I agree about the latter, he’s a centrist Democrat at best, but he’s got a lot at stake directly opposing the Trump administration on their latest actions as the US slips into dictatorship, and I’d hardly call that cowardice.

“Embryo” still implies fertilization - in casual use, it’s a broad term, but you wouldn’t use it of an unfertilized egg cell.

I don’t think most people would think of the egg itself as a chicken even if fertilized. The zygote inside the egg becomes the chicken, not the egg itself.