{"id":1434825,"date":"2022-04-13T08:45:24","date_gmt":"2022-04-13T12:45:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1434825"},"modified":"2022-04-13T08:45:27","modified_gmt":"2022-04-13T12:45:27","slug":"democrats-kill-virginia-bill-that-wouldve-banned-post-abortion-infanticide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/democrats-kill-virginia-bill-that-wouldve-banned-post-abortion-infanticide\/","title":{"rendered":"Democrats Kill Virginia Bill That Would\u2019ve Banned Post-Abortion Infanticide"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"float:left\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">18<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fdemocrats-kill-virginia-bill-that-wouldve-banned-post-abortion-infanticide%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1434825&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><\/div>\n<p>This month, Virginia\u2019s Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin <a href=\"https:\/\/www.governor.virginia.gov\/newsroom\/news-releases\/2022\/april\/name-930914-en.html\">signed more than 100 bills<\/a> into law following the state\u2019s first General Assembly under his leadership. Following the 60-day winter session, bills approved by the April 11 deadline included several supported by the state\u2019s pro-life lobby. <\/p>\n<p>Youngkin signed an <a href=\"https:\/\/lis.virginia.gov\/cgi-bin\/legp604.exe?221+sum+SB63\">extension for safe haven<\/a> protections and <a href=\"https:\/\/lis.virginia.gov\/cgi-bin\/legp604.exe?221+sum+HB50\">expanded education<\/a> about infant relinquishment laws and the <a href=\"https:\/\/lis.virginia.gov\/cgi-bin\/legp604.exe?221+cab+SC10203SB0163+UCSB3\">prohibition of requiring a surrogate to abort<\/a> in some circumstances. Some pro-abortion laws were voted down before reaching the governor\u2019s desk. Democrats in the Senate attempted to pass an assisted suicide bill but did not gain traction. Virginia\u2019s law protecting citizens from euthanasia remains one of the strongest in the country.<\/p>\n<p>After years of a pro-abortion majority in a legislature led by radical, anti-life governors Ralph Northam and Terry McAuliffe, pro-life Virginians had the House on their side but lost traction to the radicals in the Democrat-majority Senate.\u00a0<\/p>\n<h2>Democrats Spiked Bill Protecting Babies from Infanticide<\/h2>\n<p>Democrats were so afraid of life-affirming legislation, leadership even pocketed a bill that would protect a baby who survived an abortion. It has gotten so radical in Virginia that Democrats won\u2019t even acknowledge that babies who are born after an abortion procedure should not be killed.<\/p>\n<p>Olivia Gans-Turner, president of Virginia Society for Human Life, called the death of <a href=\"https:\/\/lis.virginia.gov\/cgi-bin\/legp604.exe?221+sum+HB304\">House Bill 304<\/a> a \u201cfascinating\u201d example of the Democrat majority\u2019s fear of any bill linked to the pro-life movement.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere was hope that the Born Alive bill might get some traction because it doesn\u2019t stop any abortion, the abortion has already taken place and unless it\u2019s a dismemberment abortion, the possibility of a baby surviving is quite real,\u201d Gans-Turner said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Yet when it came to a vote in the House, not a single Democrat <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2022\/02\/21\/virginia-democrats-vote-for-allowing-babies-who-survive-abortions-to-die-without-care\/\">voted<\/a> with a Republican on the bill.<\/p>\n<p>Pro-abortion advocates \u201cunderstand that acknowledging there is someone else involved in an abortion acknowledges that in abortion you are taking someone else\u2019s life,\u201d Gans-Turner said. \u201cMembers of the Democrats in Virginia have such a commitment to the abortion industry, who gives them money every year, they might actually support infanticide.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis should not be controversial, but the abortion industry opposes it, and therefore the Democratic Party opposes it,\u201d said Del. Nick Freitas, the bill\u2019s sponsor.<\/p>\n<h2>Big Losses, Small Wins<\/h2>\n<p>Pro-life advocates could not garner the Senate votes to pass the <a href=\"https:\/\/lis.virginia.gov\/cgi-bin\/legp604.exe?221+sum+SB710\">Pain Capable Act<\/a>, protecting life after 20 weeks gestation, but the Born Alive bill may have passed if Senate leadership had brought it to a fair hearing.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe knew the Senate wanted to kill it after the House,\u201d Gans-Turner said. \u201cAs is customary with pro-life bills, the Democrats left it until the end of the session.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>And then the gamesmanship went a step further. Initially, Senate leadership kept the Born Alive bill from a hearing by \u201cpocketing\u201d the bill, an uncommon move in the Old Dominion\u2019s Senate.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere are certain traditions in Virginia\u2019s Senate and one of them is that every bill gets a hearing,\u201d Gans-Turner said. \u201cPocketing a bill is almost never done.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>On the very last Thursday of the meeting schedule, and the last official meeting of the Senate Education and Health committee, the bill was discovered to not be on the docket. Senate Republicans on the committee immediately demanded an explanation, which led to the bill\u2019s revival.<\/p>\n<p>Supporters hoped the bill would then be sent to the Judiciary Committee, where it would receive a fair hearing. Democrat Sens. Joseph Morrissey and John Chapman \u201cChap\u201d Petersen sit on the committee and were considered wild cards for a pro-life vote. But Democrat Sen. L. Louise Lucas relinquished the bill to the Rules Committee, a kill committee for most Republican bills because it is stacked with Democrats.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI was shocked that the Senate tried to \u2018pocket veto\u2019 the bill by simply taking it off the docket,\u201d Freitas said. \u201cThen they sent it to a heavily stacked committee where they knew it would die. \u2026 Democratic leadership in the Senate tried to kill it without even giving people a chance to testify.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf it got a fair hearing you might have had several Democrats, certainly Morrissey and Petersen and Lynwood Lewis, voting [in favor],\u201d said Republican Sen. Mark Peake. <\/p>\n<p>Petersen, a member of Rules, did vote in favor of the bill. Morrissey and Lewis do not sit on the Rules committee. \u201cSenator Morrissey would have absolutely voted yes and Lt. Gov. Sears would have provided the vote to pass it,\u201d said Kristen Day, executive director of Democrats for Life of America.<\/p>\n<p>Also unexpected this session, self-proclaimed pro-life Republican Sen. Siobahn Dunnavant flipped on a straightforward informed consent bill to oppose it.\u00a0\u201cWhen you are undergoing a procedure that will literally take another human life, I think the patient should be informed of that,\u201d Freitas said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<h2>Next Steps<\/h2>\n<p>In the House and the Senate, versions of the safe-haven expansion bills were carried successfully. Republican Sen. Frank Ruff Jr. and Del. Hyland \u201cBuddy\u201d Fowler sponsored and passed similar bills to expand the state\u2019s safe haven timeline. Republican Del. C. Matthew Fariss\u2019s bill directed the Department of Social Services to increase education about the law through an informational hotline.<\/p>\n<p>Pro-lifers also celebrated the defeat of a state-sponsored authorization to kill bill.\u00a0Democrat Sen. Ghazala Hashmi introduced legislation to legalize assisted suicide in Virginia, but the bill was defeated in the Senate and not heard on the House side. The safe-haven expansion law and assisted suicide bill would likely have had different outcomes under the previous governor and legislature, Freitas said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Gans-Turner is convinced that Virginia\u2019s next legislative election cycle and the Supreme Court\u2019s ruling on <em>Dobbs v. Jackson<\/em> could determine the future of abortion bills. \u201cRealistically, we must change the makeup of the Virginia Senate to pass a bill like the Pain Capable bill,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe problem is not isolated within abortion law,\u201d Freitas said. \u201cThe real problem lies in a culture that has been increasingly influenced by an industry that pushes abortion as if it is some form of empowerment. If we want a genuinely pro-life movement, it requires changes in the law, but more than that, it requires a shift in mindset within the culture.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Although Virginia\u2019s regular session is complete, legislators will reconvene in Richmond on April 27 to consider vetoes and amendments. Pro-lifers plan on marching around the capitol that day and rallying in support of life legislation, with Lt. Gov. Winsome Sears as a lead speaker.\u00a0<\/p>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\" \/>\n<p>\n  Ashley Bateman is a policy writer for The Heartland Institute and blogger for Ascension Press. Her work has been featured in The Washington Times, The Daily Caller, The New York Post, The American Thinker and numerous other publications. She previously worked as an adjunct scholar for The Lexington Institute and as editor, writer and photographer for The Warner Weekly, a publication for the American military community in Bamberg, Germany. <\/p>\n<p>Ashley is a board member at a Catholic homeschool cooperative in Virginia. She homeschools her four incredible children along with her brilliant engineer\/scientist husband.e who lives in Virginia.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This month, Virginia\u2019s Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin signed more than 100 bills into law following the state\u2019s first General Assembly under his leadership. Following the 60-day winter session, bills approved<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":498,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1434825","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1434825","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/498"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1434825"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1434825\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1434825"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1434825"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1434825"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}