by Elizabeth Graham, Vice President, Texas Right to Life
With all the fake news about abortion extremist Joe Biden winning the presidential election, abortion advocates are foaming at the mouth to repeal and replace federal and state laws that protect unborn children and their mothers from the pain and anguish of “choice,” but these long-standing policies have also spared many a taxpayer from lining the coffers of abortion giants, such as Planned Parenthood. Kamala Harris campaigned as proudly pro-abortion, flaunting her record of weaponizing the Office of the Attorney General in California against pro-life journalist David Daleiden. And while Biden limply tried to obscure his pro-abortion record of 40 plus years in public office, Nancy Pelosi pulls no punches about her radical abortion agenda once alleged-president-elect Biden takes office.
First in the crosshairs of the radical left is to dismantle the Hyde Amendment, passed by the late pro-life champion Congressman Henry Hyde, a Republican who represented the northwest suburbs of Chicago for decades. The Hyde Amendment prevents taxpayers from directly funding elective abortion through Medicaid, a policy that once garnered large bipartisan support including then-Senator Joe Biden. In the 44 years since the passage of Hyde, the life-saving measure has protected untold tiny Texans and millions of Americans.
The Trump Administration has restricted federal funds to abortion providers both in the United States and abroad. He has changed eligibility requirements for so-called family planning programs, directing such programs to prioritize a broad client base and a wide spectrum of services. By doing so, he has expanded women’s health to entities and agencies that are not sullied by their affiliation with abortion providers. Because of the hostile abortion-celebrating majority in the United States House under the leadership of Pelosi, these pro-life measures have been accomplished by executive order, which fall outside the reach of her talons.
Nevertheless, Pelosi and her Democrat cohorts are undaunted and seek to enshrine public funding for all abortion in every state for any reason without limits, not only through Medicaid, but also through all healthcare revenue streams funneled from the feds to states and health care providers. The ruling class who squawks about “choice” leaves no freedom of choice for the taxpayer in funding abortion, not even for the taxpayer oblivious to the culture war.
Before the Supreme Court foisted Roe v. Wade upon America by judicial decree in 1973, abortion was seldom discussed in party politics or in polite conversation. In fact, neither the Republican nor Democrat parties referenced abortion in their party platforms. Mere ambiguous allusions to “family planning” and the right to “space children” were included in the Democratic platform — certainly not unadulterated pro-life proclamations, but not exactly clear endorsements of child-killing either. Parties evaded any explicit use of that “A” word.
Even though the Hyde Amendment does not directly ban abortion and represents one of the less aggressive efforts pro-lifers are pursuing to protect life across the county, the Democrats are determined to start their political assault with its undoing and proceed from there. One would think that Harris, Pelosi, and their coven would reserve their cacophony of feminist blather for proposed legislation such as heartbeat bills (bans on abortion when the unborn child’s heartbeat is detected), mandatory waiting period bills (before abortion), or bans on aborting unborn children with disabilities. For these measures not only stop abortions in large numbers but could potentially undermine the erroneous precedent of Roe.
But reason and measured rhetoric have long escaped these hardened hearts. Keeping some abortions legal and allowing some access to abortion is no longer enough. The sacred ritual of slaughtering the innocent on the altar of “choice” must be funded by every taxpayer so as to further condition us “deplorables” to yield our faith and freedoms to the will of the ruling class.
States have worked to defund the abortion industry and restrict Medicaid funds beyond the Hyde Amendment. Though not completely achieved, Texas leads the nation by redirecting both state and federal dollars to entities not affiliated with abortion. The legislatures in red states recognize that abortion providers do not follow the laws they work so hard to enact and are increasingly exploring ways to stop the flow of funds to these mills and their affiliates.
Federal Courts of Appeals have mixed rulings on states’ efforts to restrict Medicaid and other revenue streams from benefiting abortion providers. The left cannot win — or risk — an open, honest, and diplomatic debate so they must impose policies from the top-down, i.e., Obamacare.
They feebly shroud their policy goals in such terms as “ensuring that women have access to health care,” and “reproductive justice,” labeling the Hyde Amendment as archaic and no longer a common-sense bipartisan policy. If the Democrats, Biden, Harris, and Pelosi become the majority, stripping the Hyde Amendment from the books is only the first step on that blood-stained road to perdition for these abortion mercenaries. What follows that will be unimagined savagery.