VIDEO: Rep. Jaime Beutler defends abortion survivors in passionate speech before House Committee

Yesterday at the House Appropriations hearing on the Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education Appropriations Bill for 2020, Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.) offered a Born Alive amendment to protect abortion survivors. The Cole Amendment would, in his own words, “withhold federal funds… to any entity that does not ensure that any infant born alive following an abortion,” denying appropriate medical care as would be given to any other baby of the same gestational age. “There is no existing federal law that prohibits the denial of medical care to infants born alive in the context of abortion,” stated Cole.

Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler (R-Wash.) spoke out in favor of the Cole Amendment to the bill, telling her personal story about being told her first child, daughter Abigail, had a 100% chance of death. Beutler and her husband were told that to abort would be easier on them. They learned during Jaime’s pregnancy that Abigail had Potter’s Syndrome, which meant that her kidneys (if present) would not function effectively, and low amniotic fluid would also leave her lungs underdeveloped. They were told the condition would be fatal. But then, after hitting brick walls with other doctors who gave them no hope, encouraging them to just abort and try again, the Beutlers instead sought an experimental treatment through Johns Hopkins University, which changed everything.  Click here for more.