Senator James Lankford (R-OK) introduced a bill that would “prohibit a health care practitioner from failing to exercise the proper degree of care in the case of a child who survives an abortion or attempted abortion.”
Those co-sponsoring the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act include Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) and Senators Jim Banks (R-IN), Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-MS), Jim Risch (R-ID), Cynthia Lummis (R-WY), Katie Britt (R-AL), Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Roger Wicker, R-MS), Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), Mike Crapo (R-ID), Deb Fischer (R-NE), Chuck Grassley (R-IA), John Hoeven (R-ND), Roger Marshall, M.D. (R-KS), Thom Tillis (R-NC), Ted Budd (R-NC), Tim Scott (R-SC), Ron Johnson (R-WI), Tim Sheehy (R-MT), Tommy Tuberville (R-AL), Bill Hagerty (R-TN), John Curtis (R-UT), Todd Young (R-IN), Pete Ricketts (R-NE), Kevin Cramer (R-ND), John Barrasso (R-WY), John Kennedy (R-LA), John Cornyn (R-TX), Bill Cassidy, M.D. (R-LA), Mike Rounds (R-SD), Joni Ernst (R-IA), Rick Scott (R-FL), Steve Daines (R-MT), Markwayne Mullin (R-OK), Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Ted Cruz (R-TX), Eric Schmitt (R-MO), Mike Lee (R-UT), Dan Sullivan (R-AK), Jerry Moran (R-KS), Tom Cotton (R-AR), Josh Hawley (R-MO), and Dave McCormick (R-PA).
“No child should be denied medical care simply because they are ‘unwanted.’ Today, if an abortion procedure fails and a child is born alive, doctors can just ignore the crying baby on the table and watch them slowly die of neglect. That’s not an abortion, that’s infanticide,” Lankford said in a statement.
Although Congress passed the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act in 2022, the law did not provide measures that would enforce the protection of infants who survived botched abortions. Lankford’s bill “adds clear expectations of care, hospital transfer requirements, mandatory reporting, private rights of action for moms, and reasonable criminal penalties for health care professionals who violate the law,” a press release explains.
According to a fact sheet from the Family Research Council (FRC), statistics from nine states show that “at least 277 infants have survived abortion since 2006.”
