Opinion: Proposed late-term abortion bill could be shaky victory for pro-life movement

The House of Representatives passed the “Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act,” on Oct. 3, a measure that would nationally ban abortions after 20 weeks’ gestation, which the bill’s supporters claim is when unborn children gain the ability to feel pain.

Rep. Trent Franks of Arizona proposed the bill in both the 113th and 114th Congresses, only to watch it die both times in the hands of the Senate. Hopefully, the bill will soon pass through the Senate and prove that the third time is indeed the charm.

With the Republican party controlling the House, Senate and Oval Office, the act has a legitimate chance go further than it ever has before. The White House released a statement the day before the House vote stating that, saying that should the bill land on President Trump’s desk, “his advisors would recommend that he sign the bill into law.”

If passed into law, violators of the act would slap a fine, up to five years in prison or both on those performing or attempting to perform abortions past 20 weeks. The bill also states women who undergo a procedure may be prosecuted as well.

As part of a compromise, the measure would still allow for the abortion of pregnancies that either threaten the mother’s life or are conceived out of rape or incest past 20 weeks. While not an all-encompassing ban, this bill would greatly aid in the protection of the life of the unborn.

According to a 2009 study by the Center of Disease Control and Prevention, late-term procedures comprise 1.5 percent of all U.S. abortions since Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision to legalize abortion.

It is a statistic that, when you do the math abortion, is a larger pill for the left to swallow: with nearly 60 million abortions in the past 44 years, 1.5 percent equals roughly 900,000 terminated pregnancies. That’s about 20,000 annual, or 56 daily pregnancies terminated after the 20-week mark.

Twenty-one states already have enacted some form of a 20-week ban, but federally criminalizing late-term abortions would not only overrule the states that currently allow for abortion procedures late into the third trimester, but it would also remove the U.S. from the list of seven out of 198 nations who have yet to impose the ban.

For the pro-life movement, the bill’s passing would make a significant stride in their quest to ban abortion altogether.

But with more than one Achilles’ heel for the pro-choice movement to target, the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act may be standing on shaky ground.

One problem with the bill lies in its core argument: the unborn begin to feel pain halfway through the second trimester. An Oct. 2 Rewire article attacking Franks’ bill cited a recent scientific review of 157 studies that evidenced third-trimester fetal pain, but provided much weaker evidence for the presence of pain in earlier weeks, citing immaturity of the cortex, lack of awareness and near-perpetual sleep as an argument against HR36’s claim.

Towering over this issue is the fact that, should the bill be passed as law, the bill would likely be shot down as an unconstitutional confliction with Roe v. Wade.

The core of the case dictated that women have a constitutional right to terminate a pregnancy before a fetus becomes viable—which, the court case decided, is around 24 weeks. The bill’s proposed ban creates a month-long contradiction with Roe.

All of this aside, the bill has good intentions in furthering the anti-abortion agenda—even if its exemption of abortions in cases of rape and incest forms a less than ideal compromise.

But it is uncertain if Oct. 3 will be the bill’s last visit to the House of Representatives, even considering the Republican control of both the executive and legislative branches of government. In 2016, the bill reached the Republican controlled Senate and yet it still failed to amass enough GOP votes to pass.

Of course, it is possible for Trump to override Congress entirely and use an executive order to prevent abortions after 20 weeks. But would not that be the same action for which he criticized former President Barack Obama and the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program?

We will just have to wait and see.