Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from New Jersey very much for his comments. It is a shame that here in the United States, with the freedoms that we have guaranteed in our Constitution, that this even has to come before a court. It is so clear that it is unconstitutional to compel speech against someone's beliefs--political, religious beliefs. These are what our Nation is founded on, and to compel these clinics to do this is something that shouldn't even enter the thoughts of anyone. Again, we would never compel any other nonprofit existing on donations and the neighborhood providing things to people in those neighborhoods and communities. We wouldn't think of compelling, again, political speech. We wouldn't think of compelling religious activity. Yet, here, California attempts to compel these volunteers, these clinics, who work on providing such a valuable choice to the women in their community, to essentially refer for an abortion that is against all the deeply held beliefs of these individuals. Mr. Speaker, I want to read the stories of some of the women who go to these clinics, because this really is about choice. This is about institutions in a community that offer true choice. Now, these are stories from the pregnancy centers in my community. So let me first tell you about Miranda. Mr. Speaker, 19-year-old Miranda came to this pregnancy center with her boyfriend and learned she was 9 weeks pregnant. Miranda worked 9 hours a day as a cashier at a Home Depot.…
On the recordMarch 14, 2018
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