Illinois 'Fast-Tracks' Shocking Abortion Bill Designed To Turn State Into 'Abortion Capital Of America'

[Teh One Who Knocks]

Emily Zanotti - The Daily Wire


https://i.imgur.com/zrfyQbZl.jpg

Illinois' new Democratic governor, and a complicit Democratic legislature, are reportedly "fast-tracking" a pair of identical measures in the Illinois House and Senate designed to greatly extend legal abortion within the state of Illinois, wipe out parental notice requirements, and deny any and all rights to any pre-born individuals in the state.

The Federalist reports that the new laws boil down to one sentence: "A fertilized egg, embryo, or fetus does not have independent rights under the laws of this State.”

Per that outline, the bills would mimic similar measures in New York state and Virginia, which would legalize abortion up until the moment of birth (and, potentially, throughout the birthing process). Like New York's law, it would alter the state's code, completely decriminalizing any harm or murder of a wanted child — through domestic abuse or intentional act — along with other major changes to state policy.

"According to the legal group’s analysis, the bill would prohibit the state from interfering in any way with abortions. It would erase criminal penalties for performing abortions and allow non-doctors to do them. The legislation also would repeal the partial-birth abortion ban and abortion clinic regulations that protect women’s health," pro-life news outlet LifeNews reports, based on a legislative analysis provided by in-state, pro-life public interest law firm, the Thomas More Society.

Additionally, the state is now "prohibited from intruding in a woman’s 'reproductive health care decision-making' and creates an avenue for a woman to bring a lawsuit should she feel this right was violated," meaning that individual localities cannot roll back any part of this abortion legislation. It also appears that the bill will punish those doctors and other medical services professionals who will not perform and do not refer for abortion — potentially even those who have moral objections to the procedure.

LifeNews adds that "the Illinois legislation would treat abortion as a 'fundamental right' and strip away even minor protections for unborn babies and medical professionals who object to abortions."

Both bills are likely to pass the legislature. The Democrats control both houses of the state legislature, and extreme abortion bills passed even under the former Republican governor, Bruce Rauner, including a measure that prohibited doctors from refusing to refer for abortion if they do not personally provide the "service."

The Thomas More Society report drives home the severity of the situation.

“The Reproductive Health Act is an extreme bill that would basically enshrine abortion as a positive good in Illinois law,” the law firm noted.

Fox News reports that "Peter Breen, vice president and senior counsel for Thomas More, said in a statement, adding that the Democratic legislation would change the 'Land of Lincoln' into the 'Abortion Capital of America.'"

Both of the bills were supposed to go in front of a committee on Wednesday, March 6, 2018, but there are currently 70 bills pending before that committee. It has not been discussed yet, as of Thursday, but the Federalist notes that "the deadline to pass bills out of committee and onto the floor for consideration by the whole House is March 29." The committee is currently soliciting commentary on the bill, as well as witness slips.

[RBP]

The states-rights folks won't like me saying this, but this needs to be settled at a national level. We are talking about the basic morality of a nation.

This is NOT okay.

[Teh One Who Knocks]

This is what happens when democrats control all three sections of a state government.

[RBP]

This is barbaric.

[Teh One Who Knocks]

They haven't tackled abortion here yet, but democrats are in full control here in Colorado and they are pushing their partisan agenda through and all the republicans can do is cry foul because they don't have the power (votes) to even slow them down.

[RBP]

My letter to my state senator who is also the majority leader:

Dear Senator [name]:

Please oppose the Reproductive Health Act. I fully support ensuring abortion access up to viability, the basic tenet of Roe v Wade. But unrestricted abortion for viable children right up to the point of birth is barbaric. Yes, there should be limited exceptions. If the mother will die or the child can't survive outside the womb, as examples. But very restricted and limited.

This bill removes all rights for the unborn child. For the sake of discussion, if someone kills an 8-month pregnant mother and unborn child in your district, that's two murders under current law. Under this legislation it is one; that's not right. That family will mourn two lives lost with justice for only one.

I realize my comments will fall on deaf ears and Illinois will join Virginia and New York in a race to the bottom of human decency. It's just unfortunate.

[RBP]

I was watching Chicago Med the other night. A pregnant woman died in the ER. They started compressions because they had 18 minutes to perform an emergency C-Section to save the baby.

It's a TV show, I realize, but what if that happened after this legislation passes?

Now my state is saying the father's answer could be not only "let it die", but "kill it".

[Teh One Who Knocks]

I was watching Chicago Med the other night. A pregnant woman died in the ER. They started compressions because they had 18 minutes to perform an emergency C-Section to save the baby.

It's a TV show, I realize, but what if that happened after this legislation passes?

Now my state is saying the father's answer could be not only "let it die", but "kill it".

Don't you love progress? :|

[RBP]

https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/zorn/ct-perspec-zorn-abortion-illinois-choice-reproductive-rights-0308-20190307-story.html

Illinois is poised to fulfill one of Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s campaign promises and become the most permissive state in the nation for abortion rights. And I’m thrilled.

House Bill 2495 “provides that every individual who becomes pregnant has a fundamental right to continue the pregnancy and give birth or to have an abortion, and to make autonomous decisions about how to exercise that right.”

A companion bill, Senate Bill 1594, repeals the Parental Notice of Abortion Act of 1995 that requires minors to inform a parent or legal guardian or get a waiver from a judge before having an abortion.

Among the effects of these twin proposals, introduced by Democratic lawmakers in mid-February, would be the lifting of restrictions on late-term abortions and the removal of a leftover statutory provision calling for criminal penalties against abortion doctors and allowing localities to effectively ban abortion clinics by imposing medically unnecessary requirements on them. The House bill additionally requires private insurance plans to cover abortion services.

Opponents have branded the effort “extreme.”

Well, if it’s extreme to allow women to make the intensely personal decision about whether or not to remain pregnant free from state interference, then it’s extreme.

If it’s extreme to regulate abortion in the same manner as we regulate many other medical procedures and services, then it’s extreme.

If it’s extreme to allow minors to make their own decisions about involving their parents or guardians before obtaining abortions, then it’s extreme.

The House bill, known as the Reproductive Health Act, “would basically enshrine abortion as a positive good in Illinois law,” says a critical memorandum released Feb. 21 by the Thomas More Society, a Chicago-based conservative law firm.

No. It would enshrine access to abortion — abortion rights — as a positive good in Illinois law. It would enshrine female bodily autonomy as a positive good. It would enshrine the idea that the best person to solve the moral dilemmas associated with unwanted or seriously compromised pregnancies is the pregnant woman herself.

I’m thrilled about this legislation because I believe in reproductive choice. I believe it’s none of my business what a woman decides to do after she becomes pregnant. I believe that the very suggestion that women are casually obtaining late-term abortions because — whoops! — they just got around to making the appointment or have decided they really want to fit into that bridesmaid’s dress is offensively misleading and belies the wrenching, usually tragic circumstances.

And I’m thrilled because it represents a bracing counterpunch against cynical and oppressive efforts elsewhere to restrict and regulate abortion nearly out of existence.

The Trump administration has just released the final version of a rule preventing family-planning organizations from getting Title X federal funds if they “provide, promote, refer for, or support abortion,” even if none of those funds go toward abortion services. And along with this gag order comes the requirement that there be no physical or financial connection between approved family-planning organizations and abortion providers.

The main target of this rule is clearly Planned Parenthood, which, ironically, has prevented far more abortions than it has facilitated by dint of its robust distribution of birth control over the years. And the main beneficiary will be faith-based agencies that call themselves “crisis pregnancy centers” in order to lure in and preach to women with unwanted pregnancies.

More than 20 state attorneys general — including Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul — have joined medical organizations filing suit to block the rule, now scheduled to go into effect in May.

This cynical attempt to impede a woman’s right to choose is of a piece with efforts by numerous state legislatures to erect such barriers to abortion as stricter gestational thresholds, longer waiting periods and requirements that clinic doctors have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals. The result has been to place a particularly heavy burden on low-income women seeking abortions.

I have no doubt that many states will outlaw abortion altogether if our increasingly conservative judiciary ends up gutting or reversing Roe v. Wade, the 1973 U.S. Supreme Court decision that guaranteed abortion rights in most cases, and returns the issue to the states.

I’m thrilled that if these bills pass in Springfield — a decent bet given the overwhelmingly Democratic makeup of the General Assembly and Pritzker’s promise — Illinois will be very unlikely to join them.

Abortion is never anything to be thrilled about. But the expansion of rights and freedoms for all women is.

====================================

At the root of this in Virginia, New York, now Illinois, is TDS. Plain and simple.

[Teh One Who Knocks]

Illinois is poised to fulfill one of Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s campaign promises and become the most permissive state in the nation for abortion rights. And I’m thrilled.

I figured the author was a woman....clicked the link and it's a guy. :wha:

[RBP]

Yup.

[Teh One Who Knocks]

If it’s extreme to allow minors to make their own decisions about involving their parents or guardians before obtaining abortions, then it’s extreme.

If he's serious about this part, I hope to god he has kids and at least one is a girl and gets pregnant while she's underage.

[DemonGeminiX]

We need a national culling... and I'm not talkin' 'bout the babies.

[Hal-9000]

My letter to my state senator who is also the majority leader:

Dear Senator [name]:

Please oppose the Reproductive Health Act. I fully support ensuring abortion access up to viability, the basic tenet of Roe v Wade. But unrestricted abortion for viable children right up to the point of birth is barbaric. Yes, there should be limited exceptions. If the mother will die or the child can't survive outside the womb, as examples. But very restricted and limited.

This bill removes all rights for the unborn child. For the sake of discussion, if someone kills an 8-month pregnant mother and unborn child in your district, that's two murders under current law. Under this legislation it is one; that's not right. That family will mourn two lives lost with justice for only one.

I realize my comments will fall on deaf ears and Illinois will join Virginia and New York in a race to the bottom of human decency. It's just unfortunate.

It's what we spoke about before. They need to establish a firm cut off date for the procedure. And it should be applied to all cases, using your example when the mother passes and the fetus is older than the cut off date.


Cut off date is not the best term for this but my meaning is apparent.

[Hal-9000]

The states-rights folks won't like me saying this, but this needs to be settled at a national level. We are talking about the basic morality of a nation.

This is NOT okay.

Probably a conversation for another thread but I really question separate states and provinces having different rules. I realize it's part of the tenets when forming a country, still don't see what it accomplishes.

Why not standardize driving ages, drinking ages, consent ages, abortion timing rules...across the board?

It must be difficult for travelers who have to consult their guides attempting to find out what the particular rule is for ____ in this state/province.

Too utopian?