WICHITA, KS, February 11, 2013, (LifeSiteNews.com) – The woman trying to reopen George Tiller's abortion clinic has claimed that women who choose abortion are motivated by feelings of motherhood in a new interview with a left-wing magazine. “Abortion is about motherhood,” said Julie Burkhart, who hopes to open South Wind Women’s Center on the same grounds as Tiller's late-term abortion facility, in an interview with Mother Jones.
Julie Burkhart hopes to take up where George Tiller left off.
She said “abortion care” is “about motherhood, because by and large women coming in to have abortions are concerned about the kind of life and the future for their children.”
“Women are thinking in a very responsible manner when choosing that,” she said. “In truth these are very well thought out decisions women are making. They're taking responsibility for their lives and the lives of their future families."
Burkhart is the former leader of George Tiller's political action committee, ProKanDo. Her new organization, the Trust Women Foundation, has purchased the site where Tiller's clinic operated. On its website, the organization states the reopening is its means of “keeping Dr. Tiller’s legacy alive.”
Kansas-based Operation Rescue has already filed a complaint after discovring that the abortion facility's renovation is being carried out without a permit. Eyewitnesses say they have seen Dale's Plumbing Services modernizing the property. Local residents recently presented a petition with 14,000 signatures against reopening the clinic.
However, Burkhart says most of the area has been favorable to her, except for “the antis,” who are “good bullies.”
“We want people to understand that this is a new day; this is a new clinic. We're working on a different model of healthcare for women,” Burkhart said.
The new business will provide abortion only until the 14th week of pregnancy, she said, rather than the late-term procedures that made Tiller's location the source of national controversy.
Those reassurances ring hollow to pro-lifers.
“If this clinic is allowed to reopen, it is only a matter of time before their gross disregard for the law lands more women in the hospital emergency rooms just as Tiller’s abortion operation did,” said Cheryl Sullenger, chief policy adviser at Operation Rescue.
But Burkhart dismisses such concerns. “It's like really, come on,” she said. “We're a town that used to have three abortion clinics. Shouldn't we be able to have at least one ob-gyn practice that offers abortion care?"
