Meet the Three (Male, GOP) Politicians Who Support Over-the-Counter Birth Control Pills

Over-the-counter contraception is a popular
proposal among American women: In
a 2013 poll, two-thirds said they were in favor of making
hormonal birth control pills available without a prescription. It’s
a plan supported
by major U.S. medical organizations, too. Following this week’s

Supreme Court ruling in Burwell v. Hobby
Lobby, many libertarian types have been taking the occasion to
once again push
for OTC birth control pills. 

It’s not a terribly apt corollary to the Hobby Lobby
situation—of the contraceptive forms Hobby Lobby’s owners oppose,
one (Plan B) is already sold over the counter, and another (the
IUD) legitimately requires a doctor’s visit. But, hey, I’m always
game to discuss the merits of OTC birth control pills. Most
politicians, not so surprisingly, are not.

But what is surprising is who has been willing to
broach the topic. If this were an Upworthy-esque site, I would have
titled this post, “The 3 Politicians Who Publicly Support OTC Birth
Control—What They Have In Common Will Surprise You!” What they have
in common is they’re all male Republicans.

In the wake of the Hobby Lobby ruling, the only elected
officials who have been calling for truly giving women more
reproductive autonomy and greater access to contraception have been
Y-chromosomed conservatives. The majority of responses I’ve seen
from (male and female) Democratic politicians have simultaneously
asserted that birth control decisions are not a woman’s boss’
business and continued to call for a system that makes birth
control pills explicitly that. (The majority of official Republican
responses have been no joy ride either, but at least these tend to
be logically consistent in their idiocy.)

So without further ado: the only three politicians I could find
on record supporting non-prescription birth control
pills. 

1. Cory Gardner

Rep. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.) is currently running for a seat in
the U.S. Senate. His opponent, Democratic Sen. Mark Udall, has been
hammering Gardner over his alleged stance on contraception (Udall
claimed that Gardner wanted to ban it). Rather than sit back and
let the war-on-women hype machine roll over him, Gardner has gone
on the defensive. In June,
Gardner penned an op-ed for The Denver Post calling
for an end to the “zero-sum approach to women’s medical care.”

“It’s time we changed that and adopt modern policies that make
sense instead of using women’s medical issues as an election-year
power play,” wrote Gardner. “One of the most rational ways for
Washington to break this gridlock is to approve oral contraception
for over-the-counter purchases by adults.” 

2. Bobby Jindal

In 2012, Louisiana
Gov. Bobby Jindal also took to the op-ed pages in support of
over-the-counter birth control pills. “As an unapologetic pro-life
Republican, I also believe that every adult (18 years old and over)
who wants contraception should be able to purchase it,” Jindal
wrote in The Wall Street Journal, expressing
agreement with a recent announcement from the American College of
Obstetricians and Gynecologists that oral contraceptives should be
sold without a prescription. 

3. Gabriel Gomez

Gabriel Gomez is not even an elected official—this is how much I
had to scrape to come up with at least three vocal political
supporters of OTC birth control. Gomez was the Republican nominee
for a U.S. Senate seat in the 2013 special election Massachusetts
had to replace John Kerry. He lost to Democrat Edward Markey, who
had made abortion access and contraception a major focus of his
critiques against Gomez. 

Gomez stressed repeatedly that, while personally against
abortion, he viewed Roe v Wade as “settled law.” As far as
birth control,
Gomez said, “contraception should be available over the
counter. They should take the politics out of it. And they should
take the pharmaceutical companies out of it.”