Viral Tweet Reveals Disparity In Missouri Abortion Laws and Mask Mandates

A former Missouri legislator has gone viral after criticizing state lawmakers over what he sees as a disparity in their attempts to enact stricter abortion laws while shying away from imposing mask mandates in schools.

Bob Quinn, a former Director of the Missouri Public State Commission and ex-councilman for the City of Ferguson, appeared to take aim at Governor Mike Parson and the legislature in a tweet, which has been shared over 16,000 times.

He wrote: "So the state can mandate that a 14 year old girl carry the pregnancy forced upon her by a rapist to term and endure delivery at her age, BUT the state CANNOT mandate that same girl wear a mask at school, because that's too great a burden for the state to impose. WHAT?"

Governor Parson is in favor of vaccinations but has been a vocal opponent of introducing mask mandates in Missouri. "Dictating mask mandates when we have the vaccine is ignoring the real solution and eroding public trust," he told supporters on Facebook last month.

While Missouri does not prohibit school districts from making masks a requirement, Governor Parson is opposed to introducing a state-wide mandate.

In a recent interview with Scott Faughn of the Missouri Times he said it made "no common sense" to expect young children to wear masks all day and warned that overreach of this kind would have legislative consequences for schools.

The approach stands in stark contrast to the governor's stance on abortion rights.

Back in May 2019, Governor Parson signed a bill outlawing abortions in Missouri after eight weeks of pregnancy, including in cases of rape or incest.

The law also prohibited women from having an abortion in the event that the fetus is discovered to have Down syndrome.

Under the bill, the only exemptions would be instances where a physician determines the pregnancy would put the mother's health at risk.

The law was criticized by abortion-rights advocates who viewed it as the equivalent of an outright ban given that most women are not aware of their pregnancy at eight weeks.

A U.S. District Judge subsequently issued an order temporarily blocking the law following a legal challenge from the ACLU and the Planned Parenthood clinic in St. Louis, who argued it is unconstitutional.

Two months ago, a three-judge panel of the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Louis also blocked Missouri from enforcing the new abortion law.

Similar laws have already been struck down in conservative states like Iowa and North Dakota, where the hope is that the Supreme Court will eventually seek to overturn Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that established abortion rights in the U.S.