Category Archives: Life
2012 Legislative Session: Great Gains for Arizona Families!
By Cathi Herrod, President
Center for Arizona Policy
The Final Victories of the Session
Governor Jan Brewer signed the 3 remaining CAP-supported bills on her desk last Friday and Monday.
These three bills were no minor pieces of legislation. They were bold policies that will have a tangible impact on the lives of Arizonans.
While I am sincerely grateful to Governor Jan Brewer for signing these bills, I am also thankful for the many legislators that supported these and the other CAP-supported bills.
Earlier this week, we released our 2012 Family Issues Voting Record reporting on how every legislator voted on 12 key bills that impact life, marriage and family, and religious liberty. Take time today to find out how your legislator voted and send them a note with your thoughts. Please take time to send a note of thanks to the legislators who stood with us in defense of life, marriage and family, and religious liberty. You can be sure they have heard from those who oppose us.
An Unfounded Overreaction
From the time Rep. Justin Olson introduced HB 2800, which says federal family planning funds that pass through the state cannot go to abortion providers, to the time Governor Jan Brewer signed the bill into law, Planned Parenthood told every media outlet that would listen that this bill would deny low-income families access to medical care.
But as CAP Legislative Counsel Josh Kredit points out on the Foundations blog, there are nearly 200 clinics across the state that low-income families can visit to access care. What’s more, the vast majority of these clinics actually offer more services than the 14 Planned Parenthood clinics in our state.
Don’t Believe the Polls
Recent polls nationwide show support for redefining marriage to supposedly be a 50/50 split with support for same-sex “marriage” growing. Yet as we all know, every time the people vote on marriage, they vote strongly in favor of defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman. Then we hear, “Well, the younger generation doesn’t believe in marriage.” Yes, we do have significant challenges to restore the value of marriage in our culture. But don’t miss this fact tweeted by Family Research Council President Tony Perkins yesterday: if the votes of everyone 45+ were discounted in NC, the marriage amendment would have still passed by 8 percentage points. Check out this analysis by American Enterprise Institute.
Highlights
- 13 is the number of Center for Arizona Policy-supported bills that were signed into law this session. Simply put, Arizona is a better place for families today than it was 5 months ago because of these bills.
- 51 is the number of CAP-supported bills signed into law since 2009 when Governor Brewer took office. These last 4 years show the difference we can make when we elect pro-life and pro-family leaders to the legislature and Governor’s office.
- 114 is the number of CAP-supported bills signed into law since 1995. Each of these bills takes important steps to protect the foundational values of life, marriage and family, and religious liberty.
Governor Signs Pro-Woman Measure Restricting Abortionists from Accessing Taxpayer Funds
PHOENIX – Governor Jan Brewer this evening signed into law HB 2800, known as the Whole Woman’s Health Funding Priority Act. The Governor signed the measure while speaking at a reception for the Susan B. Anthony List, a group devoted to helping elect pro-life officials to public office.
HB 2800 prioritizes the distribution of public family-planning funds to health care entities that provide comprehensive care for women. The measure also prohibits the state or any political subdivision from contracting with a person or facility where non-federally qualified abortions are performed for the provision of family planning services.
“This is a common sense law that tightens existing state regulations and closes loopholes in order to ensure that taxpayer dollars are not used to fund abortions, whether directly or indirectly,” said Governor Brewer. “By signing this measure into law, I stand with the majority of Americans who oppose the use of taxpayer funds for abortion.”
Kansas, North Carolina and Texas have already enacted legislation similar to the Whole Woman’s Health Funding Priority Act. Indiana, New Jersey and Wisconsin have used their budget processes to bar public funding for abortion providers.
Arizona Senate Votes to Defund Planned Parenthood
PHOENIX ─ Today, the Arizona State Senate passed the Whole Woman’s Health Funding Priority Act of Arizona (HB 2800) that will defund abortion providers such as Planned Parenthood of state family planning money. The vote was 18-8.
The bill is based on model legislation developed by the Susan B. Anthony List and the Alliance Defense Fund, and prioritizes family planning funds away from abortion-centered businesses like Planned Parenthood to entities that provide women with comprehensive health care.
Congresswoman Marilyn Musgrave (R-Colorado), Vice President of Government Affairs for the SBA List said, “Planned Parenthood’s abortion-centered business model does not need or deserve taxpayer dollars. We encourage Gov. Brewer to quickly sign this bill into law. Arizona is leading the charge to protect taxpayers and women from Planned Parenthood and the violence of abortion.”
Dr. Charmaine Yoest, president & CEO of Americans United for Life, called today’s Senate action “a devastating blow for Planned Parenthood. Arizona has dealt a historic rejection to Planned Parenthood. It’s a huge blow to the abortion empire with national implications for the entire pro-life movement. This historic ban will immediately save lives in Arizona despite Planned Parenthood’s best efforts to preserve this horrific and lucrative late-term abortion procedure.”
Arizona is joining a fast-growing group of states defunding Planned Parenthood, which kills more than 300,000 preborn children each year and has been accused of defrauding taxpayers with the $487 million it receives in federal funding.
According to SBA List, eight states successfully defunded Planned Parenthood of more than $61.7 million last year. Currently, Ohio, Iowa, New Hampshire, and Oklahoma are also weighing legislation that would defund the nation’s abortion giant.
Victory for Human Life at Arizona Legislature
By Cathi Herrod, President
Center for Arizona Policy
It has been a big day for pro-life legislation at the Capitol today. A number of Center for Arizona Policy-supported bills were passed by the Legislature.
The highlight of the day was when the state House passed HB 2036 by a 37-22-1 vote. This bill, called “The Mother’s Health and Safety Act”:
- Prohibits abortion after 20 weeks because of the safety risks to the mother and the pain endured by the preborn child.
- Ensures women have an ultrasound at least 24 hours prior to an abortion.
- Establishes an informed consent website which details the facts about fetal development, risks of abortion, and services available.
- Requires doctors performing surgical abortions to have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of the abortion facility.
This bill will now be transmitted to Governor Brewer for her signature. She has until Monday to sign the bill.
It is imperative the governor hears from you to support this bill! Take one minute to send her a quick message supporting HB 2036 and thanking her for her strong pro-life track record.
A number of other pro-life, pro-family bills were passed by the Arizona Legislature this week:
- HB 2627 – removes abortion providers from the list of organizations that can qualify for the Working Poor Tax Credit. This bill is also on its way to Gov. Brewer for her signature.
- SB 1359 – prohibits so-called “wrongful life” lawsuits against medical professionals for misdiagnosing or not diagnosing a birth defect of a preborn child, which, if known, would have led to the child being aborted. This bill passed the House and is awaiting a final vote in the Senate before heading to Gov. Brewer.
- SB 1009 – requires that schools present childbirth and adoption as the preferable alternative over abortion. This bill is heading to Gov. Brewer for her signature as well.
- HB 2774 – affirms the religious liberty of churches by clarifying the statutes that exempt churches from property taxes. This bill has passed the Senate and is heading back to the House for a final vote before going to the governor’s desk.
Governor Signs Bill Strengthening Maternal Health, Protecting Unborn
Governor Jan Brewer signed into law HB 2036 – the Mother’s Health and Safety Act – which strengthens current state laws to safeguard maternal health and protect Arizona’s unborn. Among its provisions, the bill prohibits an abortion if the gestational age of the unborn child is determined to be at least 20 weeks, except in cases when the life or health of the mother is at risk.
“This legislation is consistent with my strong track record of supporting common sense measures to protect the health of women and safeguard our most vulnerable population – the unborn,” said Governor Brewer. “Knowing that abortions become riskier the later they are performed in pregnancy, it only makes sense to prohibit these procedures past twenty weeks.”
Arizona now joins seven states with similar regulations prohibiting abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy. Among its provisions, HB 2036:
·Bars abortions after 20 weeks due to safety risks to the mother and the likelihood that the unborn child will endure pain;
·Strengthens existing parental consent and informed consent regulations, including requiring that women seeking an abortion receive an ultrasound at least 24 hours in advance, and establishing the development of a website with facts about fetal development and abortion risks.
·Requires that any physician on-site for a surgical abortion have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of the abortion clinic, in case of abortion-caused complications.
State Rep. Kimberly Yee, (R-LD10), said, “I want to thank Governor Brewer for signing the Women’s Health and Safety Act. This important bill strengthens Arizona’s laws protecting the health and safety of women, and recognizes the precious life of the preborn baby.”
This is the latest legislation signed into law by Governor Brewer to safeguard the health and safety of women and protect the unborn. Among these measures, the governor has barred non-physicians from performing abortions, and required written, notarized parental consent for any minor seeking an abortion.
Legislature Moves to Protect Preborn Children
Early this afternoon, the Arizona House of Representatives passed a bill banning abortions after 20 weeks gestation. Not only are babies at that stage of development fully capable of feeling pain all over their bodies, but abortions done at that stage exponentially increase the mother’s risk of death.
The Legislature wisely passed HB 2036, and it is now headed to Gov. Jan Brewer’s desk for her signature; she has until Monday to sign it.
According to the Center for Arizona Policy, the governor is already receiving tremendous pressure from out-of-state activists not to sign the bill. Encouragement from her own constituents would go a long way toward helping this vital piece of legislation over its final hurdle.
–CitizenLink
Abortion Ban Passes in Senate, Lesko Bill Down but Not Out
Two important bills went in opposite direction in the Arizona Legislature this week.
Arizona’s Senate voted 20-10 Tuesday to ban abortions of preborn children at 20 weeks. If this bill is eventually signed into law, it would change the current legality of abortion until a preborn child is “viable.”
Senate Minority Leader David Schapira (Tempe left-winger) boasted to reporters that lawmakers are empowered to determine life and death outcomes.
Sen. Steve Smith, Maricopa conservative, disagreed: “I would like to listen to the 50 million-plus children that have been aborted and killed since Roe v. Wade. I would like to listen to what they think of this bill.”
And so did Sen. Steve Yarbrough, Chandler conservative, who said, “There’s a third person in that room. There’s the baby. Who speaks for her, the totally innocent one with no voice? Who has the duty and the right to speak for her? We do.”
The bill now goes across the capital lawn to the Arizona House of Representatives for its deliberation.
The East Valley Tribune story prominently features in its story the views of Planned Parenthood, the nation’s largest profiteer of abortion deaths. But nowhere is Arizona Right to Life or the Center for Arizona Policy included in the story written by left-wing reporter Howard Fischer.
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The Arizona Senate Wednesday defeated HB 2625, a bill introduced by Rep. Debbie Lesko, conservative, to protect religious freedom. This bill declares that any entity or individual with a religious objection to paying for objectionable insurance coverage is free to contract with an employer and insurer who want to honor their conscience. The vote was 17-13 against.
Republican Nancy Barton tendered a last-minute “no” vote to keep the bill alive for re-consideration. But no-votes included Scottsdale abortion advocate Michele Reagan, Mesa RINOs Jerry Lewis and Rich Crandall, and Republicans John Nelson, John McComish and Senate President Steve Pierce.
Clearing Up the ACLU’s Distortions about Rep. Lesko’s House Bill 2625
By Catherine Glenn Foster, Alliance Defense Fund
Once again, the enemies of religious liberty have to resort to distortions as they try to convince citizens to jump on their anti-faith bandwagon.
Headlines from the American Civil Liberties Union and its cohorts are flying viral across the Internet with catchy little phrases like, “Use Birth Control? You’re Fired!” Sadly, even the mainstream media has begun to join in this echo chamber of falsehoods.
Where did the enemies of freedom at the ACLU come up with this whopper? At issue is Arizona legislation sponsored by Rep. Debbie Lesko, House Bill 2625. Lesko, a woman, is the one leading this bill, which protects the religious freedom of both women and men. And that’s all the bill does: restore religious freedom to several statutes passed in 2002.
The 2002 government mandates attack the religious freedom of all Arizona citizens by forcing all employers to cover abortion-inducing drugs and other objectionable items related to contraception — even if they must violate their religious beliefs.
HB 2625 fixes that by declaring that any entity or individual with a religious objection to paying for such coverage is free to contract with an employer and insurer who want to honor their conscience. In fact, other religious freedom statutes in Arizona already make the anti-religious mandates unlawful, and HB 2625 simply fixes those statutes to make them comport with existing law.
This is why the ACLU must engage in distortions to get people to oppose HB 2625. The people of Arizona love freedom, and HB 2625 simply restores one of the most cherished freedoms, religious liberty, to its rightful place outside of government coercion.
So how can the ACLU claim that HB 2625 would let McDonald’s fire its employees for using contraception? They’re just following the old maxim that if you say something enough times, people might start to believe it.
The facts, however, are these: Nowhere does HB 2625 create language letting anyone discriminate for any reason. On the contrary, the law puts a stop to government discrimination and restores a zone of freedom that was improperly taken away in 2002.
And the facts are even worse for the ACLU: The existing insurance mandate, which HB 2625 amends, nowhere declares that an employer like McDonald’s cannot fire people for using contraception right now. So, the ACLU’s claim that HB 2625 is somehow removing an existing protection is impossible. It cannot remove a protection that isn’t already there.
Moreover, despite the fact that the laws amended by HB 2625 nowhere talk about firing people for the mere use of contraceptives and do not stop an employer from doing so, there are no examples of any employer in Arizona ever doing such a thing. The ACLU just made it up as yet another fear tactic.
But, some have asked, what of the mandate’s clause targeting religious employers that would be removed by HB 2625? Yes, it would be removed — and for good reason. Any clause that singles out religious employers in this way almost certainly violates both the Arizona Religious Freedom Restoration Act and the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent 9-0 decision in Hosanna-Tabor vs. EEOC. State legislators aren’t targeting anybody; they are removing a clause that did. If the ACLU wants to fault legislators for making state law consistent with the Supreme Court’s decision, it is on shaky ground.
Arizona already has other laws that govern employment non-discrimination, and HB 2625 does not amend any of them. HB 2625 only amends language that specifically attacks religious groups so that the statutes will now let religious citizens have their freedom again.
The ACLU may believe its own press releases, but you don’t have to.
Planned Parenthood Sued for Cheating Taxpayers, Defrauding Government
By Karla Dial
CitizenLink
A federal judge today unsealed a lawsuit a former Planned Parenthood employee filed nearly three years ago. The suit claims that the abortion seller engages in a pernicious and persistent pattern of Medicaid fraud.
Abby Johnson, the former director of a Planned Parenthood clinic in the Bryan/College Station area, states in the lawsuit filed by the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) that Planned Parenthood knowingly sought improper reimbursements from the Texas Women’s Health Program from 2007 to 2009.
According to court documents, Planned Parenthood of Houston and Southeast Texas filed at least 87,075 fraudulent claims. As a result, according to Johnson, Planned Parenthood allegedly received more than $5.7 million from Medicaid for services the program doesn’t cover or which were never performed in the first place.
According to a federal law, suits based on inside information about government contractors must be sealed as long as the state or federal government is considering joining the case. Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott decided not to do so, allowing the records to become public. The state recently cut Planned Parenthood — and all other organizations that provide elective abortions — out of state funding.
“We all need to be holding Planned Parenthood accountable since they are receiving almost half a billion dollars in (federal) taxpayer money,” Johnson said.
ADF Senior Counsel Michael Norton agreed.
“No matter where a person stands on abortion, everyone should agree that Planned Parenthood has to play by the same rules as everyone else,” he said. “It certainly isn’t entitled to a penny of public funds, especially if it is committing Medicaid fraud.”
On Feb. 7, ADF, along with the Susan B. Anthony List, publicly released a report it had made to Congress showing that Planned Parenthood’s southeast Texas affiliate didn’t act alone. According to the report, 10 state audits of Planned Parenthood clinics nationwide showed a pattern of improper billing practices resulting in nearly $8 million of overpayments from Medicaid.
Moreover, it found 38 federal audits of state family planning programs showed between $88 million and $99 million in overbilling, the lion’s share of which went to Planned Parenthood.
“They’ve portrayed this image of being this wonderful organization that provides health care and birth control to low-income women, and that image is just being shattered,” said former Colorado Congresswoman Marilyn Musgrave, currently vice president of government affairs at the Susan B. Anthony List. “Under some administrations, there were audits, and under others, there weren’t any.
“People have never really known what goes on inside, but now we’re finding out. There’s nothing like a former employee — a clinic director, no less — speaking out. That is powerful.”
FOR MORE INFORMATION Read the lawsuit, Johnson v. Planned Parenthood of Houston and Southeast Texas.
Read the Alliance Defense Fund’s Feb. 7 report to Congress.
Read the individual state audits of Planned Parenthood affiliates.
Arizona Right to Life PAC Endorses Santorum
Arizona Right to Life Political Action Committee (AZRTL PAC) today announced its endorsement of Rick Santorum in the Republican presidential primary. AZRTL PAC endorsed Rick Santorum based on his strong pro-life record and his leadership over the years.
Santorum authored the law banning partial-birth abortions, as well as the Born Alive Infant Protection Act, providing appropriate care for infants who survive an abortion. He was a member of the Congressional Coalition on Adoption, and also sponsored legislation related to end of life issues. He continues to be an outspoken opponent of federal funding of abortion. The AZRTL PAC considered Santorum’s support of these priority issues in deciding to endorse him.
“There are few who are as articulate and passionate on life issues as Senator Santorum,” said Michelle Clements, president of Arizona Right to Life. “He not only voted the right way, he talks about the dignity and value of every human life whenever he has the opportunity, and he lives out those values in his own personal life. We are grateful for his leadership and proud to endorse him.”
AZRTL PAC acknowledges that all the Republican presidential candidates have declared they are pro-life, and that other candidates have strong pro-life voting records. Arizona Right to Life commends them for their support and defense of life.
“The one person we know is unapologetically pro-choice, even supporting partial-birth abortion and federal funding of abortion, is President Barack Obama,” said Clements. “This is a critically important election, and we take comfort in knowing that the Republican nominee will take a strong position in contrast to President Obama who is the only pro-choice candidate.”
“We encourage Arizonans to support Rick Santorum in the Republican presidential primary election Tuesday, February 28.”
