TITLE
Recommendation to direct City Attorney to prepare a resolution by the City Council meeting on November 1st in opposition to S.4840 and H.R.1080, the so-called “Protecting Pain-Capable Unborn Children from Late-Term Abortions Act” and refer said opposition’s inclusion in the 2023 Federal Legislative Agenda to the Federal Legislative Committee.
DISCUSSION
In November of 2021, Kailee DeSpain of Mable Falls, Texas learned she was pregnant. She and her husband Cade had been trying to get pregnant for years after a string of miscarriages earlier in their marriage and were delighted to have a baby boy on the way. Tragically, 12 weeks later in February of 2022, their fetus was diagnosed with triploidy, a condition which meant that the fetus would not survive outside the womb, likely suffocating a few minutes after birth. Triploidy is also associated with higher risks of placental abnormalities in the mother, many of which can cause cancer, and increased likelihood of preeclampsia, a potentially fatal blood pressure condition which affects pregnant mothers. As Kaliee already suffered from two blood clotting disorders, her doctor informed her that carrying this pregnancy to term would involve severe risk to her life.
When the state of Texas imposed its six-week abortion ban in September of 2021, it included an exception to the ban that said that an abortion could be permitted if the mother, “has a life-threatening physical condition aggravated, caused by, or arising from a pregnancy that places the female at risk of death or poses a serious risk of substantial impairment of a major bodily function.” This was covered in local media as “an exception for the life of the mother”, though in practice, these exceptions are anything but.
According to Kailee, her doctor told her that this law’s vagueness meant that she could be held legally liable for any abortion that took place unless she was “dying on the table”, at which point she couldn’t guarantee her survival e...
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