Al Franken: “I rise in strong opposition to continued attacks on women's access to health care. Today, the Senate majority leader is…”

“I rise in strong opposition to continued attacks on women's access to health care. Today, the Senate majority leader is attempting to advance a bill to ban abortion after 20 weeks. This is a blatantly unconstitutional proposal that injects politics into a private and deeply personal decision, one that should remain between a woman and her medical provider and her family. This bill is the latest--but not the last, I know--in a serious of unrelenting attacks on safe and legal abortion in this country. It not only represents a cynical affront to well-settled law, it poses a serious threat to women's health. Let me tell you why. Nearly 43 years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court held that the Constitution protects, as a fundamental right, a woman's ability to decide whether and when to start a family. This bill is plainly at odds with that holding and plainly at odds with the Constitution, which is why Federal and State courts have found laws like this one unconstitutional time and time again, but our colleagues on the other side of the aisle are now pushing forward with this bill and doing it at the expense of women who need medical care in the most desperate of circumstances. Bills like this one demonstrate a callous disregard for the risks women face during pregnancy--women like Danielle Deaver, from Nebraska, who went to the doctor in a desperate attempt to save her pregnancy when her water broke at 22 weeks.…”