Women's Healthcare

Floor Speech

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Ms. ERNST. Absolutely, Senator Daines, and I am proud to join you on the floor for this colloquy this evening. I will take your place, and I have just a few words that I would love to share on these bills as well and protecting our unborn.

Again, I would like to thank the Senator from Montana for arranging this colloquy.

We want to get into some of these commonsense measures that we are speaking about this evening. I appreciate the Senator from Montana's words, and it is astounding that we are even having this debate on the floor of the Senate.

Very, very commonsense, lifesaving measures are coming before us this week, and, first, I would like to step back a little bit and take a moment to answer the one key, big-picture question at the center of this debate and the debate that we have over life, and the basic question there: Is life valuable? And my answer to that question is absolutely.

I see value in every single life, and we all have different ideas on how we measure the value of life, but I can boil it down a little bit. Some folks would say it is what a human being will bring to this world. Now, what that is can be determined by different measures, but what impact does a person have.

Now, some, of course, will see celebrities. They will see athletes. They will see trailblazers and scientists and say: Wow, they have made their mark on the world, and they contribute so much. There is so much impact there.

But then I see it in everyday, common people at home in Iowa, as well. I even reflect upon folks like a friend of my daughter's who grew up in our small community of Stanton. He has Down syndrome, and yet he contributed so much--and still does to this day--in our home community. He is our hometown spirit coordinator at every football game, and he is leading everyone in their cheers and supporting our hometown teams. And this young man brings so much joy to everyone. I would say that his life has made a huge impact on all who know him. We can think of the smallest among us as well, that baby in the womb, and how does that baby make an impact. As a mother, I know that fellow mothers can relate to this as well, but that baby makes an impact even in the womb. The experience of pregnancy can change a woman forever, not just physically but mentally and emotionally.

Women I talk to will often comment on the amazing feeling and bond they will have with that child who is growing in their womb. They experience that heartbeat in the womb. And even to the effects that maybe we don't like to reflect on--I remember the swollen ankles I had in the last month of pregnancy. No offense to Fred Flintstone, but I had Fred Flintstone feet. Even things like that we can reflect on. But the impact of having that child stays with me. It changed me forever.

I know that other mothers know that whether it is from the beginning of a pregnancy with a healthy, full-term child or whether it is a scary premature birth or, for some, the difficult and life-ending decision to abort, the fact remains that the tiny human being carried within us has forever left a mark on their mother. This truth spurs me on to fight even harder to protect the undeniable value that every human life has. Every human life has value.

So today I stand with my pro-life colleagues in asking our pro-choice friends--many of whom are mothers and fathers themselves--to meet us in the middle. We may not be able to get on the same page when it comes to recognizing the inherent value each of these lives holds, but surely we can agree that protecting our most vulnerable from painful death is a unifying and humanitarian cause.

What I would like to do is just tell you the story of my fellow Iowan, Micah Pickering. Micah is joining us on the Hill this week, and I encourage all of my colleagues to take some time to meet this incredible boy. He will be on the Hill tomorrow.

When I first met Micah, he was just a couple years old, and his family had brought him into my office. I had this picture. I had just this picture in my office. Micah, then 2 years old, ran over to this picture, not knowing it was he, and he pointed at it and he said: ``A baby!''

I started to cry, and I said: ``Yes, Micah, that is a baby.''

Today Micah is happy, healthy, and he is 7 years old. He was born at 22 weeks, and that is the age of some of the babies we are talking about today--born at 22 weeks. When Micah was born, he was literally the size of a bag of M&Ms, a tiny baby.

Folks, can't we all agree that this is a baby and that babies like Micah who survive a premature birth at 20 to 22 weeks--we are talking about those who survive at 20 weeks, which is more than halfway through pregnancy--are deserving of protection? I agree with that.

The only difference between Micah and the more than 10,000 children who are aborted after 22 weeks' gestation--which is what Micah was--the difference, the dividing factor, is that Micah was wanted by his parents. His parents, Danielle and Clayton, saw his inherent value.

The Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act is a measure that should meet the approval standard of my pro-choice friends because supporting this bill means giving all of the Micah Pickerings of the world an equal, fighting chance. The degree to which a child of any age is wanted does not diminish their value, and we have an obligation as lawmakers to protect their right to life.

But if we cannot come together in support of a bill that protects viable babies from abortion at the point when they feel pain, then surely, surely a baby who survives an abortion attempt deserves the same degree of care as any other newborn. Folks, just think about it. These babies, their lives--they have already survived a horrific abortion attempt and have been given a second chance at life. But without our putting the necessary protections in place, these precious babies can literally be left to die. Those in the medical field who fail to care for these precious newborns need to be held accountable.

Senator Sasse has helped lead the way in protecting these living babies with his Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, a commonsense bill that I proudly support. Given that we have an estimated 143 babies who died between 2003 and 2014 after surviving abortion, it is clear that we need to strengthen the current law. These babies deserve the basic medical standard of care regardless of how wanted they may have been.

I implore you to think about the issue of life in a new way, one that is very simple. When you think about everyone you have come into contact with, whether it is your family, your friends, your coworkers, your spouse, even yourself, every single person was at one time a defenseless child in their mother's womb. Every life, from the baby who has just been conceived, to each and every one of you in this room tonight, has value. Whether you are that star athlete, whether you are that scientist making new discoveries, whether you are that hometown cheerleader, every life has value.

To my Senate colleagues, we have had this debate before, but I ask that you consider these bills with new eyes focused on the inherent value of life. You have the opportunity to save lives, and I hope you will join me in doing so.

I thank the Senator from Montana for raising this issue this evening, and I am proud to be a ``yes'' vote on both of these tremendous bills. I hope we can get others to join us in that effort.

Thank you, Senator.

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Ms. ERNST. I thank Mr. Sasse, the great Senator from Nebraska. I want to thank him for joining the colloquy and for offering the bill that would save these babies that, as he described, are born in horrific circumstances. But a baby is a baby, and it is undeniable.

I do hope that we have a number of our friends and colleagues from across the aisle join us tomorrow in that vote and say that, yes, this is a life that deserves dignity and a chance and an opportunity. That is what we are asking for. So thank you very much for your work there.

We will continue our colloquy. We have another speaker that is joining us from the great State of Indiana. I will yield to the junior Senator.

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Ms. ERNST. Thank you very much to the junior Senator from Indiana. We really appreciate his efforts on these bills as well.

Again, I think all of us would agree that these are commonsense pieces of legislation, and we would love to see some movement coming from our friends on the left.

We have had a wonderful colloquy this evening.

Of course, again, thanks to the Senator from Montana, Mr. Daines, for leading this colloquy and for sharing his time with us this evening as we have talked about some of these measures.

To the junior Senator from the great State of Nebraska, as well, Mr. Sasse, thank you so much for authoring the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Act.

And thanks to Senator Lindsey Graham, of course, for authoring his pain-capable bill.

Again, we have talked this evening about those two bills that really hit close to home. I did happen to sit through the Judiciary Committee hearing that was led by Senator Sasse a couple of weeks ago, where we did talk about the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Act. It was true that so many of our friends across the aisle were deflecting on the legislation. They were talking about a woman's right to choose. They were talking about being pro-choice and supporting abortion. The bottom line is, this is not a bill that has anything to do with those topics. This is about saving babies who are born alive after a botched abortion attempt. So I think we have to make that very clear as we move through tomorrow's proceedings.

Again, thank you for the colloquy this evening. It has been very helpful in expressing our views about the rights of these babies to live and to make a difference in our world.

With that, we will close out the colloquy, again thanking those who are supporting the bills, as well as those who joined us here on the floor this evening. Order of Procedure

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Ms. ERNST. on Tuesday, February 25, the Senate vote on the following: one, confirmation of Executive Calendar No. 384; two, cloture on Executive Calendar No. 491; three, cloture on Executive Calendar No. 569; further, that if cloture is invoked on the nominations and following the third vote in the series, the Senate stand in recess until 2:15 p.m. to accommodate the weekly party luncheons; that following the lunch recess, the Senate resume legislative session and consideration of the motion to proceed to S. 3275 and the time from 2:15 p.m. until 3:30 p.m. be equally divided between the two leaders or their designees.

3275 and S. 311 ripen and that following the votes on those motions to invoke cloture, the Senate vote on the following: one, confirmation of Executive Calendar No. 491; two, confirmation of Executive Calendar No. 569; and, three, cloture on Executive Calendar No. 416.

on Thursday, February 27; further, that if any nomination is confirmed, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table and the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action.

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