[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 19 (Monday, January 29, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S546-S547]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Bill
Mr. LEE. Mr. President, the United States is just one of seven
countries in the entire world that currently allow elective abortions
after 20 weeks of pregnancy, and we are not in good company on that
list. Of the other six countries that allow elective abortions at that
very late stage of the child's development, half of those countries
have authoritarian governments--communist governments with horrible
records when it comes to human rights.
Yes, our abortion laws are as extreme and inhumane as the abortion
laws in Vietnam, China, and North Korea. It pains me--and it should
pain all Americans--that the United States lags so very far behind the
rest of the world in protecting the unborn, protecting human beings,
simply because they have yet to take their first breath.
Twenty weeks is the fifth month of pregnancy. Think about what that
means. At that stage, the unborn child is about 10 inches long from
head to toe. He or she is roughly the size of a banana. A baby at this
stage sleeps and wakes in the womb. She sucks her thumb, makes faces,
and, in some cases, might even see light filtering in through the womb.
By 20 weeks, if not before, science suggests that the baby can also
feel pain. Each year in this country, more than 10,000 abortions occur
after this point in the baby's development. Today, we have a chance to
stop this grave injustice.
Moments ago, this body voted on the Pain-Capable Unborn Child
Protection Act, a bill that would prohibit abortions after the 20th
week of pregnancy. This is a commonsense restriction that is supported
by a majority of Americans. More than 6 in 10 Americans support a ban
on abortion after 20 weeks, according to a Marist poll conducted
earlier this month. Not only that, but a majority of Democrats--56
percent--said they would support an abortion ban at 20 weeks. Yes, this
bill does, in fact, have widespread support, and it would bring America
back into the mainstream of nations.
More importantly, this bill is just. It is humane. It is the right
thing to do. It is the natural outcome of any question asked with a
degree of moral probity: Is this right?
The reason we signed up for this job is to fight for what is right.
And it is wrong--self-evidently wrong--that our country allows 5-month-
old unborn babies to be killed. We, in this body, have a moral duty to
protect those vulnerable human beings, but I have no illusions that
this will be easy.
We have to overcome the misinformation of the abortion industry. This
is a powerful special interest group that wants to keep abortion legal
right up to the moment of birth. The abortion industry is attacking
this bill by denying that there is any evidence that unborn babies can
feel pain at 20 weeks. The linchpin of its argument is a 2005 study
that claimed unborn babies could not feel pain until the 30th week of
pregnancy. What the abortion industry never mentions, of course, is
that this study was written by individuals with significant and, I
would add, undisclosed ties to the abortion industry itself.
As reported by the Philadelphia Inquirer, the study's lead author,
who was not a doctor but a medical student, previously worked for
NARAL. Another of the study's authors actually performed abortions as
the medical director of an abortion clinic.
How convenient that the abortion industry's denial of fetal pain
rests on a study by its own employees. If I recall, the tobacco
industry tried something similar when they denied that cigarettes cause
cancer. As always, the antidote to misinformation is more information,
and the antidote to bad science is good science.
I have three studies that address the topic of fetal pain
specifically. They were all published after the abortion industry's
favorite study--the one they prefer to acknowledge to the exclusion of
all others. Unlike that study--the one they prefer to the exclusion of
all others--none of these studies are compromised by a conflict of
interest.
This one is by the International Association for the Study of Pain.
It concludes: ``The available scientific evidence makes it possible,
even probable, that fetal pain perception occurs well before late
gestation.'' The study pinpoints fetal pain to the ``second trimester''
of pregnancy, ``well before the third trimester.''
Here is another study by the American Association of Pharmaceutical
Scientists. It concludes that ``the basis for pain perception appear[s]
at about 20 to 22 weeks from conception.''
Finally, here is a 2012 study published in the Journal of Maternal-
Fetal and Neonatal Medicine. This paper states that there is evidence
that unborn children can feel pain beginning at 20 weeks. The authors
note that at this stage, unborn children have pain receptors in their
skin, recoil in response to sharp objects like needles, and release
stress hormones when they are harmed.
They conclude: ``We should suppose that the fetus can feel pain. . .
. When the development of the fetus is equal to that of a premature
baby.''
I could go on, but I think that is enough for now. The takeaway is
this. The science at a minimum suggests that unborn children can feel
pain around 20 weeks. It can feel the abortionists' instruments as they
do their grisly work.
These children feel until they cannot. That possibility alone--the
mere possibility--should be chilling to us, and that possibility alone
should have us rushing to ban abortion at 20 weeks. I implore my
colleagues who didn't vote for this to reconsider and, the next time
they have an opportunity to support it, to vote yes on the Pain-Capable
Unborn Child Protection Act.
A vote for this bill is a vote to protect some of the most vulnerable
members of the human family. And yes, we are talking about members of
the human family. The life form we are talking about is not a puppy; it
is not some other form of animal. This is a human being we are talking
about. This is something that instinctively calls out for us. We think
about the needs of the most vulnerable among us, and we should be eager
to protect them.
Together, we can move our country's laws away from those of North
Korea and China and toward our most fundamental belief that all human
beings are created equal and that they have an unalienable right to
life.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire.
Ms. HASSAN. Mr. President, I rise today to oppose dangerous
legislation that would endanger the health of women by limiting their
constitutional right to access a safe and legal abortion. We must
recognize the capacity of every woman in our Nation to make her own
healthcare decisions, control her own destiny, and ensure that all
women have the full independence to do so.
Unfortunately, throughout the last year, the Trump administration and
Republicans in Congress have repeatedly tried to roll back access to
care and undermine the health of women. We have seen bill after bill
targeting women's healthcare by restricting access to abortion,
increasing the costs of maternity care, and allowing insurers to treat
giving birth as a preexisting condition.
The Trump administration issued interim final rules, allowing
employers to deny women access to the birth control coverage they need.
My colleagues on the other side of the aisle have confirmed Trump
administration officials and judges to the bench who are vehemently
opposed to a woman's right to make her own reproductive health
decisions. Republicans have been relentless in their attempts to defund
Planned Parenthood, which is an essential source of care for women in
New Hampshire and provides key services like birth control and cancer
screenings.
Here we are, once again, with Republican leadership bringing a bill
to the floor that attempts to marginalize women and take away their
rights to make their own decisions. This bill
[[Page S547]]
would ban abortions after 20 weeks--an extremely rare procedure that is
often the result of complex and difficult medical circumstances. The
bill lacks adequate exceptions for survivors of rape or incest, and it
gets in the way of a woman and the judgment of her doctor, threatening
to jail physicians for providing patients the care they need.
In fact, a group of medical and public health organizations have
written to Congress, saying: This bill places healthcare providers in
an untenable situation. When they are facing a complex, urgent medical
situation they must think about an unjust law instead of about how to
protect the health and safety of their patients.
This bill is a direct challenge to the precedent set in Roe V. Wade.
We are at a moment in our country when women are speaking out and
fighting for basic dignity and respect at home, in the workplace, and
in their daily lives. They also deserve that respect with regard to the
most deeply personal health decisions they can make.
Passing this legislation would send a message to women across the
country that politicians in Washington do not believe that women have
the capacity to make their own healthcare decisions--as if women don't
understand or are unable to grapple with the physical, emotional,
economic, and spiritual issues that are involved in deciding when or if
to have a family or how to handle critical health challenges.
Rather than marginalizing women, we should be doing everything we can
to include them in the bipartisan work we need to do on priorities to
move our Nation forward. Divisive and partisan bills like this one
undermine women and undermine our strength as a country. I was proud to
join many of my colleagues in voting against this bill, and I am glad
that it has failed in the Senate today.
I thank the Presiding Officer.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kansas.