Gov. Mills and the sponsors of the bill to expand abortion access in Maine, L.D. 1619, were elected to represent the will of the people.

Nathan Persinger of Hampden and other abortion opponents hold signs critical of a bill that would expand abortion access, outside the House of Representatives chamber at the State House in Augusta on June 7. Gregory Rec/Staff Photographer

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Karen Vachon is executive director of the Auburn-based organization Maine Right to Life.

Prior to the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, returning abortion policy to individual states, the U.S. was said to be one of seven countries with the most permissive abortion policies in the world. If L.D. 1619 passes, Maine may then have among the most permissive abortion policies in the world.

Mainers should ask: Is this what we want?

In 1993, Maine’s Republican Gov. John McKernan signed into law the Reproductive Policy Act, affirming a woman’s ability to end a pregnancy up to viability (approximately 23 weeks). If Roe v. Wade were overturned, Maine law would pick up where Roe v. Wade dropped off.

Hundreds of Mainers showed up in a historic show of opposition to L.D. 1619 at the state Capitol in Augusta on May 1 in a 19-hour hearing. More than 1,100 people provided testimony against the bill that would permit abortion of any viable fetus during the third trimester, for any reason, to be decided between a woman and a “trusted doctor.”

In a recent opinion piece carried by the South Portland Sentry and other local papers, Sen. Anne Carney wrote: “During the hearing on L.D. 1619, it was clear that many of the critics of the bill misunderstood abortion care.” It’s pro-abortion lawmakers who are misguided, not Maine residents.

At the public hearing of the Judiciary Committee, Nicole Clegg, interim CEO of Planned Parenthood of Northern New England, acknowledged that Planned Parenthood consulted with and provided advice to Gov. Mills during the drafting of the bill. Do our state legislators answer to the will of the people, or to out-of-state interests?

Planned Parenthood and the abortion lobby have changed words and meaning to fit their narrative and agenda. What they say doesn’t make sense, destroys ethical standards of health care and fails to recognize the loss of unborn human life.

Those hundreds who testified against the bill don’t believe that abortion is “reproductive healthcare.” The Oxford Dictionary definition of “reproductive” is to produce an offspring. Whatever happened to our trusted doctor’s sworn Hippocratic Oath, to do no harm, which surely extends to the protection of offspring?

Those who testified against the bill don’t believe that you can “trust” your doctor. This became more evident when the Maine Medical Association, which represents more than 4,300 doctors in Maine, tipped their hand and testified in support of the bill.

Those who testified against L.D. 1619 object to it on moral grounds; they believe that when an abortion is performed, a young, voiceless, innocent human life, with their own DNA separate from their mother’s, is killed. They also believe that, post-abortion, women suffer physically, mentally, spiritually and emotionally. These women instead deserve love, support, compassion and redemption.

Maine doesn’t need this bill. Maine is the oldest state in the country, with a median age of 45. We have traditionally been one of a handful of states that has more deaths per year than we do births.

Planned Parenthood is the largest abortion provider in the U.S. and Planned Parenthood of Northern New England’s political action committee in Maine spent a record amount of $836,059 on the governor’s and local legislators’ races in the 2022 election. It’s past time for Mainers to tell the lawmakers who sponsored the governor’s bill to represent them, not Planned Parenthood.

Unless some bill sponsors change their mind, this bill will pass. Maine deserves better.