Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. NADLER. I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to H.R. 36.

For more than 40 years, the Supreme Court has clearly and consistently held that women have the constitutional right to terminate a pregnancy prior to viability or at any time to protect the life and health of the mother. This bill is unconstitutional as it violates both of those provisions.

The bill provides a narrow exemption to protect women's lives, allowing physicians to terminate pregnancy after 20 weeks only if a woman's life is at imminent risk. This exemption fails to account for the many severe health issues that may arise late in pregnancy and forces physicians to think about legal implications rather than about a patient's health.

Perhaps most cruelly, this legislation includes only a very narrow exemption for victims of rape and incest, requiring that any woman seeking an abortion after 20 weeks prove that she either reported the rape to the authorities or sought counseling services. The unfortunate reality is only 35 percent of sexual assaults are ever reported, and we know that there are many reasons for not reporting a rape: the toll our criminal justice system takes on victims, the humiliation and intimidation faced by victims of assault, and even the additional risk to their personal safety.

So why place this limit on the rape exception? What does this narrow exemption say about our Republican colleagues' view of women? It is quite simple. This bill says they believe women lie. The Republicans seem to think that women are too dishonest to believe when they say they have been raped.

This bill continues a too long tradition of treating women like second class citizens. Measures introduced at the State and Federal level to restrict abortions imply that women lie about rape, that women are misinformed about their own pregnancies and must undergo invasive tests and exams, and that women are immoral for ever making the choice to terminate a pregnancy no matter what the circumstance. That is insulting. It is, frankly, none of our business.

Enough is enough. Doctors, not politicians, should be providing women guidance, support, and medical advice throughout their pregnancy, and particularly when making a deeply personal decision to terminate a pregnancy. And women, not politicians, should make that decision for themselves.

We must defeat this unconstitutional bill and continue to afford women their constitutional right enjoyed by every man, without question, to make decisions about their health care in the privacy of their doctors' offices. I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this terrible bill.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source