The New Mexico state House of Representatives has passed an aggressive abortion measure that, if it becomes law, could take its place as the most extreme on record, according to one state pro-life leader.
As reported by the Albuquerque Journal, HB-51, which passed the Democrat-controlled N.M. House on February 6 by a 40-29 vote, would “remove a state law that makes it a crime to end a woman’s pregnancy, except in certain circumstances, such as rape.” The paper noted that “the statute is largely unenforceable now because of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade.”
Democrat State Rep. Joanne Ferrary, one of the bill’s sponsors, insisted that the measure “simply removes an antiquated law that criminalizes health care.”
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Included in the language of the state’s “antiquated” abortion law, which would be stripped away under HB-51, is the following: “Criminal abortion consists of administering to any pregnant woman any medicine, drug, or other substance, or using any method or means whereby an untimely termination of her pregnancy is produced or attempted to be produced, with the intent to destroy the fetus, and the termination is not a justified medical termination. Whoever commits criminal abortion is guilty of a fourth-degree felony. Whoever commits criminal abortion which results in the death of the woman is guilty of a second-degree felony.”
New Mexico’s leading pro-life group contends that if passed, HB-51 would be one of the most radical abortion laws in the nation. In a press statement, New Mexico Alliance for Life explained that the proposed measure would make “late-term abortions, up to birth, legal for any reason” in the state, and would also strip away “explicit conscience protection for doctors and other medical professionals that protect them from being forced to participate in abortions.”
Additionally, said the pro-life group, the bill would guarantee that “parents will NOT be involved in their minor daughter’s abortion,” and would allow “sex traffickers and child abusers to take a pregnant minor for an abortion, without any parental knowledge or involvement.”
Elisa Martinez, the group’s executive director, called HB-51 “a Trojan horse backed by the national abortion lobby in order to establish abortion as a human right by removing so-called ‘religious refusals’ [for medical professionals] and turn every hospital, clinic, and doctor’s office into an abortion clinic or referral center.”
LifeSiteNews.com noted that the New Mexico bill follows “the introduction of similar bills in Rhode Island, and Vermont, their passage in Massachusetts and New York, and a Virginia bill that was tabled after Virginia Democrat Del. Kathy Tran admitted it would allow for aborting a baby moments before giving birth, and embattled Virginia Democrat Gov. Ralph Northam endorsed infanticide under the bill.”
The pro-life site added that all such recent abortion bills “are a response to speculation that the U.S. Supreme Court may overturn Roe in the near future, a possibility pro-life states such as Alabama, Arkansas, Iowa, Tennessee, and West Virginia are also preparing for with measures that either affirm no state-level ‘right’ to abortion or express their intent to ban abortion upon Roe’s fall.”
In related news, during his recent State of the Union address President Trump urged Congress, the Democrat majority of whom sat in antagonistic silence, “to pass legislation to prohibit the late-term abortion of children who can feel pain in the mother’s womb,” and to join him and America’s pro-life majority in working “to build a culture that cherishes innocent life.”
3D Illustration of Fetus (Baby) in Womb Anatomy: magicmine/iStock/Getty Images Plus
