{"id":330186,"date":"2025-04-25T12:40:02","date_gmt":"2025-04-25T17:40:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=330186"},"modified":"2025-04-30T14:16:58","modified_gmt":"2025-04-30T19:16:58","slug":"texas-life-mother-act-undergoes-clarifying-revisions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/texas-life-mother-act-undergoes-clarifying-revisions\/","title":{"rendered":"Texas Senate unanimously passes ‘Life of the Mother Act’"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Update 4\/30\/25<\/strong>: The Texas Senate unanimously approved<\/a> the state’s Life of the Mother Act<\/a> on Tuesday, a bill that aims to clarify when doctors can commit abortions in the state. The bill doesn’t expand on the exceptions to abortion that exist in Texas, but rather, clarifies them so that doctors understand when they are legally allowed to intentionally end the life of a preborn child.<\/p>\n

The version of the bill that passed the Senate states that a woman must be facing a life-threatening condition caused or exacerbated by pregnancy, but that her death does not need to be imminent before the doctor can commit the abortion. Induced abortion \u2014 the direct and intentional killing of a preborn child \u2014 is not medically necessary. In an emergency, a preterm delivery or an emergency C-section can end the pregnancy without intentionally killing the baby.<\/p>\n

The bill will now head to the House.<\/p>\n

4\/25\/25<\/strong>: On Tuesday, April 22, the Texas State Affairs committee voted favorably<\/a> for a revised version of\u00a0Texas<\/span> Senate Bill (SB) 31<\/span><\/a> (companion <\/span>House Bill – HB 44<\/span><\/a>), the Life Of the Mother Act. The goal of the Act is to clarify current state abortion law.<\/span><\/p>\n

SB 31\/HB 44, initiated because of<\/span>\u00a0erroneous and misleading claims<\/span><\/a> made by pro-abortion activists about state laws<\/a> protecting preborn children, would change the existing state code, aiming to clarify the current “exception for medical emergency.” The legislation would require physicians to take at least one approved course under continuing education requirements at no cost, as previously reported by<\/span> Live Action News<\/span><\/a>. Additionally, attorneys in the state would have access to a free educational course.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The legislation, authored by <\/span>Senator Bryan Hughes<\/span><\/a> and <\/span>Representative Charlie Geren<\/span><\/a>, recently caused alarm among some pro-life advocacy groups and individuals by its removal of the words “life-threatening” from the current pro-life laws. <\/span>However, a committee substitute replacing the critical language along with a clarifying definition of what constitutes \u201clife-threatening\u201d aims to address these concerns.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Pro-lifers express concern prior to bill’s recent revisions<\/strong><\/p>\n

Prior to the updated verbiage changes \u2014 re-inserting \u201clife-threatening\u201d provisions along with the definitions found in the updated bill language \u2014\u00a0concerns were raised regarding the removal of specific verbiage from current law in the legislation.<\/span><\/p>\n

Since Live Action News’<\/span> previous reporting on SB 31\/HB 44<\/span><\/a>, the bills have received committee hearings in both the Texas House and Senate, with ample testimony both for and against them.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

During testimony in the House<\/span> Public Affairs Committee hearing<\/span>, <\/span>pro-life Attorney Jace Yarbrough<\/span><\/a> implied that the majority Democratic sponsors<\/a> of the bill were beholden to advancing abortion, and that the bill’s language at that time simply could not be trusted. “<\/span>Instead of clarifying the law, it changes it; instead of preventing expansion, it fuels it,” he said. “It fuels it by deleting a single phrase, ‘life-threatening,’ from the Human Life Protection Act, but without that single phrase, any impairment of a bodily function, including even mental health, can be, has been, and no doubt will be used to justify the ending of an unborn baby’s life.”<\/span><\/p>\n

Yarbrough further argued:<\/span><\/p>\n

HB 44 implicitly acknowledges this danger by referencing Texas’s Supreme Court decisions. Those decisions upheld the current law by focusing on the current phrase “life-threatening physical condition.” As the court put it, the Human Life Protection Act requires that the mother have a life-threatening physical condition. But courts can’t apply that reasoning if the very language of which the court relied… is stripped from the statute. <\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

As introduced, HB 44 would do just that. Texas Courts are overwhelmingly textualist; they interpret statutory changes to reflect legislative intent; removing “life-threatening” would unquestionably broaden the law allowing abortion even when the mother’s life is not at risk.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Jonathan Covey<\/span><\/a> with Texas Values testified as neutral on the legislation and had also shared concerns about the removal of “life-threatening,” citing potentially broadening the exceptions for which abortions would be allowed.<\/span><\/p>\n