The "Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act," a piece of legislation that echoed existing laws and medical practices, had little chance of passing in the Senate on Monday evening. And as predicted, it ultimately failed. But its introduction and subsequent debate underscores something larger and more substantial than the bill itself: a push by the conservative right to reframe the reproductive rights debate toward third-trimester abortions. In their comments leading up to Monday's decision on the legislation, Democratic and Republican lawmakers painted starkly different pictures the bill. Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell called it a "straightforward" piece of legislation, while Sen. Tammy Duckworth, a Democrat from Illinois, called the bill a "political stunt." The legislation -- which fell seven votes short of the 60 it needed to move forward -- would have required doctors to provide care to infants who "survive an abortion or attempted abortion." A similar bill passed in 2002, but the most recent one was different in a key way: It would have imposed fines and potential jail time for doctors who didn't provide care. Abortion rights advocates rebuked the legislation and the rhetoric surrounding it, saying that the situation described in the bill -- infants surviving abortions -- is an extreme rarity, only occurring in instances of abnormalities so severe that the fetus has been deemed unviable. "When you're providing abortion care, this isn't something that happens," Elizabeth Nash, a senior state issues manager at the Guttmacher Institute, said in a telephone interview with CBS News Monday. "This legislation is based on lies and a misinformation campaign, aimed at shaming women and criminalizing doctors for a practice that doesn't exist in medicine or reality," Planned Parenthood Federation of America President, Leana Wen, wrote in an email to CBS News. Sen. Mazie Hirono from Hawaii called the bill "a solution in search of a problem." Only six states are required to report data on so-called "born-alive" infants, according to a 2016 report from the Charlotte Lozier Institute, an anti-abortion research group. In Florida, where data was available, there were six instances in 2018, according to the state's Agency for Health Care Administration, the group responsible for distributing the state's Medicaid funds. In an op-ed for the New York Times titled "I Didn't Kill My Baby," obstetrics and gynecologist Jen Gunter described her own experience delivering an infant that wasn't viable and died shortly after birth. Twenty-two weeks into her pregnancy, Gunter's water broke and was told that one of her triplets, who the author named Aidan, had a less than one percent chance of surviving. "As Aidan's parents we had decided that invasive procedures, like intravenous lines and a breathing tube in a one-pound body, would be pointless medical care. And so, as we planned, Aidan died." "I am uniquely positioned to say this bill is medically unnecessary and nothing more than a way to warp the reality of perinatal mortality (stillbirth or death within the first week of life) to create confusion about abortion," Gunter wrote. Still, Republicans posed scenarios to argue for the bill's passage during Monday's Senate debate. Sen. Ben Sasse, the sponsor of the bill, asked his colleagues to "picture a baby that's already been born, that's outside the womb, that's gasping for air. That's the only thing that this bill is about." Democrats pointed out that doctors are already required by federal law to provide care to infants born alive after an attempted abortion. "It is, and always has been, a crime not to," Hirono said Monday. Democratic Senators Doug Jones of Alabama, Bob Casey of Pennsylvania and Joe Manchin of West Virginia joined Republicans in voting to move the bill forward. The push for the legislation is part of an ongoing attempt by Republicans to shift the debate on reproductive rights to focus on so-called late-term abortions, an area of the abortion debate that's more controversial than others. Although 60 percent of Americans believe abortion should be generally legal in the first three months of pregnancy, just 13 percent say the procedure should be generally legal in the third trimester, according to a Gallup poll from May 2018. That shift in rhetoric was evident during Monday's debate. Nearly every Republican senator who argued in the bill's favor mentioned Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam's comments on very late-term abortion, invoking his remarks to imply the embattled Democrat supports infanticide. President Trump also used the rhetoric, falsely saying in a tweet Monday, "The Democrat position on abortion is now so extreme that they don't mind executing babies AFTER birth...." Senate Democrats just voted against legislation to prevent the killing of newborn infant children. The Democrat position on abortion is now so extreme that they don’t mind executing babies AFTER birth.... — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 26, 2019 Per the landmark 1973 Roe vs. Wade Supreme Court ruling, states may prohibit abortions after a fetus is determined to be viable, or can survive outside of the womb. In certain states, women whose pregnancies have become unviable or jeopardize their own health have legal access to an abortion in the third trimester. But just over one percent of abortions that occurred in 2015, the most recent year for which data is available, were after the patient's 21st week of pregnancy, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Despite the rarity, rhetoric surrounding third-trimester abortions reignited after New York passed legislation in January protecting abortions late in pregnancy when a woman's health is endangered. Debate intensified later last month when Virginia lawmakers proposed a similar bill and embattled Governor Northam commented on it. "As soon as the ink was dry on the New York abortion protections we started to see conservative policymakers raise issues around abortion later in pregnancy, and those attacks were heightened in the aftermath of the Virginia bill," Nash said. "These attacks, while aimed at abortion later in pregnancy, do double-duty because they also demonize abortion providers as well as the patients, which makes it easier to pass total or near total abortion bans. That is their real goal: to ban abortion outright."<doc-sep>Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer at a Capitol Hill press conference, March 1, 2018. (Yuri Gripas/Reuters) They believe that unwanted human beings have no moral status, even after birth A moral catastrophe unfolded on the floor of the U.S. Senate on Monday. Forty-four Democratic senators voted against legislation that would have required doctors to give the same care to infants who survive abortion procedures that they would give to any other infant. One after another, Democratic senators took to the floor to smear the bill as an attack on women’s health care, a baseless criticism that they failed to substantiate. In the process, they revealed their belief that allowing unwanted infants to perish after birth constitutes a form of women’s health care. Advertisement Senator Ben Sasse (R., Neb.) reintroduced his Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act in direct response to Virginia governor Ralph Northam’s endorsement of permitting mothers and doctors to let infants die of neglect. “The infant would be delivered,” Northam said, explaining a hypothetical case in which a woman in labor wanted an abortion. “The infant would be kept comfortable. The infant would be resuscitated if that’s what the mother and the family desired, and then a discussion would ensue between the physicians and the mother.” This “discussion” is what Democrats voted on Monday to preserve — a discussion not about health-care options for women but about whether or not to extend health care of any kind to newborn infants. With their votes and their speeches, 44 U.S. senators embraced Ralph Northam’s position, which, despite attempting to clarify, he has never retracted. “I want to ask each and every one of my colleagues whether or not we’re okay with infanticide,” Sasse said at the start of floor debate on Monday. “This language is blunt. I recognize that. It is too blunt for many people in this body. But frankly, that is what we’re talking about here today. Infanticide is what [the bill] is actually about.” Advertisement Though Sasse’s bill failed to pass, it succeeded in forcing Democrats to take a stance on infanticide, and though they refused to do so explicitly, the reality of their disgraceful position was abundantly clear. During floor debate, Senator Tina Smith (D., Minn.) said that the bill “puts Congress in the middle of the important medical decisions that patients and doctors should make together without political interference.” Democratic senator Mazie Hirono of Hawaii said it represents the idea that “the moral judgment of right-wing politicians in Washington, D.C., should supersede a medical professional’s judgment and a woman’s decision.” “It makes no sense for Washington politicians who know nothing about these individual circumstances to say they know better than the doctors, patients, the family,” said Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.). “The bill is solely meant to intimidate doctors and restrict patients’ access to care and has nothing, nothing, nothing to do with protecting children.” “This is how our medical system is supposed to work,” Smith added later in her remarks. “Physicians and patients making decisions together based on patients’ individual needs.” Advertisement Democratic senator Tammy Duckworth of Illinois labeled the bill an effort to “bully doctors out of giving reproductive care.” And Jeanne Shaheen (D., N.H.) said the legislation “would interfere with the doctor–patient relationship and impose new obstacles to a woman’s constitutionally protected right to make her own decisions about her reproductive health.” “Conservative politicians should not be telling doctors how they should care for their patients,” Hirono said. “Instead, women, in consultation with their families and doctors, are in the best position to determine their best course of care.” All of these statements take as their premise a fundamental lie about the legislation. No part of the born-alive bill limits abortion access or regulates abortion methods in any way. It involves abortions only to the extent that the infants in question survived them. Nor does the bill mandate any particular kind of care for these infants; it merely requires that these nearly aborted newborns be afforded “the same degree” of care that “any other child born alive at the same gestational age” would receive. But these statements from Democrats are more than mere falsehoods. They expose a sinister reality: There is no daylight between their argument and that of Ralph Northam. They have admitted that they believe that denying medical care to infants can constitute legitimate women’s health care, classified under the untouchable umbrella of “reproductive rights.” Advertisement That was the ultimate triumph of the attempt to pass the born-alive bill. Though Democrats managed to block the legislation, it forced the moral equivocators of the Democratic party to step out from behind their smokescreens. It demanded that they put their name to a vote permitting doctors to turn a blind eye to dying babies. It compelled them to defend Ralph Northam’s indefensible comments. This — and not because it would impede women’s “reproductive rights” — is why Democrats were so afraid of Ben Sasse’s bill. They knew that nothing in the text restricts access to abortion. But they knew, too, that it would expose them. To support the bill would betray a logical and philosophical inconsistency — Democrats would affirm the dignity and rights of a newborn infant, even as they dehumanize that same life, at the same stage of development, inside its mother’s womb. To oppose the bill would reveal the ghastly, consistent principle of the abortion-rights movement — that a child’s rights depend not on her size or location, but on whether she is wanted by her mother. The Democrats chose consistency, and consistency means infanticide. Something to Consider If you enjoyed this article, we have a proposition for you: Join NRPLUS. Members get all of our content (including the magazine), no paywalls or content meters, an advertising-minimal experience, and unique access to our writers and editors (through conference calls, social media groups, and more). And importantly, NRPLUS members help keep NR going. If you enjoyed this article and want to see more content like this, we have a proposition for you: Join NRPLUS. Join Now<doc-sep>How often are infants born alive after attempted abortions? It hardly ever happens, according to Dr. Daniel Grossman, a professor of obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive sciences at the University of California, San Francisco. He performs abortions and is a spokesman for the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, where he leads a committee on health care for underserved women. A healthy fetus becomes viable — potentially able to survive outside the womb — at about 24 weeks of pregnancy. Only about 1.3 percent of abortions in the United States in 2015 were performed in or after the 21st week of pregnancy, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Less than 1 percent of all abortions are done after 24 weeks, and many are performed because the fetus has a fatal condition or the pregnant woman’s life or health is at severe risk. If an abortion is performed at 20 weeks or later, a drug may be injected to stop the fetal heartbeat before the fetus comes out of the womb, Dr. Grossman said. In other cases, suction devices and other instruments end the fetus’s life before it is removed, he said. What happens in rare cases when a baby is born alive after a pregnancy is cut short? Dr. Grossman said there were painful situations in which the fetus might be at the edge of viability and labor must be induced to save the mother’s life. For instance, a condition called pre-eclampsia, involving high blood pressure and other problems, can kill both mother and fetus, and in most cases the only treatment is to deliver the baby. If it seems unlikely that the baby will survive, the family may choose to provide just comfort care — wrapping and cuddling the baby — and allow the child to die naturally without extreme attempts at resuscitation. The bill would force doctors to resuscitate such an infant, even if the parents did not want those measures, said Dr. Jennifer Conti, an obstetrician gynecologist who is a fellow of Physicians for Reproductive Health, an advocacy group. Doctors who violated the law would be subject to criminal penalties, as would anyone who saw the violation and failed to report it, she said.<doc-sep>
The U.S. Senate voted Monday against the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, that would have criminalized doctors who fail to provide medical care if a fetus is born alive after an abortion. Sen. Doug Jones, D-Ala., was one of three Democrats to vote for the bill. Rep. Gary Palmer, R-Ala., on Tuesday tried to revive the bill and asked for the it’s immediate consideration in the U.S. House of Representatives, but was quickly shut down and wasn't allowed to debate in the Democratic-controlled House. "Every newborn deserves the highest quality of care, regardless of the circumstances of their birth. For this reason, I support the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act," Jones said in statement to AL.com. "Though there are deep disagreements on the issue of abortion, I firmly believe that if we have more dialogues, we will find that we have more in common than not. We should focus on that common ground by working together on policies that can reduce abortions and strengthen families. That means taking steps to ensure that all people have access to affordable, quality health care, and develop policies that reduce unplanned pregnancy, lower the cost of child care, and promote adoption. I would like to see all sides of this debate come together to reduce and even eliminate some of the circumstances that cause women to face this difficult decision.” The bill’s sponsor, Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., said it is intended to protect newborn babies. Full coverage of the abortion debate in Alabama “This should not be complicated. But Democrats are making their feelings known by refusing to vote on H.R. 962,” Palmer said in an emailed press release. “They want abortion at any time, even after birth, and they are afraid to allow anyone in their party who might have a different opinion to vote their conscience.” President Donald Trump parroted similar sentiments in a tweet Monday night claiming Democrats are satisfied killing babies after they are born. ....This will be remembered as one of the most shocking votes in the history of Congress. If there is one thing we should all agree on, it’s protecting the lives of innocent babies. — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 26, 2019 According to the CDC, 1.3 percent of abortions performed in the U.S. were done at or after 21 weeks. Dr. Hal Lawrence, former executive vice president of the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists told reporters in 2015 there is no way a 20-week fetus is viable, even with intensive medical treatment. Cindi Branham, of Alabama Reproductive Rights Advocates, said babies are not being born and then ignored. “There are not medical professionals who will do this when a fetus is viable,” Branham said. “These people are far too compassionate and good to do this.” Branham said bills like these are trotted out every year to criminalize abortion and help politicians win elections. “The goal is to purely win elections. The people that bring it out, the representatives, senators legislators, they’re doing it just to get elected again because none of this is ever rooted in fact, Branham said. “They’re doing it purely because the evangelical voting bloc will vote for them without fail if they cry abortion loud, enough and often enough.” Branham said the bill's failure to pass was a small, but bittersweet victory. “If anti-choice people would take the time to educate themselves on the situations of women who find themselves in a late-term abortion choice, they would shed tears for the women and their families rather than the already-unviable fetus,” Branham said.