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Floor Speech

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Mr. LANKFORD. Mr. President, my guess is, if I went to every person in this room--every page, every person sitting in the Gallery, every Senator--and I pointed to this image and said, ``What do you see there?'' my guess is every person in this room would go, ``Well, that is a baby.''

That is my guess. I mean, I haven't asked every person here, but my guess is every person would look at it, and they would go: Well, that is a sonogram of a baby.

That is what I would say: It looks like a child to me.

So the issue here in America and the next question is: Should it live or die?

The first answer is pretty obvious: That is a baby.

The second question is: Should it live or die?

That one, in America, is not quite so obvious anymore.

You know, what is interesting is that I have two daughters. They are amazing, remarkable, beautiful women. They are adults now, but I distinctly remember that pregnancy test and seeing those little lines on that test, and my wife and I looking at each other with excitement.

I distinctly remember talking to friends and her parents and other folks, saying that we are pregnant. And as we shared our story, I don't remember a single person saying to me: Well, you are pregnant. What are you going to do with it? Are they going to live or die?

No one asked us that. No one asked us: Is it really a baby or is that just a fetus? No one said: You just have tissue.

They asked us questions like: Have you thought of a name? Have you figured out how to install the car seat yet?

Those are the questions they asked us because, every person we talked to and every person with whom we shared the news that we were pregnant, all acknowledged that reality that that is a baby.

Two years ago, the Supreme Court ruled on what is now called the Dobbs decision. It took away the Roe v. Wade decision that mandated that abortion had to be everywhere in the country and took it back to where it was for the first 180 years or so of our country, when the law was that the rules about abortion are handled in each State. That is all it did.

It didn't end abortion in America. We still have abortion in America, in very high numbers. But the decision of how that is done was not done by a Supreme Court. It was done by legislators, as it always had been. And that is what the Court said. So this is now going back to the people and the people's representatives on all levels.

So the debate is, again, scattered all across the country now, and the debate is very simply over: Is that a child? And if it is a child, what should happen to it?

I have to tell you, that baby is not mine, but she is really cute. I look at a baby like that--my daughters both slept in that same position, which we, as parents, call the touchdown position, where they both have their hands up above their heads. I am amazed at this picture of the sonogram to see that infant in the womb in that exact same position asleep.

I think the only difference between this child in the womb sleeping with her hands over her head and this child is time. That is it. That baby is as much of a baby as that baby is a baby. There is no difference there, other than time.

So we debate, and we talk about this very complicated question: When is a child valuable, and when is a child medical waste? When is a child valuable, and when is a child disposable?

We, as Americans, are grappling with that issue. The issue about when that child is a child really comes down to preference and convenience and to determine if the child is convenient. If they are convenient, then they are a child. If they are not convenient, then they are disposable.

If two ladies are walking down the same street--both of them, let's say, 18 weeks pregnant--and of those two ladies on opposite sides of the street, one of them steps into her workplace and into a baby shower, the folks at work are going to talk about how to install a car seat. They are going to talk about: Where are you going to set up the crib? They are going to talk about baby names, and they are going to talk about all the expenses and things. And the person on the other side of the street, also 18 weeks pregnant, is headed to get a surgical abortion.

And so I ask the question: Of those two children, what is the difference between those two children? They are both at 18 weeks of development. One of them is being celebrated and prepared for, and one of them will be disposed of. What is the difference between the two?

We, as Americans, are trying to figure out the answer to that exact question. And the conversation is happening all across the country.

I get it. It is a fair conversation: When is a child a child? Or when are they not a child?

Well, under this administration--this administration, by far, has been the most pro-abortion administration ever in the history of the country. That is not just an opinion. That is just the actions of the administration. That has just been their response to the Dobbs decision.

This administration was so disturbed that we might have fewer abortions in America that the Biden administration has aggressively worked to increase the number of abortions in America to offset the possibility that there could be fewer abortions, because they didn't want to see fewer abortions in America. They wanted to see as many or more.

So the Biden administration opened up, for the first time, VA hospitals to provide abortions--even late-term abortions, even up to the very final months of a viable child. For those VA hospitals, it would be the first time that they would be able to provide abortions.

They are withholding funds for pregnancy resource centers. Now, these are the centers that they really hate the most. These are pregnancy resource centers around the country that offer crazy things like diapers and formula and support for pregnant moms--that if pregnant moms walk in and say, ``Hey, I am really struggling with my pregnancy, and I am afraid,'' they say, ``We will walk with you. We will counsel you. We will give you free materials. We will help provide diapers and baby clothes and a car seat, and we will walk along with you so you don't have to be afraid and alone.''

The Biden administration really hates those folks. So they are withholding funds from any grants going to those folks where they have received grants in the past.

HHS is now paying to move people who illegally cross our southern border to places--even teenagers--where they can get abortions, and we have Federal dollars going to be able to move people to make sure that those people who illegally cross our border who want access to abortion be able to get it. It has been frustrating to be able to watch.

Even in my State, my State has chosen to say: We think every child is valuable. We look at these two girls, and we see them just a couple of weeks apart. But we see them both as young girls. They kind of state the obvious.

But in my State, because we don't allow abortion and promote abortion, Health and Human Services has now stripped away grant dollars from my State for one reason. Health and Human Services came to my State and said: If you don't put a 1-800 number on all of your healthcare materials stemming from the State, telling women where they can get an abortion, we will take away your Federal funding. If you don't show and give a 1-800 number where you can get an abortion, we will take away your grant funding.

They didn't take away just any grant funding, because, by the way, my State said: We are not going to do that. So the grant funding they took away from my State was for impoverished women to get cancer screenings and for AIDS patients to get testing. They took that funding away, saying: We will not allow any Federal dollars coming into your State for AIDS testing and for cancer screening for impoverished women, if you don't promote abortion in your State.

They were serious. So they did it because this administration is obsessed with increasing the number of abortions in the country and finding ways to be able to expand this and telling people not to look at this picture.

It has been a frustrating journey, the last couple of years, because we seem to be ignoring the obvious. We are so tied up here on the politics of this, even when Senator Thune brings a bill that says, if a child is born alive after a botched abortion--they are a fully delivered, full-term baby on the table breathing--what should we do?

That is a pretty commonsense bill. Yet my Democratic colleagues have knocked it down today and said: No, that child should not have the opportunity for life.

When Senator Hyde-Smith brings a bill that just says, ``Why don't we give education to more doctors and more moms about infertility''--it doesn't limit IVF at all, at all--they are like, ``No, no, not going to do that.''

When Senator Britt from Alabama brings a bill that says: Why don't we recognize, during pregnancy, that that is really expensive, and if States have the requirement to do child support for a child--well, I will just say it: for a deadbeat dad who is not paying child support. If they walk away at that point, that child support should also cover the time of pregnancy, not just after delivery. That is pretty common sense because, for any mom, they know pregnancy is really expensive. It is a very expensive time. So child support should begin when that child is there.

A commonsense bill that, I dare say, most Americans would say, ``Well, that makes sense,'' has been knocked down today. Unanimous Consent Request--S. 4524

Mr. President, I bring one more that I think is pretty common sense. It is already the law in the United States that every person has the right to conscience. Healthcare providers that go into the profession to protect life, to save life, to heal--many of them also say: I don't want to be a part of taking human life. I went into this profession to protect life.

So they express to their clinics, their hospitals--wherever they serve--that they don't want to be a part of the taking of human life. They understand that it is happening in their hospital; they just don't want to be a part of that. They express their conscience issues.

By the way, that is protected in Federal law right now, that every one of those healthcare providers has the right to be able to express their conscience and not be required to take human life. The problem is, it requires the Federal Government to actually step in and enforce that law.

So let me show you what that looks like. A nurse in Vermont, a few years ago, went into her hospital as she normally did, and as she went into her hospital, went into work as she normally does--she is a nurse that is passionate about the life of every person, including children in the womb, and she had expressed that to the hospital. She got caught as she was going in, saying: Hey, we need you in the ER right now.

She said: No problem.

So she steps into the ER to help with a procedure, gloves up, gets ready. She is going to go assist. As she walks in, the doctor that is in the room looks at her and says: Don't hate me.

She suddenly says: What is going on?

She realizes she is being called in to be able to assist with an abortion. She has already made it clear she doesn't want to be a part of taking human life.

The hospital says: No. We will fire you if you don't help. We need your help. We are short of staff today, so you are going to do this.

A direct violation of Federal law--clearly, no question. They expressed it in the operating room. They knew they were violating her conscience.

So the Federal Government goes through the process of starting to be able to enforce the law on that hospital--until the last Presidential election occurs. When the last Presidential election occurred, the new leadership of HHS stepped in and said: We are not going to enforce that. In other words, we are dropping that case.

It would be the equivalent of a police officer walking down the street, looking at a burglary that is happening, knowing that a crime is occurring right there, and just saying, ``I am going to choose not to enforce the law today,'' and just walking on by. That is what is happening right now.

So the Conscience Protection Act that I bring does a simple thing. It says that if an employer violates Federal law and the Federal Government chooses not to enforce this, the individual that has had their conscience violated--that individual has the right to be able to bring a case on their own.

This is not controversial. This would not eliminate a single abortion in America. We will not have one fewer abortion in America based on this policy. But what it will do is it will say to an American: You are free to be able to live your conscience without fear of being fired for living your conscience. That is the only thing it does. I think that is pretty straightforward and pretty common sense.

Of all things that we should be able to agree to in this body, let's protect each other's right to believe and to live our faith.

4524 and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration; further, that the bill be considered read a third time, passed, and the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

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Mr. LANKFORD. Mr. President, we will continue to be able to speak out. We do believe that is a child. We believe in the dignity of every human being.

My wife, when we were pregnant--every single cell in her body--every cell--from her toenails and her toes and her nose and her elbows--every single cell in her body has the exact same DNA. It has that signature of her. But when we were pregnant, suddenly there was a group of cells that had different DNA. They didn't match hers, and they didn't match mine. They were cells with DNA that had never existed on Earth before until that moment. They were uniquely different. I think we should acknowledge that fact in the days ahead, that there is something special about those different cells.

We will continue to speak up for the conscience rights of all individuals to be able to state the obvious and to be able to live their faith. I think in the days ahead we will have a time as Americans when we will look back on this season and think, why would we turn away from what was so obvious to all of us?

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