Pro-life medical doctors in Congress criticized the American Medical Association this week for embracing an increasingly “woke” pro-abortion agenda that endangers children’s lives.
According to Axios, several members of the U.S. House Doctors Caucus, which is pro-life, spoke out after meeting with leaders of the association last week to discuss various policy matters.
U.S. Rep. Brad Wenstrup, a pro-life Republican and Ohio medical doctor, said what the AMA is saying and doing often are two different things.
“[W]hen they told us their priorities, they aligned with our priorities. But it’s like, it doesn’t look like those are your priorities. What looks like your priorities are abortion and transgender issues,” Wenstrup, co-chair of the caucus, told Axios. “It looks like all you care about are woke issues.”
He and others pointed to various pro-abortion actions by the association in recent years, including a statement claiming abortion (the unnecessary and intentional killing of unborn babies) is health care and restricting it is a “violation of human rights.”
Tens of thousands of doctors say otherwise, that babies in the womb are human beings who deserve rights and medical care, too.
But Jack Resneck, president of the AMA, dismissed their concerns in an interview with Axios, saying doctors are not always going to agree on every policy matter.
“Yes, there are going to be a few issues that we don’t always agree on …” he said. However, “we have really strong relationships with members of Congress and I’m confident that will continue to be the case.”
ACTION ALERT: Contact the American Medical Association and urge it to take a neutral position on abortion.
But the association’s position on abortion is extreme in most Americans’ opinions, too. AMA leaders publicly have criticized even modest abortion regulations, calling them dangerous and “unacceptable.” In contrast, most Americans support and most countries across the world enforce laws that restrict killing unborn babies in abortions after the first trimester.
Additionally, the medical association has trashed pro-life pregnancy centers that help women in need and filed lawsuits against pro-life state laws that ensure women receive informed consent before going through with an abortion. It also urged the U.S. Supreme Court to uphold Roe v. Wade in an amicus brief for the Dobbs v. Jackson case.
U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, a pro-life Republican and a medical doctor in Kentucky, told Axios this week that the AMA “has been very much left-wing or left-of-center for a long time.”
“If I had time, I could probably tell you 20 things the AMA has done in the last five years that I disagree with,” he continued.
Here’s more from the report:
In November 2022, the AMA announced new policies around abortion that included not criminalizing doctors for performing abortions, preserving access to abortion training for medical students and supporting access to abortion care. …
House Republicans have been frustrated with the AMA for a while, but things seem to have reached a breaking point in the last year. This may be part of a broader trend of the GOP cutting ties with trade associations.
“I think the AMA, it’s been going on for maybe longer, but this summer when they were up on the Hill testifying about gun violence and to some extent the Dobbs decision, that might have been the end,” said Joe Grogan, a USC-Schaeffer senior fellow and former Trump administration official.
The American Medical Association has become increasingly political and pro-abortion in recent years. In 2019, it filed a lawsuit challenges two North Dakota laws involving informed consent for women seeking abortions. One law requires abortionists to tell women that an abortion ends “the life of a whole, separate, unique, living human being.” The other informs women of the abortion pill reversal procedure, which potentially can save their baby’s life.
Abortion is not health care. Its purpose is to kill an unborn child. For nearly 50 years under Roe, more than 64 million unborn babies were killed in abortions.
ACTION ALERT: Contact the American Medical Association and urge it to take a neutral position on abortion.
