Tax Payer Funding for Abortion

03.03.15

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Written by Cal Skinner

Pro-Life and Pro-Family citizens must contact their State Representatives in opposition to HB 4013.

Late last week, State Representative Sara Feigenholtz introduced HB 4013, a bill that would remove all prohibitions on taxpayer funding of abortions. In other words, this legislation would reverse the current law which bans taxpayer funding of abortion under Medicaid. In 1977 there were over 12,700 abortions paid for under Public Aid’s Medicaid program with taxpayer dollars.

Take ACTION: Please click HERE to send a message to your state representative to ask him/her to vote AGAINST this pro-abortion bill.

You can also contact your state representative by calling the Capitol switchboard at (217) 782-2000.

**Please forward this information to your pastors and/or church leaders and urge them to include this information in all church bulletins, newsletters, etc., as soon as possible.

Background

In the late 1970’s the State of Illinois stopped paying for most abortions for those on Public Aid. Shortly thereafter, abortions were removed from services paid for by the State Employees Health Plan

Now, State Rep. Sara Feigenholtz has introduced House Bill 4013.

It will allow the payment for abortions for both state employees and those on Public Aid. Details on the type of abortion would no longer need to be submitted. The requirement of a physician’s statement that the abortion was required to save the life of the mother would no longer be required.

In addition, it allows the Department of Health and Human Services to make grants to nonprofit agencies and organizations that use such grants to refer or counsel for, or perform, abortions. The most prominent of such not-for-profit agencies is Planned Parenthood.

The bill also would allow physicians who have been convicted of performing an abortion procedure in a willful and wanton manner upon a woman who was not pregnant at the time such abortion procedure was performed.

Arguments in Opposition

In a year when the budget is in more trouble than any time within the last fifty years, it is not the time to force state agencies to spend more money than last year.

Re-instating abortions for Public Aid clients is a thinly-disguised way to make sure there are fewer black and brown babies. As a white liberal Republican woman told a legislative colleague privately on the House floor during a 1990’s debate on a bill that would encourage abortions, “We have too many black babies.”

The bill would allow state-paid abortions for sex selection or any reason at all.

Cal Skinner is a former Illinois state representative (1973-1981 and 1993-2001) from Crystal Lake. He began government career in the U.S. Budget Bureau before it was called the Office of Management and Budget and served as McHenry County Treasurer from 1966-1970. Mr. Skinner ran for GOP nomination for Congress in 1980, ran for State Comptroller in 1983, and ran as Libertarian Party candidate for Governor in 2002. Mr. Skinner holds a Bachelor’s degree in economics from Oberlin College and a Master’s degree in public administration from the University of Michigan.

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