A Democratic bill legalizing abortion on demand nationwide includes provisions for "every person capable of becoming pregnant," including "transgender men."
The House on Friday passed the Women’s Health Protection Act along near party lines, in an effort to codify Roe v. Wade into federal law before the Supreme Court considers a case that could overturn the landmark decision. The bill notes that "transgender men, non-binary individuals, those who identify with a different gender ... are unjustly harmed by restrictions on abortion services."
"The terms ‘woman’ and ‘women’ are used in this bill to reflect the identity of the majority of people targeted and affected by restrictions on abortion services, and to address squarely the targeted restrictions on abortion, which are rooted in misogyny," the bill states.
Left-wing activists have largely erased the term "women" from their political vocabulary in recent years out of fear of offending biological women who identify as men. President Joe Biden’s budget proposal refers to mothers as "birthing people," a term Rep. Cori Bush (D., Mo.) also used in a May speech. Earlier this month, the American Civil Liberties Union tweeted a quote from the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg that replaced the words "women" and "her" with "people" and "their."
With Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death, we lost a champion for abortion and gender equality. And on the anniversary of her death, the fight to protect abortion access is more urgent than ever. pic.twitter.com/vIKadIHouN
— ACLU (@ACLU) September 18, 2021
The Women's Health Protection Act also includes language accusing the pro-life movement of bigotry, alleging that restrictions on "reproductive health ... perpetuate systems of oppression, lack of bodily autonomy, white supremacy, and anti-Black racism."
"This violent legacy has manifested in policies including enslavement, rape, and experimentation on Black women; forced sterilizations; medical experimentation on low-income women’s reproductive systems; and the forcible removal of Indigenous children," the bill states. "Access to equitable reproductive health care, including abortion services, has always been deficient in the United States for Black, Indigenous, and other People of Color (BIPOC) and their families."
Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood and an early abortion advocate, was heavily involved in the eugenics movement. In her autobiography, Sanger described speaking about birth control at a Ku Klux Klan meeting in 1926. Criticism over Sanger's ties to white supremacist organizations and embrace of race science led Planned Parenthood of Greater New York to remove her name from its Manhattan abortion clinic.
The Women’s Health Protection Act would outlaw pro-life measures passed in statehouses across the nation and legalize the practice of performing abortions up to birth. It is not expected to pass in the Senate, where 60 votes are needed.