As the mainstream news media focuses on condemning pro-life efforts in Alabama, Georgia and Missouri, Democratic leaders in other states are quietly pushing through radical pro-abortion bills that expand the legalized killing of unborn babies.
On Wednesday, Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed a law allowing abortions for any reason up to birth and forcing every state insurance plan to cover them. He follows the governor of Vermont, who made his state the latest to legalize abortions up to birth when he signed its radical bill yesterday.
Pritzker has bragged that the law will make Illinois the most “progressive” state on abortion, WGN-TV News 9 reports.
The law, which state lawmakers quickly rammed through over Memorial Day weekend, would legalize abortions for any reason up to birth in Illinois. 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, abortion clinic regulations and conscience protections for medical workers. Additionally, it would force all health insurance plans to cover abortions, with no exceptions for religious or moral objections.
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The legislation prompted massive protests earlier this year. In March, so many pro-life advocates filled the state capitol to rally against the bill that police had to close the building due to overcrowding. Afterward, lawmakers did not move the bill forward for months.
But over Memorial Day weekend, pro-lifers learned that pro-abortion Democrats planned to push through the bill before the end of the legislative session. Late on May 31, they passed it and sent it to the governor for final approval.
The Thomas More Society described the bill as “the most radical piece of abortion legislation that has ever been introduced in Illinois.” It would create a “fundamental right” to abortion and prevent the state from interfering in any way with the killing of unborn babies. In addition, it would require every health insurance plan to cover abortions, including late-term abortions, without any exemptions for people with religious or moral objections.
“While a growing number of states are working to advance popular pro-life laws, Illinois is trying to outdo New York’s abortion extremism – and unborn children and their mothers will pay the price,” said SBA List’s National Campaign Chair Jill Stanek, an Illinois native, a former nurse who witnessed babies being born alive and left to die in Chicago.
Stanek told LifeNews: “The bill Illinois lawmakers passed is so radical, they even went out of their way to repeal the state’s ban on barbaric partial-birth abortions. Americans of every political persuasion are appalled by these attempts to expand abortion on demand through the moment of birth and even infanticide, and that in turn is driving pro-life momentum around the country. There is no pride or glory in being the most extreme pro-abortion state in the nation.”
Last week, Catholic Bishop Thomas Paprocki of Springfield instructed priests in his diocese to refuse communion to politicians who voted for the bill until they confess and repent.
But Illinois is not alone. Earlier this week, Vermont Gov. Phil Scott signed a similar law allowing abortions for basically any reason up to birth in his state, and Maine Gov. Janet Mills signed a law allowing nurses to abort unborn babies. In January, New York lawmakers prompted national outrage after they passed a bill removing basically all restrictions on abortion in their state.
Polls indicate that most Americans oppose such laws. According to a national poll by Marist University, three in four Americans (75 percent) say abortion should be limited to – at most – the first three months of pregnancy. This includes most Republicans (92 percent), Independents (78 percent) and a majority of Democrats (60 percent). It also includes more than six in 10 (61 percent) who identify as “pro-choice” on abortion.
A May 2018 Gallup poll found that 53 percent of Americans oppose all or most abortions.
Action: Call the governor’s Springfield office at 217-782-6830 or 217-782-6831. Call his Chicago office at 312-814-2121. Email him by filling out and submitting this form here.
