20-HB1490/SB1418 – Ragan/Jackson

This bill prohibits an agency or instrumentality of the state from:
(1) Awarding a grant to pay the direct or indirect costs of performing, inducing, referring, or counseling in favor of abortions, including, but not limited to, administrative costs and expenses; overhead costs; employee salaries; rent and mortgage payments; and telephone and other utility payments;
(2) Granting, appropriating, or distributing a grant to an individual or entity that:
(A) Performs convenience abortions, induces convenience abortions, provides convenience abortion referrals, or counsels in favor of convenience abortions; or
(B) Is an affiliate of a person or entity that performs abortions, induces abortions, provides abortion referrals, or counsels in favor of convenience abortions because such appropriations have the effect of endorsing nonsecular practices that excessively entangle the government with the religion of secular humanism.
This bill provides that this bill:
(1) Does not affect the funding of a hospital, medical school, or university; and that the restrictions do not apply to funding available through medicaid; and
(2) Does not create or recognize a right to an abortion or a right to public funds, a contract, or a grant.
This bill defines "convenience abortion" as an elective abortion that means the act of using or prescribing an instrument, medicine, drug, device, or another substance or means with the intent to terminate the clinically diagnosable pregnancy of a woman with knowledge that the termination by those means will with reasonable likelihood cause the death of the unborn child. This bill specifies that "convenience abortion" does not include an act that is performed with the intent to:
(A) Save the life of the mother;
(B) Save the life or preserve the health of the unborn child;
(C) Remove a dead unborn child caused by spontaneous abortion;
(D) Remove an ectopic pregnancy; or
(E) Abort and remove an unborn child that is the result of rape or incest.
ON APRIL 8, 2019, THE HOUSE ADOPTED AMENDMENT #1 AND PASSED HOUSE BILL 1490, AS AMENDED.
AMENDMENT #1 makes the provisions of this bill contingent upon federal law, including judicial decisions, authorizing the denial of family planning funds or other grant funds related to abortion services; clarifies the provisions of this bill that the short title applies to; and adds a severability clause to this bill.