Planned Parenthood CEO Cecile Richards has said the decision to abort her fourth baby wasn't all that difficult, and there were no regrets on her part.
Richards shared her personal abortion experience in an essay recently published in Elle, hoping that her story will put a stop to the "stigma" surrounding abortion.
"I had an abortion. It was the right decision for me and my husband, and it wasn't a difficult decision," Richards wrote. "Before becoming president of Planned Parenthood eight years ago, I hadn't really talked about it beyond family and close friends. But I'm here to say, when politicians argue and shout about abortion, they're talking about me — and millions of other women around the country."
She revisited the topic during a recent interview with anchor Katie Couric, who publicly supports abortion. Richards said "undercover, hoax videos" are sadly something they've been dealing with for the past 10 years, but she hopes women would still uphold and favour reproductive rights the same way she did when she got an abortion several years back.
"It was a decision my husband and I made. It was a personal decision. And we have three children that we adore and that are the centre of my life. And we decided that was as big as our family needed to be. That was really the story," she said. "It wasn't anything more dramatic than that. But I can't imagine a woman being in that circumstance — with an unintended pregnancy – and not being able to make her own decision about that pregnancy."
Richards did not go into detail about her abortion, and she did not say how old the baby was at the time of abortion, or why she did not carry on with the pregnancy and give the baby up for adoption later.
