Kerry Washington says 'Scandal' abortion scene was 'cathartic' due to her own abortion

Actress Kerry Washington said her infamous abortion scene in the TV show "Scandal" was cathartic for her because of her own past abortion.

Key Takeaways:

• In 2015, Washington's "Scandal" character Olivia Pope smiled as she had an abortion during a Christmas episode of the show, set to the song "Silent Night."

• The scene was immediately controversial, and ABC wanted it scrapped; showrunner Shonda Rhimes refused.

• Washington later revealed she had an abortion in her 20s, and said filming the "Scandal" scene was "cathartic."

The Details:

The episode, "Baby It's Cold Outside," took place during the mid-season finale of "Scandal" in 2015.

In a new interview with the Call Her Daddy podcast, actress Kerry Washington looked back on the notorious scene after being asked if it was "triggering," given that Washington has had an abortion in real life. "I don't think it was triggering to film it," Washington said. "I do think it was cathartic."

Washington hadn't previously disclosed her history with abortion, eventually sharing it in her 2023 memoir "Thicker Than Water." But she said the scene was a way for her to share it with the world without explicitly saying it out loud.

"I got to say, 'This is something that happened to me,'" she said. "'This is something that I chose. This is something that I've lived through and I'm not going to hide it anymore.' Even though I was hiding it like on some like deeper emotional level, I was able to say like, 'I'm going to step into the truth of this moment and share it with all of you.'"

The Backstory:

Washington's character, Olivia Pope, had an illicit and tumultuous relationship with the show's president, Fitzgerald “Fitz” Grant, and in that particular episode, she learned she was pregnant. Pope chose to have an abortion, and smiled as the procedure was committed.

Before the episode's abortion scene, a man was executed, and the entire portion of the episode was set to the Christmas song, “Silent Night.”

It was accompanied by a disturbing monologue:

"A pressure point, soft tissue, an illness, an antidote to greatness. You think you’re better off with people who rely on you, depend on you, but you’re wrong, because you will inevitably end up needing them, which makes you weak, pliable. Family doesn’t complete you. It destroys you."

Afterward, Pope sat next to a Christmas tree drinking a glass of wine and listening to “Ave Maria.” The show featured songs that glorified the birth of Jesus Christ, while also glorifying the brutal killing of a preborn child.

Kerry Washington: Power, Perfection & Olivia Pope

Later, Rhimes and actress Bellamy Young, who played First Lady Mellie Grant, reflected on the episode, saying that ABC initially did not want to air it.

“I said, ‘Go ahead, alter the scene. We’ll just have a lot of articles about how you altered the scene’,” Rhimes said. “We had done an abortion on a military woman who had been raped earlier on, and we were doing nothing different than we did in that scene — they just didn’t like that it was happening to Olivia. It was a Christmas episode, and we played Christmas music.”

Young added, “I don’t think abortion had ever been presented as an emancipated woman’s option before. And it’s set to ‘Silent Night.’ The balls to pick that song!”

Why It Matters:

Pope was presented as a role model for Black women to emulate, particularly by Planned Parenthood, despite the string of selfish and unhealthy decisions made by Pope throughout the show's run. As Live Action's Christina Bennett said, "I’ve never watched Scandal because I don’t support the plot of a black woman being a mistress and wreaking havoc on a family."

Washington, meanwhile, has continued to openly advocate for abortion, presenting it as a positive for women, as opposed to the violent, traumatic experience it truly is.

“It’s just so important to me that abortion is not a bad word, and that my abortion is not another thing on the list of things that I’m ashamed of," she said, adding, "We’re at a moment where it’s really important to be telling the truth about our reproductive choices because some of those choices are being stripped away from us.”

However, this mindset is common among post-abortive women, who frequently feel the need to justify their abortions, find support for them, and encourage others to have them as well. Many later find actual catharsis from their trauma through post-abortion healing programs — not from trying to paint abortion as a positive.

The Bottom Line:

Washington has marketed herself as a defender of human rights, but the truth is, she supports depriving human beings of their most inherent right: the right to life.