House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) told reporters Thursday that Republican candidates for office should be more sensitive when running against women.
“Some of our members just aren’t as sensitive as they ought to be,” he said.
He said he supports efforts by the GOP to tutor candidates on what to say and what not to say when competing with a woman. The aim is to avoid more flare-ups like Todd Akin last year, who mused openly about “legitimate rape.”
Boehner’s advice? “Try to get them to be a little more sensitive.”
Update: The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee responded early afternoon to Boehner’s remarks.
“The Republican Congress’s problem with women isn’t what they say, it’s what they do,” said DCCC spokeswoman Emily Bittner. “Republicans keep trying and failing to paper over their hostility toward women, but secret tutoring sessions can’t fix this problem. No amount of tutoring and talking points from the men in the House Republican Leadership can hide the true agenda of this Republican Congress: taking away contraception coverage, ending our guaranteed preventive care, and hiking costs for women by making our gender a pre-existing condition.”
