of IVF, warning that it has “become the next target of ultra-conservatives.”

“Unfortunately, access to IVF can no longer be taken for granted. From the moment the MAGA Supreme Court (Roe v. Wade), the hard right has made it clear that it will continue,” Schumer said on the Senate floor last week. “As we saw in Alabama earlier this year, IVF has become the next goal of ultra-conservatives, and access to this incredible treatment is becoming more vulnerable than ever.”

IVF came into the spotlight when the Alabama Supreme Court ruled in February that frozen embryos counted as children under the state constitution, endangering IVF and prompting warnings about its potential impact on fertility treatments and embryo freezing that some fertility clinics in the United States have had to stop inpatient treatment. Less than a month later, Alabama lawmakers passed a law protecting IVF access.

This comes as Trump has said he supports IVF protection and has promised to make the procedure free for all Americans if he is elected president in November.

“I was a leader in IVF,” he said during a debate against Vice President Kamala Harris. “I was a leader in that. You know this and everyone else knows it.”

However, during the debate, Harris underscored Trump’s role in the Supreme Court’s repeal of the nation’s right to abortion two years ago and said bans enacted since then were delaying families’ access to IVF treatments. Abortion is also a key issue in the November election. Democrats warn that Trump would push ahead with restrictions on reproductive health care if he wins a second term.

Trump has tried to deflect such attacks and appear more moderate on abortion, warning that extreme positions could cost Republicans at the ballot box, even as he has repeatedly blamed himself for the appointment of the three Supreme Court justices, who fell roe. This decision led to abortion restrictions in all Republican-led states, including proposals that threatened access to IVF.

Britt’s comments came after she and Sen. Ted Cruz, a Republican from Texas, pushed for passage of an alternative bill that would have barred states from receiving Medicaid funding if they banned access to IVF, even though that measure was approved by the Democrats were blocked.

Cruz said on the Senate floor last week that he was a “clear supporter of protecting IVF” but that the bill put forward by Democrats was designed to “incite unfounded fears about IVF and advance their broader policy agenda.”

But Democrats said Cruz and Britt’s bill didn’t go far enough to protect IVF, including failing to protect against “fetal personhood” legislation.

A similar bill to protect IVF was also defeated by Senate Republicans in June. Trump’s vice president, Senator JD Vance of Ohio, voted against the measure at the time.