Shields: Cecile Richards Had to Apologize for the Cavalier Tone in Video

WOODRUFF: “Mark.”

SHIELDS: “I think David is right. I think abortion remains a painful and difficult issue in this country. America, I think it’s fair to say, is pro-choice. They don’t want to criminalize a woman who, in consultation with her conscience or confessor, her physician decides on the very painful process of ending a pregnancy. At the same time, America’s anti-abortion. The idea that this is somehow a virtuous act is objectionable and unacceptable to Americans. And I think what you have here is — and, admittedly, I give Lisa Desjardins great credit for going through the three hours of it — but an edited version. But, still, you have the woman, the doctor from Planned Parenthood in a very cavalier and callous fashion talking about, we’re going to go in, in a way — not that this is some surgical procedure being performed on a woman and ending a life or potential life, but in a way that we’re going to preserve the organs for use. I mean, it was — I think Cecile Richards had no alternative, the president of Planned Parenthood, except to apologize for that tone and the way it was done.”