Early voting began Friday in Virginia. On the ballot is Amendment 1, a radical and extreme pro-abortion and pro-transgender measure that is being deceptively sold to the public. It tears up the few remaining safeguards imposed by existing Virginia law and would preclude future Virginia legislatures from democratically enacting laws to put even the most modest guardrails on late-term abortion or transgender drugs and surgeries — even for minors. It would completely insulate doctors for the worst abuses so long as abortion or the reproductive organs are involved. Pro-lifers who may be discouraged this election cycle should turn out to vote against Amendment 1. So should voters who reject the madness of performing irrevocable transgender procedures on minors. Voters who are less committed to either side of these contentious issues would be wise to leave these matters to the legislature and reject a permanent, one-time power grab aimed at foreclosing future debate.
Virginia already has quite liberal abortion laws, which were expanded in a law signed by Governor Ralph Northam in 2020. The sales pitch is that Amendment 1 would protect and enshrine these rules. The far more important reality can be seen in what would change in the state’s laws.
The amendment’s language is deceptive. The ballot question asks only if the state constitution should be amended “to (i) protect the freedom to make personal decisions about prenatal care, childbirth, postpartum care, birth control, abortion, miscarriage management, and fertility care; (ii) protect doctors, nurses, and patients from being punished for these decisions; and (iii) allow for restrictions on access to abortion during the third trimester of pregnancy except when the patient’s health is at risk or the pregnancy cannot survive.” Nothing is said directly about transgender procedures. Nothing is said about minors. Meanwhile, this language implies that Virginia is somehow in need of protection against its legislature banning “birth control” or “miscarriage management.”
The actual constitutional text, under the heading of “Fundamental right to reproductive freedom,” is more expansive. The main provision:
That every individual has the fundamental right to reproductive freedom, including the ability to make and carry out decisions relating to one’s own prenatal care, childbirth, postpartum care, contraception, abortion care, miscarriage management, and fertility care.
An individual’s right to reproductive freedom shall not be, directly or indirectly, denied, burdened, or infringed upon unless justified by a compelling state interest achieved by the least restrictive means . . . The Commonwealth shall not discriminate in the protection or enforcement of this fundamental right . . .
For the purposes of this section, a state interest is compelling only if it is for the limited purpose of maintaining or improving the health of an individual seeking care, consistent with accepted clinical standards of care and evidence-based medicine, and does not infringe on that individual’s autonomous decision making. [Emphasis added.]
Not only does this language leave no room for the law to distinguish between adults and minors; its anti-discrimination language seems aimed at ensuring that no such distinction can be drawn to require parental consent even for the youngest minors. The life of the unborn is categorically excluded from consideration as a state interest; so is protecting the patient from fraud or coercion — but even measures essential to protect patient health are prohibited if it would infringe on the patient’s “autonomous decision making.” This is worse than Orwellian; it is Canadian.
Abolishing the legal distinction between an adult woman and an underage girl seems to be one of the driving purposes of Amendment 1, given that Virginia law currently draws such a distinction in requiring parental consent. Moreover, Virginia law also currently includes “sterilization” among the contraceptive procedures that require parental consent for minors. By declaring a “fundamental right” to all decisions regarding “contraception,” Amendment 1 would likely be read by courts to bulldoze the state’s existing parental consent requirements for gender-transition surgeries or drugs that destroy a minor boy or girl’s reproductive organs.
The second big change wrought by Amendment 1 is to blow a huge hole in the state’s carefully drawn limits on late-term abortions. This is phrased as an exception:
Notwithstanding the above, the Commonwealth may regulate the provision of abortion care in the third trimester, provided that in no circumstance shall the Commonwealth prohibit an abortion (i) that in the professional judgment of a physician is medically indicated to protect the life or physical or mental health of the pregnant individual or (ii) when in the professional judgment of a physician the fetus is not viable. [Emphasis added.]
Under existing Virginia law, a mother may get an abortion in the third trimester when “the continuation of the pregnancy is likely to result in the death of the woman or substantially and irremediably impair the mental or physical health of the woman.” Further protections are provided to ensure that this judgment is shared by multiple doctors. The new “exception” expands the criteria to anything that might “protect . . . physical or mental health” while explicitly allowing “a physician,” singular, to make the final and fatal judgment.
Then there’s the third strike: Amendment 1 insulates the medical profession against any legal consequences:
The Commonwealth shall not penalize, prosecute, or otherwise take adverse action against an individual based on such individual’s own exercise of this fundamental right or such individual’s own actual, potential, perceived, or alleged pregnancy outcomes, including miscarriage, stillbirth, or abortion. The Commonwealth shall not penalize, prosecute, or otherwise take adverse action against any individual for aiding or assisting another individual in exercising such other individual’s right to reproductive freedom with such other individual’s voluntary consent.
This not only precludes prosecutions or professional discipline by the medical authorities for botched abortions or transgender surgeries; it would appear to preclude medical malpractice suits as well — so long as medical practitioners (even unlicensed ones) have obtained “voluntary consent” from the patient, however uninformed and without regard to whether the patient is a minor. Not only could this give legal immunity to a future Kermit Gosnell in the Commonwealth; it seems aimed at insulating gender-reassignment quacks from the malpractice suits they have faced in states such as New York for transitioning minors.
None of this is just, wise, necessary, or decent. None of it would be clear to ordinary Virginia voters from the ballot description. Collectively, it represents a step further into dystopia for Virginia. It should be voted down.