Illinois lawmakers voted to approve a sweeping abortion rights bill that would, among other actions, repeal the state’s ban on partial-birth abortion.
The state legislature sent the Reproductive Health Act to the desk of Democrat Gov. J.B. Pritzker, who supports it.
“This law is the most extreme expansion of abortion on demand anywhere in the country, even worse than the one enacted by New York earlier this year,” said Jill Stanek, national campaign chair of the Susan B. Anthony List (SBA List).
Stanek, an Illinois native and a former nurse, witnessed babies being born alive after abortions and left to die in Chicago.
“It allows abortion throughout pregnancy, up to the moment of birth, for any reason,” she said of the Illinois legislation in a statement. She added:
It allows abortions by a non-doctor in a facility that’s not inspected and doesn’t have to report injuries. It strips away conscience protections for pro-life health care workers and forces all health insurance policies to cover abortions, including religious organizations. It even goes so far as to repeal Illinois’ ban on barbaric partial-birth abortions and eliminates protections for babies born alive during failed abortions. It is sweeping and barbaric.
The bill would allow abortion clinics to go unlicensed and without health and safety inspections. It would also strip all rights from unborn children and declare, instead, that abortion is a “fundamental right.”
Peter Breen, vice president and senior counsel of the Thomas More Society, said the bill is “the most radically pro-abortion measure of its kind and would make Illinois an abortion destination for the country.”
Democrat State Rep. Kelly Cassidy sponsored the legislation in the Illinois House. She tweeted her enthusiasm for its approval:
“RHA codifies our existing practices and, and this is critical, treats abortion care just like any other health care, because it is,” she said, reported ABC7.
Planned Parenthood also celebrated the expansion of abortion in Illinois:
Breen said, the “legacy of any legislator” who voted for the bill “will be that of cruel dehumanization on a mass scale.”
“Those legislators will bear the legacy of thousands of late-term dismemberment abortions inflicted on perfectly healthy children,” he added. “Those legislators will bear the legacy of harm done to those women who suffer from abortions performed in filthy unlicensed clinics.”
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