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Police were called on Saturday to investigate an abortion rights activist message left in chalk on a sidewalk outside the Maine home of Senator Susan Collins, one of two prominent Republican female senators who support abortion rights.
“Susie, please Mainers want WHPA -> vote yes, clean up your mess,” protesters wrote in water-soluble chalk outside the senator’s home in Bangor, Maine, according to a police department report. .
WHPA stands for Women’s Health Protection Act, the bill Democratic senators are pushing through Congress that would codify Roe vs. Wade in the law. Collins said last Thursday that she would not support him.
According to the police report, officers responded to a call Saturday night to investigate the message. In an email to The Washington Post, a Bangor police spokesperson said the message “was not threatening” and that “no crime had been committed.”
The message, the spokesperson said, was taken away by the city’s public works department. Officers have yet to identify those responsible.
A spokeswoman for Collins did not immediately respond to a Post request for comment.
“We are grateful to the Bangor police officers and the city’s public works employee who responded to the defacement of public property in front of our home,” Collins told the Bangor News.
Collins and fellow Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), who also supports abortion rights, are under pressure from abortion rights activists to gain support for the bill that would guarantee access to the right to abortion on a national scale. But both are unlikely to back the Democratic-led measure — they voted against an earlier version of the legislation in February.
Instead, the two proposed a competing bill, the Reproductive Choice Act, which is much more narrowly drawn than the Democratic bill and has no other co-sponsors.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki, asked about the incident during her Tuesday briefing, said peaceful protests are welcome but should not turn violent toward people or property.
“Even though the passions are strong,” Psaki said. “Even if people are scared, even if people are scared and frustrated, which is understandable, we shouldn’t – no one should resort to violence, of course, or threats, or intimidation, or vandalism That these are not effective means.