John Legend has been vocal about his stance in the current election, particularly in addressing the views and beliefs held by the right-wing.
One key topic he weighed in on during his interview on the Club Shay Shay podcast is the debate over reproductive rights, where he expressed his support for pro-choice policies as opposed to the pro-life stance often championed by Republicans and conservatives.
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“I was always pro-choice. Actually not always,” he said. “I grew up in the church and we were taught that we were supposed to be pro-life when I was growing up in the church. But as soon as I became an adult I just realized that we need that choice. We don’t need the government telling us what to do and women don’t need the government telling them what to do with their bodies. Life is complicated and there are all kinds of reasons why people might want or need an abortion and the government has no place in that decision.”
The “All of Me” singer delved deeper into the conversation by sharing details about he and his wife, Chrissy Teigen’s, experience with infertility. The couple has four children, three were conceived by in vitro fertilization and the last was welcomed via surrogate.
But in 2020, Legend and Teigen naturally conceived their son Jack, who would have been their third child. At just 20 weeks, Teigen had to have a life-saving abortion procedure due to partial placenta abruption, which is a condition where the placenta either partially or completely separates from the uterus before birth. There are cases where it can be mild, but the condition can be life-threatening for the baby and the mother – which was the case for Teigen.
Legend added, “then when we went through all these fertility struggles and then had a miscarriage it made it even more clear to me how personal everything that happens in that room with your OBGYN – everything that happens in that room is private.”
The decision to overturn Roe v. Wade in 2022 erased the federal constitutional right to abortion. Now, some states have severely limited or even eliminated a woman’s option to get an abortion. Currently, there are 13 states with full abortion bans while others have bans based on gestational limits on the stage of pregnancy the woman is in. Early gestational limits are usually anywhere from six-15 weeks into the pregnancy.
Continuing the topic of discussion with Sharpe, Legend said, “And then what people don’t realize is when you say ‘Oh I’m fine with it as long as it’s up to 15 weeks,’ like people that have an abortion after 15 weeks almost always say they wanted to keep the baby, but there is some kind of complication that came up that they have to have an abortion.
“So my wife, she was well past 15 weeks when she had to have an abortion. She was miscarrying and bleeding out and…her life was in danger and for the government to say ‘Uh we need to evaluate this to make sure you’re sufficiently dying before you can have an abortion.’ That’s what they are saying in Texas and Georgia and all these states where they have Trump abortion bans.”
The “Ordinary People“ singer also called out Trump for wanting to “take credit” for enforcing the overturn of Roe v. Wade. He pointed out that many of the states that have severe abortion bans are the southern ones.
“You put it with these states and by the way that’s where most Black women live – in the south. So that means the majority of Black women are in regimes that would rather…possibly let them die before giving them the life-saving treatment that they need.”
According to the CDC, Black women are three times more likely to die from a pregnancy-related cause than white women. It also claims that 80% of all pregnancy-related deaths are preventable.
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