On Wednesday, President Obama will end a three-day tour through Iowa, one of the battleground states. First Lady Michelle Obama will join him on his last day for just the first time since May. He is trying to continue his appeal to women and has stressed regularly his support for the issues important to them such as abortion rights. This issue could come into real focus because of Paul Ryan joining the Republican presidential ticket.

Ryan, the Wisconsin Representative, is the chairman for the House Budget Committee and is known for the very conservative budget proposal he authored. However, his opinions on issues such as abortion are just as conservative as his economic views. In 2010, he told the Weekly Standard, a conservative magazine, that he was as pro-life as anyone can be.

Ryan’s credentials for anti-abortion rights are impeccable, unlike those of Romney. Ryan has been given a 100% pro-life voting record stamp by a nationwide group that tracks voting records of congress members on abortion rights issues. The federation says that for every vote Ryan has participated in since becoming a member of Congress in 1999, he has voted on the side of anti-abortion.

He voted to stop federal funding in 2011 for the group Planned Parenthood. In 2006, he voted against permitting servicewoman stationed overseas to have abortions in medical facilities on U.S. bases, except where it would save their lives or in the case of incest or rape.

Ryan was also one of many Republicans who co-sponsored legislation in 2011 that never did make it to the floor of the House, called the Sanctity of Life Act. This measure said the life of every human starts at fertilization, cloning and or its functional equivalent. Thus at that time, the human being will have all the constitutional and legal privileges and attributes of personhood.

Those in favor of reproductive rights often have pointed out loudly that types of legislation like the Sanctity Act not just outlaw abortion, but could potentially outlaw in vitro fertilization and certain forms of contraception.