American author Veronica Roth has said: “Lies require commitment.”
Last year’s heated debate over a fetal pain bill in Texas showed just how committed to lying about caring for women abortion advocates really are.
Instead of supporting provisions designed to ensure safer procedures and adequate medical standards for women, opponents shamefully focused on protecting abortion providers’ bottom line.
Their main argument: it puts unreasonable demands on providers and will force up to 13 facilities, that don’t meet the new standards, to close.
They also claimed it violates a woman’s constitutional right to have an abortion.
The bill has four major components:
- It bans abortion after 20 weeks when a preborn child undeniably feels pain.
- Abortion facilities must meet the same standards as other ambulatory surgical centers.
- Abortion providers must have admitting privileges to a hospital within 30 miles of their facility in case something goes wrong and a woman needs to be admitted to a hospital.
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Abortionists must follow FDA-accepted norms when administering the abortion-inducing drugs such as RU-486, which is already responsible for the death of at least 14 women in the U. S. and has caused adverse side effects on more than 2,000 others.
Planned Parenthood (the nation’s largest abortion provider), the Center for Reproductive Rights, the ACLU and a dozen abortionists immediately challenged the law. The group filed an appeal with the U.S. District Court in Austin, TX.
Surprisingly, the groups did not challenge the 20-week section of the law.
In what can only be called a mindless denial of the truth, Planned Parenthood President Cecil Richards vowed to try and overturn the hospital admitting privileges requirement.
“Texans value women’s health—and that is why we will take every step we can to protect the health of Texas women in the wake of this ruling.”
Richards also claimed the law will drastically reduce access to “safe and legal abortion statewide.”
Protecting women’s health? Reduced access to safe abortions?
It can only be their blind commitment to a lie to suggest that opposing those requirements is helping women.
Judicial action came quickly. The groups filed suit in a U.S. District Court.
Judge Lee Yeakel immediately struck down the hospital admission requirement, claiming it has “no rational relationship to improved patient care.”
As for meeting FDA standards, Judge Yeakel modified the law to allow its use on women between 50 and 63 days of gestation instead of up to 49 days according to FDA regulations.
He said following the procedures “requires more of physicians’ time” and is “marginally more expensive.” In short, what is best for women’s health and safety takes a back seat because it’s too expensive and time consuming to follow the recommended procedures.
Three days later, a federal appeals court reinstated the hospital requirement.
Shortly after that, the abortion rights groups filed an emergency motion with the U.S. Supreme Court to block Texas from enforcing the hospital admission section of the law. The high court declined.
As of the writing of this article, the challenge is scheduled to be heard in the federal appeals court in January.
“This case clearly reveals a heartless commitment to profit over women’s safety,” said GRTL President Dan Becker. “And it should serve as a reminder that we need to be as committed to working for the truth as they are for a lie.”
Sources: lifesitenews.com; mysanatonio.com; scotusblog.com; ncregister.com; washingtontimes.com; cnn.com; nytimes.com.