Senator Schumer calls for abortion-on-demand roll call vote today

One of the most deceitfully-named bills in Senate history is up for a vote again today.

Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer is bringing the ‘Women’s Health Protection Act’ to the Senate floor for another vote, despite failing in a February 28th vote.

Schumer is forcing the vote in reaction to the leaked Supreme Court draft document which suggests that SCOTUS may overturn Roe v Wade. He wants to put members of both parties on record as either supporting or opposing this dreadful piece of legislation.

As Maggie DeWitte, Pulse Life Advocate’s Executive Director explained:

“The Women’s Health Protection Act would make us more pro-abortion than China.”

Essentially, the bill’s sponsors believe it would codify abortion and override all anti-abortion regulations passed by state legislatures, such as the fetal pain restrictions Iowa’s legislature passed banning abortions after twenty weeks.

The bill keeps failing, Democrats keep trying to get it passed

This bill was proposed by Democrats in 2013, 2015, and 2017, failing each time. What is interesting is that its latest version removed carve-outs for parental-notification laws, such as we have on the books in Iowa.

In other words, Democrats recognized that laws which required parental notification before their child could obtain an abortion resonated with voters across the country. Until this year, the Women’s Health Protection Act allowed for those laws to stand. But since the party has been purged of its last pro-life member, the exemption was dropped.

In this year’s cloture vote on the bill, every Democrat in the senate, except for Joe Manchin, voted yea, every Republican voted nay.

Iowa Senators Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst both opposed this abortion bill in February. I encourage you to contact them and let them know you appreciate their pro-life opposition to the Women’s Health Protection Act.

Democrats want to ‘codify’ Roe v Wade

If Democrats succeed in passing the bill, abortion will be “codified” into the law of the land, eliminating all democratically-enacted regulations on abortion at the state level.

Under this bill, abortion would be legal for all nine months of a pregnancy. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops details the type of laws this bill will ban:

  • laws requiring that abortion be performed only by a physician
  • ultrasound laws
  • parental notice or consent laws
  • waiting period laws
  • admitting privilege laws
  • laws that regulate prescribing, dispensing, or administering drugs for the purpose of inducing an abortion
  • laws regulating or restricting the use of telemedicine specifically in relation to abortion
  • health or safety regulations specific to abortion facilities
  • licensure, certification, and other credentialing requirements specific to a health professionals or facilities that performs abortions
  • laws prohibiting government funding for abortion
  • laws prohibiting use of government-owned or -operated facilities for an abortion
  • laws authorizing the exclusion of abortion coverage from a health plan
  • laws creating any “similar” limitation; and
  • laws that “impede access” to abortion, no matter how reasonable the law or how slight the impediment, including (a) any law that would delay or deter “some” patients in obtaining an abortion even if there would be no delay or deterrence in the vast majority of cases, and (b) any law that would increase the cost of an abortion, no matter how reasonable the law or how negligible the increased cost.

This is a radical piece of legislation that even most rank and file Democratic voters oppose, once they realize what the bill actually does.

Senator Schumer is demanding this vote as a political ploy to scare elected officials into caving to the radical laws demanded by Big Abortion.

Watch it backfire.

2 Comments

  1. Mark Spooner on May 11, 2022 at 9:16 pm

    Fortunately, the Schumer bill has no chance of passing. If it did pass, I think it would pose an interesting constitutional issue. Presumably, the sponsors would try to justify it under the Commerce Clause of the Constitution, which gives Congress broad power to regulate economic activities affecting interstate commerce. The proponents would argue that the bill regulates the “commerce” of offering abortions. But since “commerce” isn’t really what the legislation is all about, it might be effectively challenged.



  2. Tom Quiner on May 12, 2022 at 12:37 am

    Yes, you’re right it has no chance of passing. The bill was again voted down today 51-49, with only one Democrat voting against. However, Dems keep trying. Each manifestation of the bill is more extreme. This one expunged the word ‘woman’ from the bill … except for the title of the bill. I hope you’re right that it wouldn’t hold up to judicial scrutiny. Thanks for writing.