Removing Deadline for Ratification of Equal Rights Amendment

Floor Speech

Date: Feb. 13, 2020
Location: Washington, DC

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Mrs. MILLER. Madam Speaker, I rise today to oppose H.J. Res. 79.

It pains me to say that life is under attack in our Nation. The pro- abortion discussions taking place around this country are sickening. In the last year, we heard a Governor promote infanticide, and we saw State legislatures take action for the same.

We still haven't had a vote on this floor in the United States House of Representatives to protect babies who survive abortion. Yesterday, in committee, I even introduced legislation that would protect babies who survive abortion. It failed along party lines once again.

We have millions of American families who would love to adopt, yet we don't discuss that. I know women who have cried every month when they realized that they had not conceived the baby they so desperately wanted. I know men and women who have undergone multiple tests and procedures just to conceive a child. They would gladly adopt a baby that someone else didn't want.

Instead, today, we are voting once more on another piece of legislation that would drastically reduce protections for life. This bill would create the basis for taxpayer-funded abortion at the Federal level, and it would permanently allow abortion until birth for any reason throughout the Nation. It would force government-funded healthcare providers and hospitals to provide abortions.

We cannot have that. We cannot bring abortion into a healthcare debate because it is not healthcare. Abortion is murder.

If we want to discuss protecting rights for all Americans, it needs to pertain to everyone, including and, especially, newborns.

While I always welcome a conversation with my colleagues about how we can advance women's rights and the rights of all people, this is not the way to do it. It is not through thinly veiled messaging bills with nice names but radical policies.

We can pass good pro-woman, pro-family, pro-American legislation through bipartisan solutions.

So if we are going to do it, let's do it; but today, sadly, we won't, and that is so disappointing.

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