In the House yesterday, the Committee on Energy & Commerce held a hearing on abortion policy, the fifth such hearing that House Democrats have held over the past week.
The deck was stacked in favor of the pro-abortion perspective, with five witnesses testifying on behalf of legalizing abortion on demand and just a single pro-life witness, Dr. Christina Francis.
Some highlights of the hearing:
Pro-abortion activist Renee Bracey Sherman made the Democratic position quite clear with this statement: “Give us back our abortions at any time and for any reason, anywhere in this country.”
Leah Litman, an assistant professor at the University of Michigan Law School, said that Dobbs allows states to treat women as second-class citizens who are unequal to men.
Meanwhile, Bracey Sherman characterized Francis’s testimony on behalf of pro-life laws and pro-life medicine as being “racist” and “anti-black,” and she accused Francis of antisemitism for having noted that prominent abortion advocate Dr. Daniel Grossman has financial and institutional ties to the abortion industry.
Another of the pro-abortion witnesses accused Francis of spreading “misinformation” about abortion, echoing the assertion of congresswoman Diana DeGette (D., Colo.), who said before the hearing began that she expected to hear inflammatory language and intentional distortions of the truth.
Despite the stiff opposition, Francis was able to clarify several key points. She noted that there isn’t a single pro-life law in the country that would prevent women from obtaining care for an ectopic pregnancy or care after suffering a miscarriage. To the extent that there is confusion about this treatment, the problem is not with the law, it is with the implementation of laws in the medical context: “It is the fault of the hospital systems or state departments of health. It’s their responsibility to educate their physicians on what the law says and what it means.”
Francis was also able to testify to the medical risks to women of allowing for telemedicine chemical abortions, or abortion pills obtained without an in-person doctor’s appointment. She pointed out that in some cases, such as with an ectopic pregnancy or a pregnancy further along than a woman realizes, there are significant health risks to women of taking these abortion drugs at home without having seen a physician ahead of time.