We live in a remarkable State in an incredible moment in History.
Because of the leadership of Governor Greg Abbott and the pro-life leaders and members of the Senate and House in our Capitol building before you, our state provides vast resources for women with unplanned pregnancies. Last session the Legislature and our Governor appropriated $165 million for the highly successful Alternatives to Abortion program. That program provides services at 200 sites for women facing unplanned pregnancies to assist them in carrying the baby to term, giving birth, and keeping or placing the baby for adoption. Services continue for three years after the birth of the child.
Also, $2.3 billion for medical care for pregnant women — prenatal, birth, and post-partum for 12 months for low-income women. Of the more than 360,000 annual births, Texas pays for more than half.
And hundreds of privately supported non-profit and church organizations provide programs for pregnant women and their unborn babies before and long after birth.
As Governor Abbott has said, our state’s pro-life laws are saving babies lives, and they are saving mothers’ lives.
The laws, particularly the Human Life Protection Act, now completely protect unborn babies from abortion, from conception to birth as well as babies who survive abortion.
Since Roe was overturned, reported elective abortions have plummeted from thousands per month to zero. Yes, zero. The once thriving abortion industry in Texas has collapsed. Yes, we now have thousands of dangerous and deadly abortion pills being mailed into Texas. Those are killing babies and putting women into hospital emergency rooms. Anyone doing needs to know something. Illegally trafficking abortion drugs is a very serious criminal offense under the Prenatal Protection Act, life in prison and a minimum $100,000 fine. We need our district attorneys to enforce this law.
We applaud Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and his team for holding a New York-based abortion doctor accountable for mailing abortion drugs that killed an unborn baby and landed the Texas mother in an emergency room. That doctor will soon be paying $100,000 for each violation.
Our state’s pro-life laws are saving women’s lives. The exception in the laws allow abortions in rare and tragic cases when pregnancy endangers a mother’s life. Doctors have reported performing 132 abortions to save women’s lives in the first 26 months since Roe fell. The claim that women cannot get treatment to save their lives in Texas is a complete lie.
No doctor has been prosecuted. No doctor has been sued. No doctor has been sanctioned for any of those abortions performed under the medical necessity exception. Our laws also explicitly allow treatment of miscarriage and ectopic pregnancy. No woman has lost her life in Texas or in any other state for lack of exception language.
And the law does protect precious babies conceived in the tragedy of rape or with life-limiting or fatal diagnoses. The Texas Supreme Court has upheld the Human Life Protection Act as constitutional and clear for doctors to understand two times.
I am proud of Texas. Who’s proud of Texas?
We are a pro-life state. The November elections showed that. Voters overwhelmingly defeated all candidates running statewide who supported abortion, abortion up to birth. All our pro-life statewide elected officials, running for re-election, won by wide margins. The Texas House became more pro-life. The Texas Senate became more pro-life.
Texas is pro-life. Yes. We are, Pro-Life.
We will never grow weary, nor depressed. Our movement is winning, and thousands of babies now are born each year, who would otherwise have perished. We celebrate the births of those babies.
For as long as any pregnant woman needs help, for as long as an unborn child needs protection, we will be here for them.