Franken co-sponsors bill to establish unlimited abortion until birth

Al Franken speaks at a 2013
Planned Parenthood rally

Today the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing on the so-called "Women's Health Protection Act" (S. 1696), a radical measure that would eliminate almost all state and federal limits on abortion—including, for example, Minnesota's Woman's Right to Know law. It is co-sponsored by Minnesota Sen. Al Franken.

Carol Tobias, president of National Right to Life, testified at the hearing:

I would note at the outset that we find the formal title or marketing label, "Women's Health Protection Act," to be highly misleading. The bill is really about just one thing: It seeks to strip away from elected lawmakers the ability to provide even the most minimal protections for unborn children, at any stage of their pre-natal development. While the proposal is so sweeping and extreme that it would be difficult to capture its full scope in any short title, calling the bill the "Abortion Without Limits Until Birth Act" would be more in line with truth-in-advertising standards.

Tobias' full written testimony is available here. National Right to Life previously summarized what the bill would do:

The new bill would invalidate nearly all existing state limitations on abortion, and prohibit states from adopting new limitations in the future, including various types of laws specifically upheld as constitutionally permissible by the U.S. Supreme Court. Among the laws that the bill would nullify are requirements to provide women seeking abortion with specific information on their unborn child and on alternatives to abortion, laws providing reflection periods (waiting periods), laws allowing medical professionals to opt out of providing abortions, laws limiting the performance of abortions to licensed physicians, bans on elective abortion after 20 weeks, meaningful limits on abortion after viability, and bans on the use of abortion as a method of sex selection. These laws generally have broad public support in the states in which they are enacted, including support from substantial majorities of women.

The bill would also invalidate most previously enacted federal limits on abortion, including federal conscience protection laws and most, if not all, limits on government funding of abortion.

To support the "Women's Health Protection Act" is to support unfettered abortion on demand—with no serious regard for the welfare of pregnant women or for unborn children at any stage of development. It is to support a bill that would undeniably and substantially increase the number of unborn children who are killed.

Franken, one of 35 co-sponsors, has earned a zero percent pro-life voting record. He has vigorously opposed such commonsense bills as the Pain Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, which would simply protect unborn children after 20 weeks, when they can experience pain.