Another example of what would be in store for women from a Republican Administration:
House Republicans attached language to a major education bill Wednesday night that would financially penalize school districts that allow school-based health centers to provide information about abortion to pregnant high school students.
The amendment to the Student Success Act, a GOP overhaul of No Child Left Behind, would withhold federal funding from school districts that contract with health centers unless the center certifies that it will not provide abortions or give students any information about abortion, including directions to the nearest abortion provider.
School based health services
don't provide abortion services, so the House Republican language is partly redundant. What is new is the provision forbidding health care workers associated with our public high schools from mentioning the possibility to high-school-age young women who might feel it is in their best interest to terminate an unwanted pregnancy, from even describing it as an option, and from letting them know where an abortion provider could be found. This
Amendment, titled "
Schoolchildren's Protection From Abortion Providers," would ensure that they couldn't turn to a health professional at their school for assistance with that decision. Presumably, should they ask, the health care professional would be compelled not to reply. The penalty would be loss of Federal funding which would in many cases could lead to closing of the entire school.
Republicans attached Texas Republican Randy Neugebauer's Amendment through a procedural trick known as a "manager's amendment" (usually reserved for technical or non-controversial fixes) so each Republican House member wouldn't have to go on record as voting on it.
"This amendment is a cowardly attack on young people's access to the full range of information about their reproductive health care," said Cecile Richards, president of the Planned Parenthood Action Fund. "This provision ties the hands of health care professionals in schools, and would deny teens access to important and basic information about their health care options."
If you think it couldn't be worse, you'd be wrong. Prior to the insertion of the above language, another white male Republican, Doug Lamborn (the Huffpo article mis-identifies him as a Democrat) of Colorado, introduced an Amendment (ultimately ruled out of order) to the same education bill that would have treated a school-based health service providing legal emergency birth control (the "morning after pill") in a manner similar to what you would expect if they had been trafficking crack cocaine:
[Lamborn's Amendment] would have prohibited federal funds to any school that provides emergency contraception, or a prescription for it, on the premises of a high school or elementary school. The "morning-after pill" is an example of such contraception.
So not only would Republicans punish schools for telling young women how to terminate their unwanted pregnancy by obtaining an abortion, they would ensure that no woman would have the option of doing so before being forced to try to obtain one.
President Obama has said he will veto the Bill, which also strips the Federal government of authority to provide assistance to schools in low-income districts. There is little doubt that given all their public pronouncements on abortion all of the current Republican candidates for President would have signed it into law.