Iranian State Media Mocks Kamala Harris’s Abortion Comments

The Iranians were hardly the only foreign observers to find some merriment in Harris’ remarks. The UK Daily Mail, for example, called the interview “bizarre” and reproduced her entire exchange with CNN’s Dana Bash:

‘I thought about it as a parent. We have two children who are in their 20s, a son and a daughter. I thought about it as a godparent of teenagers. I thought of it as an aunt of preschool children,’ Harris said.

Journalist Dana Bash offered, ‘And as a woman yourself?’

‘And a woman myself, and the daughter of a woman, and a granddaughter of a woman,’ Harris answered. 

The entire Democrat party went into convulsions only one month ago because Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson refused to define the word “woman” and insisted only highly credentialed biologists could do so.

Islamist Iranian women demonstrate against loose veiling after the weekly Friday prayer in Tehran. (ATTA KENARE/AFP/Getty Images)

The Iranian government is exceptionally hostile towards abortion, pronouncing it haram (“forbidden”) under Islamic law. 

In November, Iran ratified the “Youthful Population and Protection of the Family Law,” which severely restricted access to both abortion and contraception. The law stipulated that persons who conducted multiple abortions could be accused of “corruption on earth,” an offense punishable by execution.

A supporter of Iranian religious hardliners with two children takes part in a demonstration after the weekly Friday prayer in Tehran demanding that the government fully enforce obligatory rules that women be veiled in public. (ATTA KENARE/AFP/Getty Images)

Radio Free Europe (RFE) noted the Youthful Population and Protection of the Family Law appeared to be intended to reverse Iran’s demographic decline, which has accelerated as the Iranian economy withered and more women decided motherhood was too expensive:

In recent years, a growing number of Iranian women have chosen to have fewer or no children — mainly due to economic woes, changing gender norms, the growth of girls’ education, and family planning programs.

That trend has seen Iran’s population growth rate drop from over 4 percent in the 1980s to 1.29 percent in 2020, according to the World Bank, a development that has alarmed Iran’s clerical establishment.

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The new law also requires state broadcasters to produce content that encourages women to have more children and denounces celibacy or abortion. It also bans the production, distribution, and publication of any content that violates the country’s population policies.

RFE observed that Iran also tightened its already difficult procedure for determining if an abortion was necessary to avoid threats to the mother’s life, adding judges to panels that previously consisted of only doctors.