October 23, 2024 02:41 PM UTC

Anti-Choice Zealots Beg Pueblo To Reconsider Being Their Petri Dish

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• by: Colorado Pols

As the Pueblo Chieftain’s James Bartolo reports, after losing earlier this month a second attempt to pass a city ordinance attacking abortion rights, anti-abortion usual suspects at Colorado For Life sent a letter this week to two professed pro-life members of the Pueblo City Council urging them with politically threatening overtones to switch their votes to “yes” and try again:

Councilors Roger Gomez and Joe Latino voted against the ordinance on Oct. 15, despite their personal opposition to abortion. The email, sent by Colorado for Life Executive Director Marcie Little, said the two councilmen “were voted into office specifically to move this forward.”

The anti-abortion ordinance, prepared by Councilor Regina Maestri, would have amended Pueblo municipal code to prohibit the mailing of abortion materials and “partial-birth abortions.” Interpretations of federal laws, including the 1873 Comstock Act and Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003, were cited in the failed ordinance…

If you’re asking what authority the Pueblo City Council has to pass an ordinance in direct contravention of the statutory protections for abortion rights in Colorado, that’s the whole point and you’re not alone. Much like a similar effort a year ago introduced by the same right-wing Councilor Regina Maestri, the purpose of this ordinance is to provoke a legal challenge from the Colorado Attorney General and move the challenge to what they hope will be friendly conservative federal courts. In a “confidential” September letter to the city council, the right-wing Thomas Moore Society offered to provide pro bono legal representation to defend the ordinance if passed–but that wasn’t enough to convince two personally pro-life councilors,who voted to turn down the “opportunity” for Pueblo to commit to years of litigation as the test case for a national anti-abortion agenda.

And from Bartolo’s conversation with the two city councilors being targeted Roger Gomez and Joe Latino, that doesn’t look likely to change:

“I am not for abortion, I want that to be very clear, but I voted the way that I did because, basically, it’s not going to stop at this level,” [Latino] said at the work session. “It’s going to go to the (Colorado) Legislature, possibly the governor, and finally the state supreme court.”

Gomez told the Chieftain on Tuesday that the city does not have the money and resources to defend the passage of the ordinance. He also said there’s no way the ordinance will “see the light of day” considering Colorado state laws on abortion. [Pols emphasis]

“When you’ve got the attorney general sending you a letter saying that, if you guys pass that, we are going to sue you based on two state laws that are already on the books — tell me the logic that is involved with that,” Gomez said. “What are we doing? We’re sitting here setting us up to take a fight on.”

On the one hand, you have anti-abortion zealots who are completely unconcerned with the cost of their actions or even the likelihood of success of the effort. On the other, you have city councilors who may agree on principle but don’t consider their city to be the appropriate vehicle for this legal fight over an issue well beyond the scope of city government. The City Council made the right call on October 15th when they sent these itinerant troublemakers packing, just like they did a year ago.

If these two councilors refuse to be bullied into a monumental waste of municipal time and treasure, they’ll be doing the job they were elected to do.

Wedge-issue wishcasting is not what Pueblo needs.