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UPDATE: Border Agency Denies Asking Detained Woman About Abortion [1]

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Date: 2022-09-17

The original interview I did with The Guardian Australia generated a lot of interest on here so I thought people might be keen to read what CBP have said about one of their staff asking me if I’d had recent abortion.

From The Guardian story: An Australian woman who planned to house-sit in Canada during a holiday has said she was detained, fingerprinted, interrogated about her abortion history and quickly deported during a stopover in the US.

CBP told The Daily Beast they ask all travellers in their custody a series of health questions, including pregnancy-related questions for females being held in airport detention. CBP said the immigration officer asked me—the female traveller en route to Canada—if I ‘suffered a pregnancy loss’ (the officer didn’t say that).

From The Daily Beast story: Now, the agency is denying her claim and insisting the officer asked only if she had suffered a pregnancy loss—which it says is standard procedure for any woman being detained at a border crossing. “CBP denies any wrongdoing,” an agency spokesperson told The Daily Beast. “The officer acted with integrity, respect, professionalism and in accordance with U.S. laws and regulations.”

Now they’re telling the Daily Mail: 'We don't use the word abortion ever. We say termination of pregnancy’. They definitely didn’t ask about ‘termination of pregnancy’ either. The officer said abortion. ‘Have you had recently had/had a recent abortion?’

From the Daily Mail story: Jaime Ruiz, public affairs for the US Customs and Border Protection/US Department of Homeland Security sent DailyMail.com a lengthy statement that includes their policies and denied the claims made by Gourley. 'We don't use the word abortion ever. We say termination of pregnancy. You can go back to the policy act it never mentions the word abortion,' Ruiz said. He continued, saying, 'the story has been taken out of context' and that the incident had 'nothing to do with politics or anything. Nothing to do with abortion today. It is totally unrelated. The abortion word was never used.'

Isn’t an abortion the same as ‘termination of pregnancy’? What do you guys think?

And has it been taken out of context? I didn’t say there was a political motive behind it—I just thought it was odd they asked me these questions given I was being held on suspicion of working illegally in the USA (despite being on my way to Canada when this all happened).

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/9/17/2123580/-UPDATE-Border-Agency-Denies-Asking-Detained-Woman-About-Abortion

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