OPINION: Kunce vs. Hawley: A clear choice for reproductive freedom

By ANDY COHEN

I’m a born-and-raised Missourian. And if Josh Hawley had his way, my kids would not be alive today.

Like many Americans — women, men, gay (I’m actually not married — just gay), straight — I had to rely on IVF to build my family. I’m so incredibly thankful for the doctors, donors, and rockstar surrogates who helped bring my kids into the world. Those women gave me life. They gave me the chance to have a family. And I will be forever indebted to them.

My son Ben was born in 2019, and my daughter Lucy was born in 2022 — just a few months before the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organizations decision. As any parent with IVF kids can tell you, it isn’t easy. It’s expensive, takes time, and often fails. Fertilized embryos will almost inevitably be lost, and the costs associated with indefinite storage means extra embryos are almost always either donated to research, donated to family, or discarded.

It’s an immense privilege to be able to build a family with IVF, when it should be a right.

Now, two years after Dobbs, we’re living in an America that has less freedom than it did before — from a total abortion ban in Missouri and IVF shutdowns in Alabama, to “fetal personhood” laws (which Missouri also has) that threaten reproductive freedom in its entirety.

And no U.S. Senator is more personally responsible for it than Josh Hawley — who is now up for his first election since everything changed.

HAWLEY’S RECORD
It all started when Hawley led the Hobby Lobby case in front of the Supreme Court, which gave employers the power to refuse coverage for birth control for their workers.

Once Hawley got to the U.S. Senate, he did everything he could to push his extreme anti-reproductive freedom agenda forward…Using his taxpayer-funded office to support his activist-lawyer wife’s cases to overturn Roe, enacting Missouri’s total abortion ban, and even trying to ban the abortion pill nationwide. And sponsoring extreme “fetal personhood” bills at the national level.

Then Hawley made it clearer than ever how he feels about IVF and our right to build a family.

Hawley told the media the Right To IVF Act was really part of an “abortion agenda.”

His ultimate goal here is obvious. He wants to control OUR bodies, and even how we choose to build and raise OUR families.

And if he gets another six years to finish what he’s started, then the ability to build a family like mine — or even likely a family like yours — could be made impossible.

Josh Hawley poses a unique and existential threat to reproductive freedom, and this is our one chance to put a stop to his crusade against our freedoms. 

In fact, he objectively has the worst record on reproductive rights of any U.S. Senator.

But it’s an election year, which means Josh Hawley will be telling all sorts of lies to voters claiming he’s not responsible for this assault on our freedoms. And that’s where you and me come in.

Will you join me in supporting Lucas Kunce, the Marine veteran born-and-raised Missourian taking Hawley on this November?

(Andy Cohen is an American radio and television talk show host, producer, and writer. He is the host and executive producer of The Real Housewives franchise and Bravo’s late night talk show, Watch What Happens Live! Lucas Kunce is the Missouri AFL-CIO’s endorsed candidate in this race. For information about Kunce, go to lucaskunce.com.)