Massachusetts House lawmakers passed a radical pro-abortion measure Thursday to expand late-term abortions and allow young girls to abort their unborn babies without a parent’s knowledge or consent.
WBZ News Radio reports House lawmakers voted 108 to 49 in favor of the pro-abortion amendment to the state budget. The state Senate is expected to consider it next week.
Amendment 759 to House Bill 5150, sponsored by state Rep. Claire Cronin, D-Easton, is similar to the ROE Act, radical pro-abortion legislation that has languished in committee for more than a year. Cronin’s amendment is not quite as extreme as the bill, but it still would expand the killing of unborn babies in abortions in multiple ways.
Currently, Massachusetts prohibits abortions after 24 weeks except if the mother’s life is at risk. The amendment would expand these exceptions, allowing viable, late-term unborn babies to be aborted if they are diagnosed with a fatal anomaly or “to preserve the patient’s physical or mental health” – a definition that can be widely interpreted.
Unlike the ROE Act, Cronin’s amendment would not get rid of the state law that protects babies who survive abortions from infanticide. However, state pro-life leaders said it would amend and weaken that law.
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The amendment also would allow non-doctors to abort unborn babies and lower the parental consent requirement from age 18 to 16.
Pro-life Democrat and Republican lawmakers spoke out strongly against the measure before it passed.
State House News Service reports state Rep. Colleen Garry, D-Dracut, said lowering the age of parental consent for abortions is wrong.
“If a young girl cannot get married, if she cannot smoke a cigarette, if she can’t drink alcohol, if she can’t vote, — I certainly don’t think that she should be able to get a third-trimester abortion without parental or the judicial bypass,” Garry said. “Again, July 2018 we codified Roe v. Wade. This is not protecting Roe v. Wade. This is expanding abortion to the moment of birth and it is just wrong under those circumstances.”
According to the report, 19 Democrats joined Republicans in voting against the amendment, while one Republican voted in favor of it.
Meanwhile, outrage is growing. On Tuesday, more than 300 pastors in the state sent a letter to Gov. Charlie Baker, a pro-abortion Republican, urging him to veto the bill.
“In 2019 alone, there were 18,593 abortions performed in the Bay State. How much more ‘accessible’ does the murder of unborn children need to be?” they asked. “Abortion ends the life of a human child and puts the physical, mental and emotional health of women, most especially young women, at risk.”
Massachusetts Citizens for Life and other pro-life organizations in the state also are urging people to call state lawmakers and the governor’s office and voice their opposition to the anti-life legislation.
The amendment appears to be strategic, a way Democrat politicians hope to pass the legislation quickly through the budget to appease pro-abortion lobbying groups before too many unhappy voters find out.
“It’s an underhanded way of pushing it on their constituents who continually oppose it,” C.J. Williams, director of community engagement at Massachusetts Citizens for Life, told the Daily Free Press.
A recent poll by Susan B. Anthony List found strong opposition to the Massachusetts legislation. According to the poll, 62 percent of Massachusetts voters oppose late-term abortions, including 49 percent of Democrat and 66 percent of independent voters. The same number, 62 percent, also supports the current state law requiring parental consent before a girl under 18 has an abortion.
Similar legislation passed in New York, Illinois, Vermont and Rhode Island last year, prompting massive outrage. Another pro-abortion bill narrowly failed in New Mexico because of strong public opposition.
ACTION ALERT: Contact Massachusetts senators here and also Contact Gov. Charlie Baker to oppose this measure.
