The U.S. House passed a radical pro-abortion bill Friday that would force states to legalize the killing of unborn babies in abortions without limits up to birth nation-wide.
The deceptively named Women’s Health Protection Act passed in a 218-211 vote with one Democrat joining Republicans in voting against it. No Republicans supported the pro-abortion legislation.
Democrat leaders portrayed the bill as the “codification” of Roe v. Wade into federal law, but the legislation goes far beyond Roe.
Pro-life leaders said the Abortion Without Limits Up to Birth Act is a more accurate name for the bill. The legislation would erase basically all restrictions on abortion and prevent states from enacting even modest protections for unborn babies. Limits on late-term abortions and bans on sex-selection abortions would be gone.
The legislation would get rid of laws that protect women and girls, too, including parental consent for minors and informed consent laws that ensure mothers receive basic facts about their unborn baby’s development before going through with an abortion.
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The text of the bill states, “A health care provider has a statutory right under this Act to provide abortion services, and may provide abortion services, and that provider’s patient has a corresponding right to receive such services, without any of the following limitations or requirements,” and then lists numerous examples of pro-life laws and regulations.
U.S. Rep. Chris Smith, a leading pro-life congressman from New Jersey, lamented how abortion activists have gone to extraordinary lengths for decades to ignore “the battered baby victim” of abortion.
“For the first time ever by congressional statute, H.R. 3755 would legally enable the death of unborn baby girls and boys by dismemberment, decapitation, forced expulsion from the womb, deadly poisons, or other methods at any time until birth,” Smith said.
He pointed to a 2021 Marist poll that found 65 percent of Americans support allowing states to enact restrictions on abortion – something the bill would stop them from doing.
Prior to the vote, U.S. Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, a pro-life Republican from Washington state, said the bill is much more radical than Roe v. Wade.
She urged lawmakers to protect children like her son Cole who has Down syndrome. Rodgers said many unborn babies with Down syndrome are targeted for abortions and the bill would allow this eugenic discrimination to continue.
“I understand the uncertainty and the fear when doctors give the long list of challenges and chances for heartache,” she said. “But Cole’s life couldn’t be further from what we were told. He brings my family an immense amount of joy and love.”
“My hope is that we learn and open our hearts to the science, to the research, and technology and come to reject abortion because it is inhumane,” Rodgers continued. “Open your ears to the cries of the unborn.”
The bill now heads to the U.S. Senate where its fate is less certain. Though Democrats also narrowly control the Senate, there appear to be enough votes to block the legislation. One Democrat, U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, is pro-life, and U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, a pro-abortion Republican from Maine, said the bill is too radical for even her and she will vote against it, Forbes reports.
Pro-life leaders promised to keep fighting to protect the rights of all Americans, born and unborn, and stop the bill from becoming law.
Jeanne Mancini, president of March for Life, said the legislation would harm born Americans, too, by forcing healthcare workers to participate in the killing of unborn babies in abortions and force taxpayers to pay for their deaths.
“Pro-abortion Democrats have revealed their true vision for abortion policy in America by pushing the deceptively named Women’s Health Protection Act,” she said. “If Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi, and their allies get their way, the United States will soon be indistinguishable from North Korea and China on the human rights issue of abortion.”
Students for Life Action President Kristan Hawkins slammed Democrat leaders as “bullies” for pushing such radical anti-woman and anti-child legislation.
“Making more abortion a top federal priority fails to help women advance and puts them at great risk of injury, infertility and even death,” Hawkins said. “Trying to pass a federal power grab over the state’s authority to protect preborn life reflects is a misuse of authority from the bullies who have moved from ‘choice’ to coercion when it comes to abortion.”
Kristen Day, executive director of Democrats For Life of America, said many Democrat voters oppose the bill as well.
“We need to move this abortion debate back to reducing abortion, providing support to pregnant women, and at least maintaining health and safety regulations,” she wrote on Twitter. “There is bipartisan opposition to HR 3755. We need to move forward to protect and support women, not end preborn lives.”
Polls consistently show strong opposition to the measures in the bill, including taxpayer-funded abortions. A new AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll found that 65 percent of Americans think most or all abortions should be illegal in the second-trimester and 80 percent think most or all should be illegal in the third trimester.
If passed, the bill would:
- Eliminate all state and federal parental consent laws in relation to abortion
- Eliminate all state informed consent laws, including those that allow women to view an ultrasound prior to abortion
- Prevent states from passing laws to protect babies at 20 weeks, thereby joining countries like North Korea, China, Vietnam, Singapore, Canada, and the Netherlands in not protecting unborn children later in development
- Force doctors and nurses opposed to abortion to lose their jobs, and Catholic hospitals could lose public funds unless they perform abortions
- Eliminate decades-long limitations on direct taxpayer funding of abortion – including the popular Hyde Amendment, which has saved over 2 million lives since enacted
- In short, overturn all federal and state pro-life laws, and go further to make it illegal for elected officials to even introduce pro-life legislation.
