Sen. Ted Cruz wants to know if Sen. Bernard Sanders is getting policy ideas from Marvel Studios scripts after witnessing his response to overpopulation concerns Wednesday evening.
Democrats vying for the party’s 2020 nomination fielded questions on climate change during a CNNs town hall in New York when someone asked about ways to “curb population growth.”
“Human population growth has more than doubled in the past 50 years,” a woman in the New York audience asked. “The planet cannot sustain this growth. I realize this is a poisonous topic for politicians, but it’s crucial to face. Empowering women and educating everyone on the need to curb population growth seems a reasonable campaign to enact. Would you be courageous enough to discuss this issue and make it a key feature of a plan to address climate catastrophe?”
The Vermont senator didn’t hesitate.
“The answer is yes,” Mr. Sanders replied. “And the answer has everything to do with the fact that women in the United States Of America, by the way, have a right to control their own bodies and make reproductive decisions. And the Mexico City Agreement, which denies American aid to those organizations around the world that allow women to have abortions or even get involved in birth control to me is totally absurd. So I think especially in poor countries around the world where women do not necessarily want to have large numbers of babies and where they can have the opportunity through birth control to control the number of kids they have, it’s something I very, very strongly support.”
Mr. Cruz pounced on the response Thursday morning.
“In a surprise move, last night Bernie announced Thanos as his running mate,” the Republican joked.
The villainous character Thanos obsessed over the issue in “Avengers: Infinity War” and “Avengers: Endgame,” going so far as to eradicate over 50% of the universe with a magical snap of the fingers.
Conservative commentator Ed Morrissey of Hotair also railed against Mr. Sanders’ comments.
“The lesson here?” Mr. Morrissey wrote Thursday. “The Left hates imperialism, except when it comes to [checks notes] encouraging other nations to kill off its young for the good of Western nation’s standard of living. Bernie Sanders wants US resources deployed in poor countries to expand abortion, not just for ’reproductive rights,’ but to achieve zero population growth.
“Even Sanders’ framing of this issue is imperialistic,” Mr. Morrissey added. “If other countries want to fund abortions, they can make that decision for themselves. All the Mexico City policy says is that US taxpayers will not fund abortions in other countries. We do not have the authority to tell other nations how to spend their own money, nor does the Mexico City policy pretend to do so. If they do not want to abide by the terms of use of our funds, they don’t have to take them.”
In a surprise move, last night Bernie announced Thanos as his running mate https://t.co/OKaRO0zRkp
— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) September 5, 2019
• Douglas Ernst can be reached at dernst@washingtontimes.com.
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