‘Pro-life’ Senator Greg Treat Calls Abolitionist Colleagues ‘Terrorists’ For Seeking Hearing on Bill
Vaunted Oklahoma ‘Pro-life’ leader and President Pro Tempore of the Oklahoma Senate Greg Treat continues his unholy crusade against any legislation that would permanently abolish all abortion in his state, recently calling fellow senators Dusty Deevers and Nathan Dahm “terrorists” for seeking to bring SB 1729, the Abolition of Abortion Act, to the floor.
Despite Treat describing himself as pro-life and fundraising on those credentials, receiving accolades from Oklahoma’s pro-life community, he is the man more responsible than any other for the legislature’s failure to pass an abolition bill.
Despite Republican politicians having a supermajority in the House and Senate in the state for years and despite nearly all of them running as pro-lifers, they have consistently failed to abolish abortion in the state before the overturning of Roe and even now resist efforts after the fall of it.
Treat has consistently opposed abolition legislation, and there has never been an abolitionist bill introduced that he didn’t seek to move heaven and earth to see undone and made dead on arrival. Notably, in 2019, he was instrumental in denying SB13, a bill that would have abolished abortion completely, a hearing on the floor.
After facing outrage (and perhaps pressured by SB13 supporters putting thousands of door hangers in his district urging him to allow the vote), Treat quickly authored and introduced a trigger bill that would only outlaw abortion after Roe was overturned, which is a cowardly way of doing nothing.
This is Treat’s trademark move. He has introduced several pro-life bills over the years, all designed to regulate abortion in some manner-how it is done, when it can be done, and where it can be done- but never a bill that insists “under no circumstances can it ever be done.’
Frustrated with Greg Treat’s habit of choosing to hear almost exclusively his own bills and that of his friends at the expense of any grassroots bills, including the Abolition of Abortion Act, Senators Deevers and Dahm staged an hours-long filibuster to protest Treat’s action.
Rather than allow these bills a hearing, which would have taken far less time, Treat was content to listen to and endure the filibuster, which saw the two senators spending hours reading other bills word for word, including the text of a medical marijuana bill.
In response, Treat declared that “he doesn’t negotiate with terrorists,” casting aspersions on the senators who simply want their bill and other conservative grassroots bills to be heard.
I started hearing rumors about some dissidents wanting to gum up the process earlier this week, and then last night the rumors became a little bit more persistent. So I wasn’t shocked that Senator Dahm and Senator Deever wanted to gum up the process.
…(I’m) obviously displeased with the tactics that are taking place on the Senate floor right now. It distracts from getting important things to the finish line on this deadline. I don’t negotiate with terrorists so if they want to hold things up they can hold things up as long as they want. We’ll be here until midnight.
We would urge everyone, especially Oklahomans, to call & email Greg Treat urging him to hear, support, & vote for the abolition bill, SB1729.
405-521-5632 | Greg.Treat@oksenate.gov
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