OFFICIALS LEGISLATION INTEREST GROUPS PUBLIC STATEMENTS COMMITTEES VETOES

S. 311

Floor Speech

Date: Feb. 25, 2019
Location: Washington, DC
Issues: Health and Health Care Reproduction

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Mr. SCHUMER. Madam President, a word on today's vote on women's reproductive rights: The bill the Senate will vote on shortly is carefully crafted to target, intimidate, and shut down reproductive healthcare providers. Doctors across this country--Democratic doctors, Republican doctors--are lining up against the bill because it would impose requirements on what type of care doctors must provide in certain circumstances, even if that care is ineffective, contradictory to medical evidence, and against the family's wishes.

My Republican colleagues have said some incendiary things about opposing this bill. Let me be very clear. Many of these claims are false. It has always been illegal to harm a newborn infant. This vote has nothing--nothing--to do with that. Read the language. We are talking about situations when expectant parents tragically learn their pregnancy is no longer viable, and there is a fatal diagnosis. What happens in those circumstances should be decided between a woman, her family, her minister, priest, rabbi, imam, and her doctor.

It makes no sense for Washington politicians who know nothing about individual circumstances to say they know better than the doctors or the patients and their families. The bill is solely meant to intimidate doctors and restrict patients' access to care and has nothing--nothing, nothing--to do with protecting children.

Last Friday, the administration announced it was imposing a gag rule on U.S. reproductive healthcare providers and trying to restrict access to healthcare clinics that provide reproductive care. So this vote doesn't occur in a vacuum. It is part of a pattern of actions taken by President Trump and congressional Republicans to limit, deny, or circumscribe a woman's right to healthcare.

I urge the American people to do their own research, read the bill, and see what it says. Most of you will agree with it. Pay attention to the facts and not the false rhetoric. This bill is Washington politics at its worst. I will vote no.

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