Democratic Texas State Rep. and U.S. Senate candidate James Talarico claimed that the Bible does not take a stand on abortion and argued that the government should not restrict the practice.
“I trust Texas women to make decisions about their own bodies, to shape their own destinies in consultation with their family members, their doctors, their faith leaders,” he said while speaking with podcaster Jamie Kern Lima. “I don’t believe that’s a place for government. I don’t believe it’s a place for politicians. I don’t believe it’s a place for the state. And that’s a belief I hold not despite my faith, but because of my faith.”
Talarico declared that “Jesus never talks about abortion” and that the Bible is “silent on abortion.”
“And when that happens with a social issue as important as abortion, we Christians have to take Scripture as a whole. And we’ve got to try to make some kind of ethical determination,” he continued, condemning Texas’s abortion law.
Talarico has also criticized the Ten Commandments in Texas classrooms. “I think this is an unconstitutional decision. I also think this is a deeply un-Christian decision,” he told CNN, “because we are supposed to be loving all of our neighbors, particularly our neighbors of other faiths.”
He also took a shot at Attorney General Ken Paxton, who praised the Fifth Circuit’s 9-8 decision upholding Senate Bill 10 as a “major victory for Texas and our moral values.” Talarico told CNN he wasn’t sure Paxton was “in a place to lecture us on moral values.”
