Another Step In the Long March

US House of Representatives Votes to Require Doctors to Help Babies That Survive Abortion

by Kimberly Leonard
Washington Examiner

The House passed legislation Friday that obligates healthcare workers to provide a specific level of care to babies who are born alive after an abortion attempt.  The Born Alive Abortion Survivors Act passed the same day that the annual March for Life rally was being held in Washington, D.C., which protests abortion on or around the anniversary of the Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision that made abortion legal nationwide.  The bill passed 241-183, with help from just six Democrats.

The legislation would hold any healthcare provider at the scene criminally accountable if an abortion is botched and a baby is born, and the provider fails to help the infant. Actions they could take include bringing a baby to a hospital or using the same type of medical care that they would toward a baby that is born premature.

The bill, which passed by the House in 2015 but not the Senate, is an expansion on legislation passed in 2002 and signed by former President George W. Bush, which gave legal standing to infants born alive following a failed abortion. . . .

But Republicans said the legislation was necessary and told stories of babies who had been born alive after a failed abortion and were left to die on a clinic floor or in a garbage bag.
They argued that a law was needed aimed specifically at healthcare providers. They cited the case of Kermit Gosnell, an abortion provider in Philadelphia who was convicted of murdering infants born alive following an attempted abortion.

"The problem is [the law] is not being followed," said Rep. Vicky Hartzler, R-Mo.  The bill was introduced by Rep. Trent Franks, R-Ariz., who resigned in December after female aides came forward to say they became uncomfortable when he asked them to consider becoming surrogates. The legislation was re-introduced by Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn. 

Blackburn said from the House floor that the bill made changes that built onto existing law and needed to be done.  "The reason we have chosen to do this is because of what we have learned since 2002," she said, referring to the Gosnell case.  "This bill is about protecting women and babies," she continued.

Anti-abortion groups are also pressing for the Senate to vote on a bill that would ban abortion after 20 weeks of gestation, called the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act. Jeanne Mancini, president of March for Life, told the Washington Examiner that her organization and others would like to see the bill arrive to the Senate floor close to the rally.

The bill already passed the House but the Senate has not taken it up. It will require 60 votes and is unlikely to pass, but anti-abortion groups hope that a vote will force members to go on the record as to where they stand on the issue of abortion later in a pregnancy.