A new bill in the Virginia legislature would end the requirement that an underage girl receive her parent’s consent prior to having an abortion in the state.
Parental consent and parental notification laws help protect young girls from coercion and abuse. They also are a target of the abortion industry and the lawmakers who it supports.
The Daily Wire reports Virginia state Sen. Dick Saslaw, a Democrat from Fairfax County, introduced the bill during Thanksgiving week. Saslaw also is the Senate Majority Leader-elect who will take over in January after pro-abortion Democrats won control of the Virginia legislature in November.
Saslaw’s Senate Bill 21 would remove a requirement that girls under 18 receive a parent’s consent or a judge’s authorization before having an abortion.
The pro-abortion bill also would remove important informed consent requirements for women seeking abortions. According to the report, it would end a “requirement that a pregnant woman seeking to obtain an abortion undergo a fetal transabdominal ultrasound prior to obtaining an abortion at least 24 hours prior to obtaining an abortion, or at least two hours prior to obtaining an abortion if the pregnant woman lives at least 100 miles from the facility.” It would end a number of basic health and safety regulations for abortion clinics in the state as well.
Parental consent laws help protect the health and safety of minors. They can help young victims of sexual abuse who may be forced or coerced into an abortion by their abuser. The laws also help protect vulnerable teens from making a hasty, uninformed decision to abort their unborn babies – something they may later regret. And research shows that these laws help save unborn babies from abortions.
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Parental involvement laws have strong public support, and 37 states currently require a parent’s involvement in some form before a minor aborts her unborn baby. This year, however, Illinois, Massachusetts and Rhode Island also are considering pro-abortion bills to end their parental involvement laws.
These pro-abortion measures would be “disastrous” for the safety of young girls, according to Illinois Right to Life.
Mary Kate Knorr, spokeswoman for Illinois Right to Life Action, told Capitol News Illinois in July that parental involvement laws are a “checkpoint” for human trafficking and abuse.
“If this law were repealed, an abuser could take a young girl to a clinic for an abortion without her family even knowing,” the pro-life organization warned. “This law is purely common sense, enacted as to be a safeguard for young, vulnerable girls.”
The organization also pointed to statistics showing that abortions dropped significantly among minors in Illinois after the parental notification law went into effect.
Many states ban girls under 18 from using tanning beds and prohibit them from getting tattoos without a parent’s permission.
Planned Parenthood, NARAL and other abortion advocacy groups often lobby against parental involvement laws. They believe that underage girls should be able to abort their unborn babies in a dangerous surgical or drug-induced abortion procedure without their parents’ knowledge or consent.
Polls show strong support for parental involvement laws. A Gallup poll found 71 percent of Americans favor laws requiring parents’ involvement in a minor’s abortion decision.
ACTION: Contact Virginia state senators.
