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[Page S1410]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
BUSINESS BEFORE THE SENATE
Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, on an entirely different matter, this
week the Senate will resume our work in the personnel business by
considering yet another of President Trump's qualified judicial
nominees.
Eric Miller has been chosen to sit on the Ninth Circuit Court of
Appeals, and one look at his legal career to this point says he is well
prepared to do so.
Mr. Miller is a graduate of Harvard and the University of Chicago,
where he served on the Law Review editorial staff. He has held
prominent clerkships on both the DC Circuit Court of Appeals and the
U.S. Supreme Court. His record of public service at the Justice
Department and in private practice reflects a legal mind of the highest
caliber.
I hope each of my colleagues will join me in voting to advance the
first circuit court nominee of this new Congress. That will be 31 since
President Trump took office. But first, in just a few hours, the Senate
will vote on advancing a straightforward piece of legislation to
protect newborn babies. This legislation is simple. It would simply
require that medical professionals give the same standard of care and
medical treatment to newborn babies who have survived an attempted
abortion as any other newborn baby would receive in any other
circumstance. It isn't about new restrictions on abortion. It isn't
about changing the options available to women. It is just about
recognizing that a newborn baby is a newborn baby, period.
This bill would make clear that in the year 2019, in the United
States of America, medical professionals on hand when a baby is born
alive need to maintain their basic ethical and professional
responsibilities to that newborn. It would make sure our laws reflect
the fact that the human rights of newborn boys and girls are innate;
they don't come and go based on the circumstances of birth. Whatever
the circumstances, if that medical professional comes face-to-face with
a baby who has been born alive, they are looking at a human being with
human rights, period.
To be frank, it makes me uneasy that such a basic statement seems to
be generating actual disagreement. Can the extreme, far-left politics
surrounding abortion really have come this far? Are we really supposed
to think that it is normal that there are now two sides debating
whether newborn, living babies deserve medical attention?
We already know that many of our Democratic colleagues want the
United States to remain one of seven nations in the world that permit
elective abortions after 20 weeks--seven countries, including North
Korea, China, and the United States of America. But now it seems the
far left wants to push the envelope even further. Apart from the entire
abortion debate, they now seem to be suggesting that newborn babies'
right to life may be contingent--contingent--on the circumstances
surrounding their birth. Well, evidently, the far left is no longer
convinced that all babies are created equal, but the rest of us are
still pretty fond of that principle.
My colleagues across the aisle need to decide where they will take
their cues on these moral questions. On the one hand, there are a few
extreme voices who have decided that some newborn lives are more
disposable than others. On the other side is the entire rest of the
country.
I would urge my colleagues: Let's listen to the voices of the
American people. Let's reaffirm that when we say every life is created
equal, we actually mean it. Let's vote to advance the Born-Alive
Abortion Survivors Protection Act later today.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. SCHUMER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Ernst). Without objection, it is so
ordered.
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