She had made this statement after two controversial statements of Erdoğan where in 2014 he had publicly said "women are not equal to men" and in 2016 he said "women who reject motherhood are deficient and incomplete".[22] On the 17 March 2021, the state prosecutor Bekir Şahin demanded for Tuncel and 686 other HDP politicians a five-year ban to engage in politics together with a closure of the HDP due to the parties alleged organizational unity with the PKK.[23]