Public schools would teach children as young as 12 about abortion as part of the middle and high school sex education curriculum, give them a list of abortion businesses, and inculcate an attitude of “inclusivity and support in conversations surrounding abortion,” if a new bill passes the California legislature. The legislation is one of 17 new abortion-related bills Democratic lawmakers have introduced to enhance the state’s self-identity as an “abortion sanctuary.”
Additional bills would allow abortionists to break the law in other states with impunity, create a taxpayer-funded “awareness campaign” that critics believe will malign pro-life pregnancy resource centers, and expand publicly funded abortion-on-demand for minors without parental consent.
AB 598 from Assemblywoman Buffy Wicks (D-14) requires that middle school and high school sex education programs instruct kids in “pregnancy prevention and care, including, but not limited to, guidance regarding contraceptive methods and abortion.” Teachers have to give students “information about obtaining abortions during different stages of pregnancy, including informational resources, methods, and medical risks.” The bill further specifies that “all pupils shall receive a physical or digital resource detailing the local resources” to carry out an abortion — such as a webpage linking minors to local abortion facilities. The bill also asks teachers to inculcate a “positive” attitude of “inclusivity and support in conversations surrounding abortion or contraception.”
The legislation encourages teachers to have children “support” abortion-on-demand. “Instruction shall also discuss accessibility of and community attitudes toward reproductive care, with an emphasis on positive community tenets such as inclusivity and support in conversations surrounding abortion or contraception,” says the bill.
Pro-life commentators called the bill the next logical step in state-sponsored abortion advocacy. “California’s mandatory sex-ed program has always been a boon to the abortion industry. Encouraging children to engage in sexual activity will inevitably result in unintended pregnancies, so it’s not surprising that the Democrats in the legislature want every middle and high school student to know where to get an abortion without involving their parents,” Mary Rose Short, the director of California Right to Life, told The Washington Stand. “If students make it to college, it’s even easier to get an abortion, since California law mandates that state universities provide abortions on campus as a staple of student life.”
“Rather than working to improve education in California’s failing schools, Democrats are focused on turning students into lifelong customers for the abortion industry,” Short told TWS.
The bill is one of nearly a score of abortion-promoting bills drawn up by the California Future of Abortion Council in conjunction with the California Legislative Women’s Caucus. The latest legislative blitz comes just months after Governor Gavin Newsom (D) signed 15 abortion-related bills aimed at turning California into a national “abortion sanctuary.”
Additional measures would shield California abortionists from the consequences of breaking the law in pro-life states.
“These are dark times,” said State Senator Nancy Skinner (D-Berkeley), chair of the women’s caucus. She hoped her legislative vista would assure that “California will remain a light of hope, a safe haven for abortion.”
AB 36 would jail bail bondsmen who arrest abortionists or those who carry out transgender procedures that violate another state’s pro-life or pro-child protective laws, allowing judges to imprison private investigators for up to a year in county jail and to impose a $5,000 fine. It also forbids magistrates from issuing arrest warrants, or judges from calling witnesses to testify, in cases involving other states’ pro-life/pro-gender laws.
“California is really playing with fire here,” said Jonathan Keller of the California Family Council. “They are so eager to export their ideology when it comes to abortion to the rest of the country [that] they’re trying to set up a legal fiction of saying that the laws in other states do not apply to people here in the state of California.”
Skinner’s bill also makes out-of-state abortionists eligible for welfare. If a state employee determines that a “person is fleeing to avoid prosecution” for a pro-life law, the applicant qualifies for food stamps and benefits administered by CalWorks.
Another bill in the collection of abortion-expanding proposals — AB 352, introduced by Rebecca Beth Bauer-Kahan (D-16) — would prevent any health care provider or institution in California from complying with another state’s lawful subpoena investigating whether a violation of that state’s pro-life law has occurred. It also seeks to prevent any information about abortion or “gender affirming care” from “automatically being disclosed, transmitted, or transferred to, shared with, or accessed by, individuals and entities in another state.”
A third piece of legislation, AB 710 introduced by Pilar Schiavo (D-40), would require the state to launch a taxpayer-funded “abortion services awareness campaign.” The legislation originally specifically stated it would be aimed at pregnancy resource centers — which California pro-life advocates said could result in the state maligning their charitable services. Pro-abortion activists nationwide have regularly targeted pro-life women’s centers, which Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) called “fake clinics,” physically attacking them dozens of times following the Dobbs decision last May.
Under this bill, the state could begin “attacking one of the best features of the California social safety net, which is nonprofit organizations, led by people of faith, that are seeking to provide free resources and support to families in need,” Keller told TWS.
AB 571 by Assemblymember Cottie Petrie-Norris (D-Irvine) would force medical malpractice insurers to cover abortionists and those who carry out transgender surgeries and cross-sex hormone injections; it also prevents insurers from charging those facilities any added surcharge.
AB 1432 by Assemblymember Wendy Carrillo (D-Los Angeles) would require health insurance to underwrite abortion and transgender procedures for Californians, even if those procedures are illegal in the company’s home state.
AB 793 would interfere with police investigations by preventing detectives from learning whether women searched for abortion-related terms, such as abortion pills. In St. Louis, prosecutors convicted a 25-year-old woman of double infanticide in part by noting that she had Googled “cheap abortion pills,” “free abortion clinic,” and “can you cause a miscarriage if you hit yourself in the stomach hard enough?”
AB 576 has the state Medicaid program, Medi-Cal, cover chemical abortion through 10 weeks (70 days) post-fertilization (LMP).
AB 1481 introduced by Boerner-Horvath would make any minor, and adults up to age 26, automatically eligible for Medi-Cal funding of abortions without parental consent.
AB 254 introduced by Bauer-Kahan would bar entities involved in health care from sharing information about any woman who had an abortion.
AB 1194 introduced by Wendy Carillo (D-52) requires businesses to erase any data in a woman’s consumer record revealing that she has had an abortion.
AB 1707 introduced by Blanca Pacheco (D-64) says that abortionists cannot be disciplined by state medical boards, denied a license, or refused staff privileges based on violating other states’ pro-life laws.
SB 345 introduced by Skinner would define abortion and transgender procedures as “legally protected health care activity.” It also bans state health boards from taking certain disciplinary actions against those who carry out these acts and says pro-life states cannot charge abortionists who illegally facilitate abortions.
SB 385 introduced by Atkins California Senate President Pro Tempore Toni Atkins (D-39) forces physician assistants to supervise/assist in aspiration abortions as part of their training requirements. The bill bans any “exclusively online or simulation-based training programs that do not include mandatory clinical hours involving direct patient care,” e.g., aspiration abortions.
SB 487 introduced by Atkins shelters abortionists from civil lawsuits authorized by other states’ pro-life laws.
AB 1481 introduced by Bauer-Kahan and Tasha Boerner Horvath (D-76) replaces the word “women” with “pregnant people.” It also makes it easier for women up to age 26 to obtain state-funded abortions under the Medicaid program, Medi-Cal, as well as other pregnancy-related services.
AB 1646 introduced by Stephanie Nguyen (D-4) lets medical school graduates work in California for 90 days, a move he said aimed “to keep up” with the state’s surging demand for abortion-on-demand.
AB 90 introduced by Cottie Petrie-Norris (D-73) requires taxpayers to fund the cost of IUDs and other implantable devices for those at or below 200% of the federal poverty level. The new program, administered by the Office of Family Planning, promotes “long-acting contraceptives,” which often act as abortifacients.
Bauer-Kahan said the bills aim to cover “every single woman and pregnant person.”
“If California does this, our biggest export will be murdered children,” said Kristin Turner, executive director of Pro-Life San Francisco.
Ben Johnson is senior reporter and editor at The Washington Stand.
