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Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Apr 1, 2024 / 18:05 pm (CNA).
The Florida Supreme Court ruled to allow the state’s 15-week abortion ban to take effect while also allowing a broad abortion amendment to be added to the November bal… […]
Cardinal Wilton Gregory, archbishop of Washington, leads the recession of the Mass on Ash Wednesday at the Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle on Feb. 22, 2023, in Washington, D.C. / Credit: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
CNA Staff, Apr 1, 2024… […]
South Dakota’s Governor Kristi Noem arrives to speak during the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) meeting on Feb. 23, 2024, in National Harbor, Maryland. / Credit: MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Mar 28, 2024 / 13:00 pm (CNA).
A prominent pro-life group is praising South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem for signing a “Med Ed” bill that it says will mandate the creation of an informational video to combat “abortion misinformation.”
According to a March 25 statement by Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America (SBA), the South Dakota bill is the “first legislation of its kind drafted to end the confusion caused by the abortion lobby through direct education to doctors.”
Kelsey Pritchard, SBA state public affairs director, said in the statement that “though every state with a pro-life law allows pregnant women to receive emergency care, the abortion industry has sown confusion on this fact to justify their position of abortion without limits.”
“With many in the media refusing to fact-check this obvious lie, other states should look to South Dakota in combating dangerous abortion misinformation,” she said.
The bill, passed overwhelmingly by the Republican-controlled legislature, was signed into law by Noem, who is also a Republican, on Monday. Introduced by state Rep. Taylor Rehfeldt, who is a nurse, the bill requires the South Dakota Department of Health to create an informational video describing the state’s abortion law and clarifying when “life-threatening or health-threatening” exceptions apply.
Now that the bill has been passed into law the Department of Health has until Sept. 1 to create the video and accompanying informational materials. The video and materials will be posted to the Department of Health’s website for doctors and the public to use as a reference in understanding the state’s abortion laws.
South Dakota is one of 14 states that prohibit abortion through all nine months of pregnancy. While some states allow exceptions in cases of rape, incest, and fetal anomaly, South Dakota only makes exceptions in cases where the mother’s life or health is in danger.
The ACLU of South Dakota decried the bill when it passed out of committee, saying in a Feb. 28 statement that it “gives anti-abortion activists a guise to appear to care about pregnant patients while actually passing legislation that further enshrines anti-abortion cruelty.”
Pritchard, however, said that the new informational material will help to clear up confusion on when the exception allows an abortion to take place in the state.
“Regardless of political affiliation or whether someone is pro-life or pro-choice, South Dakotans of all philosophies can celebrate that moms will be better protected through direct education to our doctors on their ability to exercise reasonable medical judgment in all situations,” she said.
According to SBA, Kentucky and Oklahoma have also taken steps to clarify their abortion exceptions and the Texas Medical Board is currently considering issuing a clarification to its life of the mother exception.
Hundreds of pro-life and pro-abortion demonstrators hold rallies alongside each other as the Supreme Court hears oral arguments in the high-stakes abortion pill case Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v. Food and Drug Administration, March 26, 20… […]
The Supreme Court heard oral arguments on March 26, 2024, for a lawsuit brought by the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine (AHM), which seeks to impose more restrictions on the prescription of mifepristone. / Credit: Peter Pinedo/CNA
Washington, … […]
Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) senior counsel Kellie Fiedorek (center) and Elizabeth Gillette (right), who survived severe complications from a chemical abortion, spoke with EWTN News Nightly anchor Tracy Sabol about the case. / Credit: Screen… […]
Pro-lifers march through lower Manhattan amid a heavy downpour and pro-abortion protests necessitating a significant police presence on March 23, 2024. / Credit: Jeffrey Bruno
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Mar 25, 2024 / 18:18 pm (CNA).
In what ha… […]
Benedictine College in Atchison, Kansas. Courtesy photo. / null
CNA Staff, Mar 23, 2024 / 07:00 am (CNA).
A new Catholic, osteopathic medical school that will be housed on the campus of Benedictine College hopes to open in the fall of 2027, the… […]
A participant in a Women’s March event Jan. 18, 2020, in San Francisco holds a “Pass the Equal Rights Amendment” sign while marching. / Credit: Sundry Photography/Shutterstock
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Mar 22, 2024 / 18:30 pm (CNA).
Nevada Judge Erika Ballou ruled this week that the state must include abortion in its Medicaid program.
This ruling effectively mandates Nevada taxpayers fund abortion. It is unclear whether the state will appeal the decision.
Ballou did not give any explanation for her Tuesday ruling, only issuing a one-page order that granted a local pro-abortion group’s request to strike down the Medicaid restrictions.
The pro-abortion group, called “Silver State Hope Fund,” which provides grants for women seeking abortions, applauded the ruling, calling it a “historic day for Nevada.”
Represented by ACLU Nevada, Silver State Hope Fund filed a suit against the state’s Health and Human Services Department in August 2023. The suit argued that the state was violating the ERA through its so-called Medicaid “coverage ban” on abortion. ACLU Nevada argued that not including abortion in Medicaid “disadvantages women because of their sex, including their reproductive capabilities.”
According to reporting by the Las Vegas Review-Journal, attorneys for the state of Nevada argued that the state has “a legitimate interest in efficiently utilizing Medicaid funds — both federal and state — to maximize the services provided to Medicaid recipients” and that “if Medicaid were to cover elective abortions, it would have to divert state money from covering other services because it cannot use federal matching dollars to pay for elective abortions.”
All funding for abortion would have to come out of the state’s budget because of the Hyde Amendment’s prohibition of federal tax dollars from being used for abortion.
ACLU attorney Rebecca Chan also celebrated the ruling, saying in a statement: “We are relieved that the court correctly recognized the severe harms of Nevada’s ban on Medicaid coverage for abortion, which directly violates the recently passed state Equal Rights Amendment.”
“Every person, regardless of their income level or insurance source, deserves the power to make personal medical decisions during pregnancy, including abortion,” she said.
The Nevada ERA, passed in a referendum vote in 2022, added a section to the Nevada Constitution that said: “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by this State or any of its political subdivisions on account of race, color, creed, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, or expression, age, disability, ancestry, or national origin.”
There is an ongoing national push to add a similar version of the ERA to the U.S. Constitution, something the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has firmly opposed. The bishops have voiced concerns that the language could be used to claim a constitutional right to an abortion or could be used to infringe on religious liberty.
In 2023 Arlington Bishop Michael Burbidge, chair of the bishops’ Committee on Pro-Life Activities, issued a statement speaking out against this version of the ERA.
“The Catholic faith teaches that women and men are created with equal dignity, and we support that being reflected in law. The proposed ‘Equal Rights Amendment,’ however, would likely create a sweeping new nationwide right to abortion at any stage, at taxpayer expense, and eliminate even modest protections for women’s health and the lives of preborn children,” he said.
Burbidge added that the measure “could also pose grave problems for women’s privacy and athletic and other opportunities, and negatively impact religious freedom.”
Rep. Matt Rosendale, R-Montana, speaks at a press conference on the debt limit and the Freedom Caucus’s plan for spending reduction at the U.S. Capitol on March 28, 2023, in Washington, D.C. / Credit: Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Mar 22, 2024 / 14:00 pm (CNA).
Four congressmen in the conservative House Freedom Caucus voiced “strong objections” to a Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) plan to expand its coverage of in vitro fertilization (IVF) to unmarried veterans, including those in same-sex relationships.
Under the previous rules, the VA only covered IVF treatments for married couples who produce their own eggs and sperm for the fertility treatment. The new policy will allow donor eggs and sperm and cover treatments for unmarried people who require such donations to create an embryo.
The lawmakers, led by Rep. Matt Rosendale, R-Montana, expressed their dissent in a letter to VA Secretary Denis McDonough on March 20. He was joined by Caucus Chairman Bob Good, R-Virginia; Rep. Mary Miller, R-Illinois; and Rep. Josh Brecheen, R-Oklahoma.
“An IVF embryo is the earliest stage of life that exists outside of the womb,” Rosendale said in a statement accompanying the letter.
“Through this expansion, a surplus of embryos will be created, which are likely to result in abandoned or cruelly discarded human life,” Rosendale said. “Accompanying that, legislation has been introduced previously to expand IVF at the VA, meaning the legality of this decision is questionable at best.”
IVF is a fertility treatment in which doctors extract eggs from the woman and fertilize the eggs with sperm to create human embryos in a laboratory without a sexual act. Clinics create a surplus of embryos to maximize the likelihood that the mother can bring one healthy baby to term — the remaining embryos are often discarded, which ends a human life, or frozen indefinitely.
The letter from the lawmakers notes that expanding IVF “creates a plethora of ethical concerns and questions” and calls the treatment “morally dubious.” Because most human embryos are either destroyed or abandoned, the signatories conclude it “should not be subsidized by the American taxpayer.”
Rosendale and his three colleagues also requested information from the VA pertaining to what the department does with surplus embryos, how many are destroyed or frozen, how much the IVF expansion and embryo storage will cost taxpayers, and what specific law grants them the authority to take this action.
Rather than expanding IVF, the lawmakers suggested the VA provide reimbursements for adoption efforts instead.
“There are around 400,000 children in foster care nationwide, and approximately 117,000 are waiting to be adopted,” the letter adds. “The VA also provides fertility and infertility care to help veterans who struggle with infertility. It would make more sense to use the funds that the expansion of IVF will cost to bolster adoption efforts at the VA.”
Under its current policies, the VA can provide up to $2,000 for adoption expenses, but only if the veteran has a service-connected disability that causes infertility. The law does not allow coverage for surrogacy.
Access to IVF became a major political issue after the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos created through IVF are covered under the state’s “Wrongful Death of a Minor Act.” After several clinics stopped providing IVF, Republicans and Democrats in the state quickly passed legislation to grant clinics immunity in the deaths of human embryos, which was signed by Gov. Kay Ivey, who claims to be pro-life.
A large number of Republicans, including lawmakers who are outspoken on other pro-life issues, distanced themselves from the ruling and embraced IVF despite the destruction to human life that is integral to the industry. Few have spoken out against the process.
The Catholic Church opposes IVF because it separates the marriage act from procreation and destroys embryonic human life. Acknowledging the advances in science available today to those seeking help having children, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops warns Catholics on its website of the ethical issues involved.
“The many techniques now used to overcome infertility also have profound moral implications, and couples should be aware of these before making decisions about their use,” the guidance reads.
© Catholic World Report