The Week in Quotes (Jan. 15 – 21)

Here are some of the week’s most notable quotes culled from news reports from across Texas, and beyond.

Dr. Laura Meyers, President & CEO of Planned Parenthood of Metropolitan Washington, on a recent gathering of religious leaders who came together to bless Planned Parenthood and its mission.

Having such a ceremony take place at this moment in history is especially powerful for us as we seek to mobilize our communities of different faiths to come together to affirm and support the reproductive freedoms we cherish and have fought so hard to achieve.

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Rhonda Struminger of Texas A&M University and Shauna Shames of Rutgers University-Camden, on the Texas regulation requiring fetal remains from miscarriage or abortion to be buried or cremated.

Whatever their personal views of abortion, Texans should unite against an overbearing state that infringes on freedom of religion and plays the role of a disapproving parent to its citizens.

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Texas House Speaker Joe Straus, criticizing the anti-LGBTQ “bathroom bill” that Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick has made a priority.

There’s been a lot of work put into our state’s economic success. Contrary to popular myth, it is not a miracle. We want to continue that success and we want Texas to keep attracting the best and the brightest. One way to maintain our economic edge is to send the right signals about who we are.

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Dan Quinn, Texas Freedom Network communications director, on Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s “bathroom bill.”

Allowing transgender people to use the public restrooms is not a violation of privacy to anybody, nor is it a threat to safety. The folks most likely to face physical danger are LGBT people themselves, and that’s not helped when you have elected officials who use them as political ‘red meat’ and demonize them just to please their political base.