Senate Judiciary Committee Hears Bill to Restrict Reproductive Rights
Contact Name: Marina Altschiller
Phone: (603) 271-3207
CONCORD – Today, the Senate Judiciary Committee heard HB 625, a bill to ban abortion at or after 24 weeks without exception for the health of the fetus or in cases of rape or incest.
After the hearing, Senator Becky Whitley (D-Hopkinton), Senator Jay Kahn (D-Keene), and Senator Cindy Rosenwald (D-Nashua) issued the following statements:
“HB 625 is yet another attempt to diminish an individual’s decisions about their own reproductive health,” stated Senator Becky Whitley (D-Hopkinton). “This bill chooses an arbitrary point in time, after which abortion and providers would be criminalized. Abortions later in pregnancy are uncommon and often occur within tragic and difficult situations. Every pregnancy is unique and every individual's circumstances are different, and these most difficult and personal decisions belong only to an individual and their healthcare providers. To suggest that these decisions should be dictated by legislators playing politics with women’s lives is deeply offensive. As legislators, we should be expanding access to reproductive healthcare, not restricting it.”
Senator Jay Kahn (D-Keene) added, “As we heard from members of the public at the hearing, abortion later in pregnancy is highly stigmatized, and it is a devastatingly difficult decisions to have to make. This bill fails to take into account the fact that no two pregnancies are alike, and to treat them as such only speaks to the deep divide in expertise between the legislature and medical professionals who specialize in prenatal care. As a legislator, I cannot in good conscience insert myself between a woman and the choices that are hers to make about her health; it would be irresponsible and cruel to do so.”
Deputy Senate Democratic Leader Cindy Rosenwald (D-Nashua) added, “Make no mistake, these proposals have just one goal: to chip away at women’s rights to make their own decisions about their own health. Abortions later in pregnancy are uncommon, and when they do happen, they’re in the most heartbreaking of circumstances. This crusade against women and their ability to make their own choices fails to take into account that every woman and every pregnancy is different. It fails to acknowledge that women are equal members of society who can be trusted, whose decisions don’t need to be made for them by this legislature, or anyone else. We need to trust women, in consultation with their doctors, to make the right decisions for themselves, their bodies, and their families.”
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