'This Week' Transcript 4-23-23: Sen. Mark Warner and Rep. Nancy Mace

Interview

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Right. Right.

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Well, it was the right decision on Friday night by the Supreme Court. The judge's decision in Texas, this was a hand-picked case with a hand-picked judge to get this outcome. And when you look at the ruling in Texas, in part at least, it used a law that the U.S. Supreme Court, in 1983, said was unconstitutional. So, the basis for his ruling, I ague, was debunked and it should not have been. And I totally disagree with it.

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Well, I want us to find some middle ground. As a Republican and conservative, constitutional conservative who's pro-life, I saw what happened after Roe v. Wade because I represent a very purple district, as purple as this dress, and I saw the sentiment change dramatically. And as Republicans, we need to read the room on this issue because the vast majority of folks are not in the extremes.

And we just saw, you know, a fetal heartbeat bill signed in the dead of night recently in Florida. There are -- in my home state of South Carolina, there was a small -- a very small group of state legislatures that filed a bill that would execute women who have abortions and gave right -- more rights to rapists than women who have been raped.

That is the wrong message heading into '24. We're going to -- we're going to lose huge if we continue down this path of extremities. And finding that middle ground, the vast majority of people want some sort of gestational limits, not at -- you know, not at nine months, but somewhere in the middle. They want exceptions for rape and incest. They want women to have access to birth control. These are all very common-sense positions that we can take and still be pro-life.

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It hurt us in the midterms. We actually lost seats.

As a Republican, I told my story on the campaign trail. I actually ran an ad about my own circumstances. I was raped as a teenager and talked about how I would work and protect women who have been raped, girls who are victims of incest.

And rather than by winning by one point, like I did two years ago, I ended up winning by 14 points. And we made this issue part of our campaign because I want women to know you can be pro-life and be pro-woman. They're -- they're not mutually exclusive.

But we've hidden away from this issue. We've buried our head in the sand. We're afraid to talk about it because we're afraid -- we want to -- we want to go to the extreme corners of this issue, but that's not where the vast majority of Americans are right now. And we've got to show compassion, especially to victims who have been raped.

The Florida bill mandated that women who were raped, to get that exception, had to report it to the -- to the police, had to get evidence at a hospital. And I will tell you, based on my own experiences, it took me a week before I was actually able to tell somebody what happened to me.

And by that time, there was no evidence. There's nothing you can collect at that point.

And, you know, that puts heavy, heavy restrictions on these victims. And there are millions of women everywhere who have gone through this. I'm not the only one.

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Well, I mean, this is the left's new war on women. I mean both sides, whether it's the extreme right on abortion, or the extreme left on biological men and women's sports, we have come so far.

I don't want to see biological men take away the achievements of women and girls. I told this story on Thursday. I was molested by a friend of one of my coaches at the age of 14. I was raped by a classmate at the age of 16.

Before a girl ever sets foot in the pool, or on the court, or on the field, she's already in a very venerable position. And we've worked hundreds of years for our achievements. It took 100 years for the state of South Carolina -- 100 years after women's suffrage, to get their first Republican woman in Congress when I won in 2020.

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Yeah.

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Well, if you read the story --

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Well, Riley Gaines, OK? Their -- also the athletes that we've met along the way.

There was a story last week in Wisconsin where 14-year-old girls were forced to share a locker room and showers. An 18-year-old boy, biological male whose, I guess, a trans girl now, but he exposed himself in the shows to these young, underage girls.

My girl is about to be 14. I can't imagine if there were men in her locker room exposing themselves.

And you hear these stories -- you hear these stories more frequently as we go on. And it's -- and it's wrong. It is a war on women. It's a different war on women, but it's still a war on women.

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Right. And, look, I'm an -- I'm a pro-LGBTQ Republican. That's not what this is about.

We don't want anyone committing suicide because we've taken this position. To conflate the two is a radical and extreme position to take. But we want -- what we do want to do is protect women and girls. I mean, it took 154 years before the Citadel admitted women. And I was the first female graduate of that college.

You see women whose achievements, whether it's a medal in an athletic event, or they're losing scholarships, or they're begin exposed, underage, in a locker room, those things are wrong.

And though it doesn't happen all day, every day, but the -- we still want to protect our women and girls. And when you talk to parents of these girls, when you talk to the girls directly, they're very angry about it. They're very upset about it.

We don't want to keep anyone from competing -- I mean, but these are biological men. They're much stronger. They shouldn't be in the locker rooms. And you hear these stories. And they're real.

It's not a -- it's not a fantasy. It's not a conspiracy theory. These are happening. These things are happening to women and girls across the country.

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Thank you.

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