Richard Hanania, a scholar from Columbia University, fretted to his thousands of followers on Wednesday night that a new Texas law that would ban abortions once a heartbeat can be detected would be detrimental to America because it would enable more people with down syndrome to be born.
As The Daily Caller reports:
A Columbia University scholar suggested late Wednesday night that Texas’ Heartbeat Act will lead to the birth of more babies with Down syndrome, increasing negative stereotypes about red states.
One in every 700 babies in the United States is born with Down syndrome, according to the National Down Syndrome Society. It is not clear what number of babies with Down syndrome are aborted, but one 2012 study estimated the abortion rate for babies with Downs was 67%, the AP reported.
A September 2011 study on perceptions of people with Down syndrome found that almost 99% of people with Down syndrome said they were happy with their lives and loved their families, 97% liked who they were and their brothers and sisters, and 96% liked how they look.
Hanania, a former research fellow at the Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies at Columbia University who has written in The Atlantic, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Needless to say conservatives on social media didn’t take kindly to Hanania’s transparent call for eugenics to end the lives of disabled people in the womb:
Saying the ‘quiet part out loud’ about Eugenics and the killing of those with disabilities? You do realise Nazi promoters of this were hanged for this after World War II?
— Gray Connolly (@GrayConnolly) September 2, 2021
Endorsing eugenics to own the cons. https://t.co/scAnZaDlYh
— Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) September 2, 2021
Have you ever met a kid with Down syndrome, Richard? I have. He’s one of my brothers. Downs kids are pure joy. Setting public policy thresholds for what constitutes a “worthwhile” human life is eugenics. Even Planned Parenthood isn’t dumb enough to say this out loud. https://t.co/7SF5KbbNj6
— Rachel Bovard (@rachelbovard) September 2, 2021