Mississippi Governor Reeves Defends His State’s Abortion Law

BUCK: We have with us Governor Tate Reeves of Mississippi. Governor Reeves, thanks for being with us.

GOV. REEVES: Hello, how are you all doing today?

BUCK: We’re good, sir, we’re good. Tell us, first off, because obviously the whole country was hearing about — many watching or listening live, I should say, to the oral arguments that occurred earlier this week in the Supreme Court about a Mississippi law meant to protect unborn babies. Can you just tell us the specifics about what is this law accomplishing and why do you believe that it will be upheld?

GOV. REEVES: Well, the law that passed the Mississippi legislature, and I have a little bit of a unique perspective here, because while I get the opportunity to serve as governor while we’re arguing this case before the United States Supreme Court, I was actually the president of the state senate that helped usher this bill to its passage. So it’s particularly important to me.

It would not allow for any abortions in the state of Mississippi beyond 15 weeks of gestation. We believe that this is a reasonable limit. And if you look at the two rulings that currently set abortion laws in Mississippi and therefore in the United States as well, it’s basically the two cases, Roe v. Wade, which was decided in 1973, as well as Planned Parenthood v. Casey, which was decided in 1992. And we believe that the United States Supreme Court got both of those cases wrong. And we think this is an ideal opportunity for the court to recognize that and to really right a wrong decision.

CLAY: Governor, appreciate you coming on with us. This is Clay. When you watched the discussion — and, look, any lawyer out there can tell you that trying to analyze the questions of any judge is sometimes a fool’s errand, but it seemed quite clear. Even — I’m looking at the front page of the New York Times. They said, hey, this question went really well for the state of Mississippi.

I feel like they’re going to uphold your law, maybe also overturn Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey. But let’s assume that for the first part that your law is going to be upheld. Would you anticipate that almost immediately the Mississippi law becomes a model for many other states across the country? And if the law is upheld at 15 weeks, would Mississippi go back and say, “Let’s see whether 10 weeks or 12 weeks or eight weeks”? What number…? Doesn’t that just encourage…? If they say 15 is okay, the next question is, “Well, what number is not okay? How much more can we restrict?” Isn’t that the natural evolution here?

GOV. REEVES: Well, Clay, let me be clear: I believe that life begins at conception, and anything we can do to reduce the number of unborn children that are aborted is a major victory. And so we’re going to continue to try to protect every single unborn child. You know, there’s been 62 million unborn children in America since Roe was decided that have been aborted.

Sixty-two million in America since some 49 years ago, and so there’s no doubt that regardless of how the court rules, the words that they write on the page in their opinion is going to be exceptionally important as to what our next step is. I certainly believe that if the court upholds our law — and I believe it should be noted, because I don’t know that everyone really understands this.

The other side in this debate, the abortion-on-demand crowd, they really want people to believe that this law would be outside the mainstream of abortion laws in the world. Nothing could be further from the truth. If you look at states like California and New York in the U.S. right now, their abortion laws are much more like China and North Korea than they are like other countries around the world.

In fact, if this 15-week ban is upheld, there are 42 countries in Europe, Clay, that allow elective abortions. If our law is upheld at 15 weeks, there will still be 39 countries in Europe that have more restrictive abortion laws than Mississippi, and I believe Mississippi is one of the most conservative states in all of the United States, and yet still 39 countries in Europe would allow more restrictive laws. This is a piece of legislation that’s really in the mainstream of what’s going on in the rest of the world, and I’m hopeful that the nine justices recognize that.

BUCK: We’re speaking to Governor Tate Reeves of Mississippi. Governor, Clay and I are trying to get a sense… We don’t know, obviously, what the Supreme Court’s ruling will be. Nobody does until it comes out in June of 2022. But we’ll be in a midterm election year. I know you’re focused in on the state of Mississippi and what’s happening in the state, as far as you as a governor, but if you would look at the national political contests that will be underway next year, how do you see Roe v. Wade and the Supreme Court looking at the Mississippi law playing into that? And what do you think the effects will be?

GOV. REEVES: You know, that’s a great question, and it’s one that I know many of my friends in the political realm are very interested in that question. What I would submit to you is a couple of things. Number one, I believe that the people of America are with us on this issue. If you look at the latest Gallup poll — and let’s be honest, I think we can agree that Gallup is not exactly a right-wing polling organization.

But if you look at the latest Gallup poll, there are only 18% of Democrats in America who believe abortion should be allowable in the third trimester. There are only 41% of Americans, according to Gallup, that believe that any abortion should be allowed after the first trimester. Because of that, I think this particular bill probably has the support of between 60 and 70% of Americans.

One of the reasons that I’ve spent a great deal of time over the last week or so going on every outlet that I possibly could — including those that are exceptionally unfriendly to me — is because I believe the more we talk about the reasons we’re standing up for unborn children, the more Americans we can convince to be on our side on this issue, because by and large Americans are good people and they want what’s right.

So I believe this is an issue that we, as Republicans, can win on. I believe that it’s certainly an issue in Mississippi that we can win on. But I will also tell you, Clay and Buck — and this may not go over well with everyone — sometimes I think we have too many politicians in America that are focused on the next election rather than being focused on doing what’s right.

And for me, this isn’t a Republican or Democrat or an independent issue. This isn’t a left-and-right issue. This is an issue on right and wrong. And if I were to lose my next election because I fought too hard for unborn children, you know what? That’s something I can get up every morning after I lose that election, look myself in the mirror and say, “You know what? I did what I believe is right,” because people like me and others like me around the country have to stand up for the rights of the unborn because they cannot stand up for themselves.

CLAY: We’re talking to Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves. Governor Reeves, I was just… Much less serious news here, but also positive stuff. I was just down in Oxford, Mississippi, one of the great jewels of college landscapes across the country. Lane Kiffin had a good year. I’m good buddies with Mike Leach, Mississippi State’s coach.

I’m sure you saw when Dr. Fauci came out and said (summarized), “Oh, when college football season starts covid is going to feast on all these red-state crowds.” I’m looking right now at the latest data. The five states with the lowest rate of covid in America, according to the data I’m looking at right now in the New York Times, are Mississippi, Georgia, Louisiana, Hawaii, Alabama and Florida. I think that’s six states.

What are you seeing on the ground? Five of them are red states, Southern states there. What are you seeing on the ground as it pertains to covid in Mississippi? I know covid can make fools of everybody when it comes to prognostication, but do you think you guys have gotten through the Delta variant, and what are you seeing in terms of the numbers on the ground on a day-to-day basis in your state?

GOV. REEVES: Well, when the Delta variant initially surfaced here on American soil, it obviously started and hit those of us in the Sunbelt and in southeastern states very hard, very quickly, very early in the process. We saw is an uptick in cases which led, of course, to an uptick in hospitalizations, primarily amongst the unvaccinated.

But an uptick in hospitalizations and uptick number of patients in ICU beds. But unfortunately, there’s so many people around America that have tried to treat this virus and treat this disease with politics. And the reality is, what we’ve tried to do in our state is recognize that there’s only… We can certainly do certain things that protect us at the margin.

But we also have to realize that our job is to protect the integrity of the health care system to ensure that every single Mississippian who gets the virus that can get better with quality care, receives that quality care. So we’ve been focused on the integrity of our healthcare system. We have seen everything from cases to hospitalizations, to patients in ICU beds, to patients on ventilators down between 90 and 94% from our peak back in August.

And obviously that’s a good thing. I just happened to look at the data because I was having a conversation recently. Our total seven-day average — the most recent one I’ve seen a day or so ago — was 237 cases. On the same day, the state of Michigan had approximately 10,000 cases on a seven-day average.

So what you were looking at that time was literally a state that had 3-1/2 our population had 50 times our number of cases. Again, it doesn’t matter if you have a Republican governor or Democrat governor, and it really, the virus is going to virus at certain times and we’ve just got to be prepared to deal with it.

BUCK: Governor Tate Reeves of Mississippi. Sir, appreciate your time very much today. Thank you for being on the Clay and Buck show.

GOV. REEVES: Thank you so much, Clay and Buck. Appreciate it always.