A Democratic Senate bill would remove every last popular abortion limitation to defend a life, something possible under Roe

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, author of legislation to make abortion legal at any time for any reason

The Texas abortion law that the Supreme Court has allowed to go into effect indeed represents an effort by unalloyed pro-lifers to overturn Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court’s controversial embodiment of the “right” to have an abortion.

Pro-choice adherents are over the moon. How dare anyone use a constitutional, democratic process to challenge their hallowed viewpoint! A bunch of “forced birthers!” Or as syndicated columnist Steve Chapman lamented, “Giving birth is now mandatory in the state of texas “

Yes, the law does go beyond the moderate view held by most Americans. It’s provision giving anyone, instead of law enforcement agencies, the power to enforce the law smells too much like a self-appointed posse.

But at the opposite end of the abortion continuum is the pro-choice extremist U.S. Senate bill 1975, laughingly mislabel The Women’s Health Protection Act of 2021. This extreme bill ought to be called the “How to Legally Kill Your Unborn Infant Act.”

Sponsored by Senate Majority Leader Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), it would outlaw parental notification, informed consent and all the other reasonable and moderate “restrictions” that, according to numerous polls, are favored by most Americans. (Here and here, for example.)

Dick Durban, chairman of the influential Judiciary Committee and one-time pro-lifer until it served his political career to support the most extreme pro-choice positions, along with 46 other senators–all in the Democratic caucus–co-sponsored the legislation.

Let’s as the cliche says, unpack it.

Since 1973, the Suprme Court repeatedly has recognized the constitutional right to terminate a pregnancy before fetal viability, and to terminate a pregnancy after fetal viability where it is necessary, in the good-faith medical judgment of the treating health care professional, for the preservation of the life or health of the person who is pregnant. [My emphasis.]

What the bill doesn’t say is that the companion high court decision, Doe v. Wade, defined a woman’s health so broadly as to include just about any reason at all, that technically permits up to the moment of birth.

For many states, that’s too much to swallow, so they are imposing a viability test to make the death of an infant that can live outside the womb difficult to legally perform.

That’s not acceptable to extremists like Blumenthal, the Democratic Senators, the abortion industry and fanatics such as NARA Pro-Choice America.

This bill, which would wipe out any state laws or regulations, eliminates any of those popular restricts. The bill reads:

Nonetheless, access to abortion services has been obstructed across the United States in various ways, including blockades of health care facilities and associated violence, prohibitions of, and restrictions on, insurance coverage; parental involvement laws (notification and consent); restrictions that shame and stigmatize people seeking abortion services; and medically unnecessary regulations that neither confer any health benefit nor further the safety of abortion services, but which harm people by delaying, complicating access to, and reducing the availability of, abortion services. [Emphasis added.]

No wiggle room there. Parental notification, gone. Anything that reduces the “availability of, abortion services,” a gigantic loophole, gone. An even bigger loophole, “restrictions that shame and stigmatize people,” whatever that means.

Of course, the bill genuflects to au courant wokeism. A few quotes:

Reproductive Justice seeks to address restrictions on reproductive health, including abortion, that perpetuate systems of oppression, lack of bodily autonomy, white supremacy, and anti-Black racism….

Abortion-specific restrictions are a tool of gender oppression, as they target health care services that are used primarily by women. These paternalistic restrictions rely on and reinforce harmful stereotypes about gender roles, women’s decision-making, and women’s need for protection instead of support, undermining their ability to control their own lives and well-being….

The terms “woman” and “women” are used in this bill to reflect the identity of the majority of people targeted and affected by restrictions on abortion services, and to address squarely the targeted restrictions on abortion, which are rooted in misogyny. However, access to abortion services is critical to the health of every person capable of becoming pregnant. This Act is intended to protect all people with the capacity for pregnancy—cisgender women, transgender men, non-binary individuals, those who identify with a different gender, and others—who are unjustly harmed by restrictions on abortion services….

Another major Supreme Court decision in Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey (1992) reaffirmed Wade with some clarifications, such as states could not prohibit pre-viability abortions.

Presumably left standing was the Doe v. Wade definition of “health:”

…medical judgment may be exercised in the light of all factors physical, emotional, psychological, familial, and the woman’s age relevant to the well-being of the patient. All these factors may relate to health. This allows the attending physician the room he needs to make his best medical judgment. And it is room that operates for the benefit, not the disadvantage, of the pregnant woman.

And, of course, to the disadvantage of the unborn person in the womb.

The Blumenthal bill bans, among other things,

A prohibition on abortion after fetal viability when, in the good-faith medical judgment of the treating health care provider, continuation of the pregnancy would pose a risk to the pregnant patient’s life or health.

A limitation on a health care provider’s ability to provide immediate abortion services when that health care provider believes, based on the good-faith medical judgment of the provider, that delay would pose a risk to the patient’s health. [Emphasis added.]

These and other provisions underscore the intent of the bill: To make all abortions legal, for any reason and at any time, up to the moment of birth. In other words, to replace Roe and Casey, with a law that virtually lifts any provision that would seek to create a balance of rights between the mother and the infant at some point in the pregnancy. It would virtually handcuff any judge from making any reasonable or discretionary decision.

So, beware of any of the pro-choice rhetoric that claims that laws are to be passed in Washington or the state that are meant only to “preserve” Roe. It’s typical of the abortion industry and its acolytes to bend the truth or to outright lie. Like Blumenthal.

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