Press Release from Congressman David Weldon

April 5, 2000

Weldon Advocates Partial Birth Abortion Ban

WASHINGTON, DC -- Today, the House of Representatives passed the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act by a vote of 287-141.  After today’s vote, Rep. Dave Weldon made the following statement:

The House has debated the Partial Birth Abortion Ban for three years in a row, and each time has overwhelmingly voted to outlaw this barbaric procedure. Each year, I have worked tirelessly to outlaw this horrific operation. Not only is the result is a dead baby, but women’s health is in tremendous jeopardy here. Women who undergo this procedure are at risk for serious medical consequences.

The American people need to be told the truth about this procedure. Partial Birth Abortion is the utterly gruesome procedure by which an abortionist forcibly turns the baby into the breech position, pulls the child by the legs out of the mother, stabs the baby’s base of the skull with scissors to suck the brains out with a vacuum. As I doctor, I know first hand that a pre-born child feels pain- in this procedure the pre-delivered baby undoubtedly feels extreme pain.

The abortion industry would have us believe that the partial birth abortion procedure is rare. However, the current estimates pit this as high as 10,000 killings per year. I believe that the most important indicator of a civilized society is how it treats its weakest and most defenseless population. And I cannot think of a weaker or more defenseless person than a baby in the mother’s womb. It is indeed a grim comment on western civilization when we kill humans of any age.

This is not a religious issue, it is a human issue. The distance between life and death for these babies is a mere three inches. Since Roe v. Wade we have seen 35 million abortions in this nation. The value of human life has been debased in our civilization to the point where animals have protective rights were humans do not. We are knee-deep in a culture of death.

I am pleased that the partial birth abortion ban passed the House, and I urge the President to sign this bill. His long term extremist stand to allow this gruesome procedure to continue only exemplifies how he is out of step with the American public, and out of step with human principles and dignity.

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