Abortion

While Eliminating Health Care, North Carolina Governor Offers Advocates a Plate of Cookies

As protesters continued to demonstrate outside the governor's mansion Tuesday, Gov. McCrory hand-delivered to them a plate-full of cookies—a gesture that many reproductive rights supporters have interpreted as condescending.

As protesters continued to demonstrate outside the governor's mansion Tuesday, Gov. McCrory hand-delivered to them a plate-full of cookies—a gesture that many reproductive rights supporters have interpreted as condescending. Chocolate chip cookies via Shutterstock

Republican Gov. Pat McCrory signed into law a long fought-over package of abortion restrictions Monday evening. As protesters continued to demonstrate outside the governor’s mansion the following day, McCrory hand-delivered to them a plate-full of cookies—a gesture that many reproductive rights supporters have interpreted as condescending.

The protesters at the governor’s mansion “came up with an off-the-cuff chant: ‘Hey Pat, that was rude. You wouldn’t give cookies to a dude,'” The News & Observer reported.

The protesters returned the offering untouched.

Irene Godinez, director of public affairs for Planned Parenthood Health Systems Action Fund, called the gesture “incredibly bizarre,” a sentiment picked up by Planned Parenthood Action Fund. The group tweeted out an image of a plate of cookies with the words “Governor McCrory: I’ll take health care, you keep the cookies.”

Photo via PPActionFundCNC / Twitter
Photo via PPActionFundCNC / Twitter

The reproductive rights advocates who began their “veto vigil” against SB 353 on Monday, changed gears—and decades—Tuesday, asking participants to don ’60s-era Mad Men-inspired costumes to evoke the days before Roe v. Wade. Advocates held a similar action early in the 2013 legislative session in protest of a bill that would have allowed employers to refuse coverage for birth control in their employees’ insurance plans.

As Paige Johnson, vice president of public affairs for Planned Parenthood Action Fund of Central North Carolina, said in a statement, “We will not go back to a time when access to safe and legal healthcare as well as basic voting rights were reserved for the privileged few.”