STATEMENT OF U.S. REPRESENTATIVE JAN SCHAKOWSKY ON LATE TERM ABORTION LEGISLATION

"As a mother and grandmother of girls, I am deeply and personally offended by this legislation. It implies that American women just have to be stopped from frivolously deciding to terminate a pregnancy just weeks or days before delivery. It has been stated that these pregnant women have not explored all the medical and surgical options to save their babies or to protect their own lives. And it takes politicians to stop them.

"The truth is the women who have late abortions are forced to end wanted pregnancies either because the baby will surely die or the women will seriously jeopardize their own lives and health. Women are portrayed as irresponsible baby killers, when in fact, it is the sponsors of this bill who show utter disregard for the life or the health of women. This bill implies that the current law allows women to have abortions up to the last minute before delivery. That is not true. Despite all the rhetoric to the contrary, Roe v. Wade strictly limits abortions after viability.

"This isn't about one procedure or even late term abortions. This bill is so vague that it would ban most abortion procedures, including some first and all second and third trimester abortions. And that's the goal -- to reverse Roe v. Wade and to take away from women what the Supreme Court calls 'the most intimate and personal choices a person may make in a lifetime, choices central to personal dignity and autonomy, [and] central to the liberty protected by the Fourteenth Amendment.'"