Anti-abortion groups are speaking out after Senate Republicans rejected the federal Right to IVF Act and a woman died after taking an abortion pill.
U.S. Sen. Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill., urged Senate Republicans to support her bill dubbed the Right to IVF Act and said former President Donald Trump is the reason IVF is at risk.
“I doubt Donald Trump even knows what the acronym IVF even stands for … heck, I’m not sure he even knows how to spell IVF. Despite the incoherent, delusion and frankly embarrassing ramblings that came out of his mouth last week…he is the reason IVF is at risk in the first place,” said Duckworth alongside Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer at a news conference.
Illinois Family Institute Executive Director David Smith criticized Trump for his support of IVF. Trump said that he wants to make in vitro fertilization treatments free for all women who need it
“It’s very disappointing that Donald Trump said that he would mandate this [that health care providers cover IVF treatments]. Pro-lifers have concerns because IVF does create multiple human embryos, they’re not going to become giraffes…and many of them will be discarded [through IVF],” said Smith.
Smith said the government, with taxpayer dollars, shouldn’t be on the hook for IVF treatments for all.
Duckworth said Trump’s support was inauthentic. She said, “While it may now be convenient for him to claim his support for IVF is as huge as his made-up crowd sizes at his rallies…we know the truth. He is to blame.”
Sen. Dick Durbin in a social media post said that Amber Thurman died because an extreme post-Dobbs abortion ban prevented her from getting the health care she needed.
Durbin also called Senate Republicans blocking a bill that would have provided access to IVF to women nationwide, “not pro-life.”
Smith said the abortion pill that Thurman took ultimately killed her, not anti-abortion laws.
“You should be under a doctor’s care when you are going through an extreme medical intervention [such as taking an abortion pill],” said Smith.
Reports detail how a clinic in North Carolina, where Thurman had driven to from Georgia to receive a surgical abortion, gave Thurman abortion pills instead because she arrived late to her appointment. From there Thurman, reportedly, suffered bleeding and an infection and died at a Georgia hospital.
“Obviously there was a series of bad choices made by this young woman, and it’s sad,” Smith said about Thurman having unprotected sex, arriving late to an abortion appointment and taking abortion pills from the North Carolina clinic.
According to reports, Georgia doctors waited 20 hours to perform a dilation and curettage when Thurman arrived at the hospital after passing out from the abortion pills. Smith said there are no laws that do not make provisions for the health and wealthfare of the mother and child.
“If medical professionals are choosing to ignore the situation, that’s on them not on any pro-life policy,” said Smith.
Georgia enacted a 6-week abortion ban.
