Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) is going to force Democrats to vote on whether or not babies born alive in abortions should be legally protected, the lawmaker announced.
Thune said during remarks from the Senate floor last week that he will bring the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act for a vote before the 52nd Annual March for Life in Washington, DC, on January 24.
“This straightforward bill simply states that a baby born alive after an attempted abortion is entitled to the same protection and medical care that any other newborn baby is entitled to,” Thune said.
“This vote will ask Democrats to answer whether a living baby born after an attempted abortion should be provided with medical care or be left to die,” he added. “It shouldn’t be a hard question.”
“As thousands of pro-life Americans come to Washington for the 52nd Annual March for Life, we’ll take up the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act.”@LeaderJohnThune pic.twitter.com/P1udqayP17
— March for Life Action (@MFLAction) January 10, 2025
Republicans have been pushing for the passage of the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act since at least 2015. The bill most recently passed the Republican-led House in January of 2023 but was never voted on in the Democrat-dominated Senate. At the time, Republicans unanimously passed the bill, while nearly all Democrats voted against it, save for Reps. Henry Cuellar and Vicente Gonzalez, both of South Texas, who voted in favor of the bill and “present,” respectively.
The bill would require medical providers to treat babies born alive after a botched abortion with the same level of care as they would any other newborn, and violators would face fines and up to five years of imprisonment.
Democrat detractors argue babies born alive in abortions are already protected by the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act of 2002, but Republicans note that law has no enforcement mechanism, essentially leaving babies born alive in abortions unprotected.
RELATED ARTICLE – Florida State Data: Four Babies Born Alive in Abortions in 2024
“[T]his law was only a definitional change stating that all infants who survive an abortion are full persons under the law. Since the 2002 law’s passage, there have been no federal prosecutions against abortionists, despite state records indicating that at least 277 infants have been born alive following abortion in the United States,” Family Research Council’s director of the Center for Human Dignity Mary Szoch analyzed in a 2024 report.
Szoch noted that only eight states currently report about infants born alive in abortions — meaning the total number could be much higher — and most states do not disclose if babies born alive ultimately survived. She wrote:
At present, if an infant is killed after birth, it would be regarded as a crime of infanticide if reported. However, if the abortionist or any healthcare practitioner present fails to render care to an infant born alive following an abortion and that infant dies as a result, they do not face any federal criminal charges.
“The Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act seeks to change this by requiring the abortionist and any healthcare practitioners present to report any failures to provide life-saving care to infants born alive following an abortion and imposing penalties for such failures,” she continued.
Katherine Hamilton is a political reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow her on X @thekat_hamilton.
