UN bashes Alabama on women's rights, immigration, abortion - State Auditor says agency 'has
By Howard Koplowitz | hkoplowitz@al.com
Montgomery, AL
Alabama State Auditor Jim Zeigler railed against a United Nations report that slammed the state's voter ID law, "history of severe violence against abortion providers," and treatment toward immigrants, saying the U.N. has "no business in Alabama."
The report, released Friday, was compiled by a group of U.N. investigators who were in Alabama and two other states last month and found that in the U.S., "women fall behind international standards as regards their public and political representation, their economic and social rights and their health and safety protections."
Reached on Monday by AL.com, Zeigler said the report is "not going to sit well with the people of Alabama and they have no business doing this. They should be going to Syria or many, many other places besides Alabama."
Zeigler said he was particularly concerned by a section of the report referring to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, or CEDAW, which notes that the U.S. is one of seven countries that haven't ratified the convention. Still, the U.N. said the convention's ideals are contained in another U.N. provision that is "binding" to America.
The state auditor said Alabama is capable of handling discrimination outlined by the convention. He added that although the report found that the state's voter ID laws made it difficult for women whose names changed due to marriage or divorce to cast ballots, he never heard of such complaints.
"The Alabama secretary of state's office and the state Legislature are perfectly competent to look into any complaints about that," he said.
The report also criticized the state's "history of violence against abortion providers," referring to the 1993 killing of Dr. David Gunn, who was killed at his Pensacola, Florida, abortion clinic and operated another clinic in Alabama. The report didn't invoke the bombing of a Birmingham abortion clinic by Eric Rudolph in 1998.
Zeigler accused the U.N. investigators of mischaracterizing Alabama and said the body should butt out of the state's business.
"We all are against violence against anyone, but the court systems and law enforcement are perfectly capable of handling that," he said, adding that the Gunn murder was "ancient history" and "in another millennium."
"We don't need the help of the U.N.," Zeigler continued.
The body also called out Alabama's treatment of immigrants, bashing the state for not allowing immigrants who lawfully reside in the state to get access to Medicaid even after they wait the federally mandated five-year timeframe to apply.
"We heard appalling testimonies of migrant women who were diagnosed with breast cancer but could not afford the appropriate treatment," the reporters wrote. Our Group also regretted to learn about the serious inadequacies of health care facilities to treat women with disabilities and calls for improvement."
Zeigler questioned the credibility of the report because investigators didn't contact church leaders, adoption advocates or abortion alternative counselors.
"The U.N. is preparing to try to dictate to Alabama what we must do on abortion, contraceptives given to youth, sex education in schools, tolerance of alternative sexual orientation and other 'progressive' issues," he said in a statement.
"I will monitor this developing situation and report back. I will also coordinate a strategy for how we can resist this U.N. intrusion."