The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

HOAX? Biden Repeats Unverified Story About 10-Year-Old Ohio Girl’s Abortion

Posted on | July 8, 2022 | 2 Comments

Monday, I called attention to this story (“A Story Too Good to Check?”) about an Indiana abortion doctor who claimed that, just three days after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, she had a 10-year-old girl referred for an abortion from Ohio, where a new law banned abortions after six weeks — and the girl was allegedly just past that gestational threshold. As a longtime editor, the problem was obvious to me:

Where’s the comment from police?
Even if you’re willing to take Dr. Caitlin Bernard’s word for the basic claim — while some 10-year-olds are physically capable of getting pregnant, such cases are very rare — you’ve left the reader knowing nothing about the most basic elements of the story: What Ohio city did this happen in? Do authorities have a suspect in custody? Or is the public still in danger from the child rapist responsible for this atrocity?

Obviously, I wasn’t the only one who found this story suspicious, and Megan Fox at PJ Media has been raising hell about it, too. The veracity of this story is not enhanced by the fact that Biden invoked it for political propaganda purposes today at the White House:

What we’re witnessing is a giant step backwards in much of our country. Already, the bans are in effect in 13 states. . . . They’re so extreme that many don’t allow for exceptions, even for rape or incest. Let me say that again: Some of the states don’t allow for exceptions for rape or incest.
This isn’t some imagined horror. It’s already happening. Just last week, it was reported that a 10-year-old girl was a rape victim in Ohio — 10 years old — and she was forced to have to travel out of the state, to Indiana, to seek to terminate the [pregnancy] and maybe save her life. That’s — the last part is my judgment. Ten years old. Ten years old Raped, six weeks pregnant. Already traumatized. Was forced to travel to another state. Imagine being that little girl. Just — I’m serious — just imagine being that little girl. Ten years old.
Does anyone believe that it’s the highest majority view that that should not be able to be dealt with, or in any other state in the nation? A 10-year-old girl should be forced to give birth to a rapist’s child? I can tell you what: I don’t. I can’t think of anything as much more extreme.

Ohio is so “extreme,” you see, and this story proves it — but when asked about the case, the White House was unable to provide any verification:

The White House has refused to offer proof to support President Biden’s claim that a 10-year-old rape victim was denied an abortion in Ohio and had to travel to Indiana for the procedure.
Mr. Biden said the story illustrated the “extreme” anti-abortion laws taking hold in states after the Supreme Court overturned a nationwide right to abortion.
When asked about the story, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre refused to say if the administration had taken steps to verify the story or if it knew the girl’s identity. Instead, she referred questions to the Justice Department saying there was a “legal component.”
“I would refer you to the DOJ, I don’t have anything more to share on the identity of this young woman or the question you asked,” she said.
She said Mr. Biden highlighted the story to underscore how “extreme” anti-abortion laws are in states that have outlawed the decision.
When pressed again if the administration, including the Justice Department, will take steps to protect the girl, Ms. Jean-Pierre sidestepped the question.
“I think what the president is calling on and what he has laid out is to protect girls and women like her and beyond,” she said.

How rare is a pregnant 10-year-old? Rare enough that there is a listing of every 10-year-old known to have given birth, and it has happened just three times in the United States since 2000:

  • March 2009: A 10-year-old Haitian girl in Lantana, Florida, became pregnant after a 33-year-old man [Fede Datilus] raped her when she was 9. Her father learned of her pregnancy only when he took her to the clinic when she suffered labor contractions on March 18, 2009. The same day, she gave birth naturally to a full-term boy. . . . She confided that she had been afraid that she and her father would be deported to Haiti — a threat the rapist had used against her. Datilus was sentenced to life imprisonment for raping a minor under 12 years, to which 5 years for impregnating her was added.
  • April 2008: Isabel Chasearez’s 10-year-old daughter, from St. Anthony, Idaho, gave birth by cesarean section to a girl weighing approximately 6 lb (2.7 kg) at Madison Memorial Hospital in Rexburg after her mother’s boyfriend [Guadalupe Gutierrez-Juarez] raped her. The man, an undocumented immigrant from Mexico, was jailed on one felony count of rape with impregnation; Chasearez was jailed as well for failing to provide proper prenatal care. Juarez was sentenced to 5 years to life.
  • April 2006: A young girl in Abbeville, South Carolina, gave birth by cesarean section. Her 26-year-old stepfather, William Edward Ronca, raped her. The baby was placed up for adoption. Ronca admitted to having molested the girl over a two-year period and was sentenced to 25 years in prison and is currently incarcerated in the Allendale Correctional Institution.

Three times in more than 20 years. If you went all the way back to 1969 (i.e, more than 50 years), you’d only add five more cases to the list. While we cannot exclude the possibility that some cases might have escaped public notice, the point is, a pregnant 10-year-old is extremely rare, so that the claim that such a case occurred in Ohio just this month, immediately after a new Ohio law went into effect, seems peculiarly convenient. As always, of course, Democrats expect the media to let them get away with telling such stories without fact checking — indeed, the media is actively helping to promote this likely hoax. Because the story has now been made so notorious, however, more reporters now have an incentive to try to verify it and all I can say to them is, good luck.

Maybe ask Jayson Blair and Stephen Glass to investigate . . .




 

Category: Abortion, Joe Biden, Journalism

Comments

2 Responses to “HOAX? Biden Repeats Unverified Story About 10-Year-Old Ohio Girl’s Abortion”

  1. WEEKEND LINKS - The DaleyGator
    July 8th, 2022 @ 9:03 pm

    […] The Other McCain notices that President Mumbles migt have told a fib, and by fib he means a damn lie! […]

  2. The Future Democratic Voters Project and the 10-Year-Old Ohio Rape Victim : The Other McCain
    July 15th, 2022 @ 5:14 pm

    […] last Friday (“HOAX? Biden Repeats Unverified Story About 10-Year-Old Ohio Girl’s Abortion”), I offered still more relevant […]