Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., on Tuesday unveiled a proposed national 15-week ban on abortions.
Graham's legislation comes as control of the Senate is up for grabs in the Nov. 8 midterm election, leading some Republican candidates to soften their positions on the issue.
Graham's bill, which will go nowhere in the Democrat-controlled Congress, is stricter than similar legislation he introduced in previous years that aimed to ban abortions after 20 weeks. The current bill allows exceptions in cases involving rape, incest, or risks to the mother's life and health.
Washington Post journalist Caroline Kitchener, who covers abortion topics for the paper,
posted on Twitter Monday night that Graham would join Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America group's President Marjorie Dannenfelser in announcing the legislation, called the "Protecting Pain-Capable Unborn Children from Late-Term Abortions Act," at the press conference at the U.S. Capitol.
The announcement comes a day after Dannenfelser wrote a letter to Congress to act on the issue.
"Since the Dobbs decision, over a dozen states have taken action to protect unborn children, potentially saving more than 200,000 lives," the letter said. "Yet radical Democrats are pushing an extreme agenda of abortion on demand until birth, paid for by the taxpayer, leaving countless unborn babies and mothers unprotected from the violence of abortion. Already, more than 50,000 abortions a year take place after unborn children can feel excruciating pain. While we work toward a day when every child is protected, we urge Congress to find consensus on a minimum federal standard that reflects the values of the overwhelming majority of Americans."
The organization said it represents more than 1 million pro-life Americans nationwide and is dedicated to ending abortion by electing national leaders and "advocating for laws that save lives."
According to the Senate's official website, a previous version of the bill was introduced in January 2021 that would ban abortions after 20 weeks with exceptions in the cases of rape, incest, or if the life of the mother is endangered.
Almost 630,000 abortions were reportedly performed in the United Stares in 2019. The year's numbers are available on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website, with a ratio of 195 abortions for every 1,000 live births.
The agency estimates that the number of rape or incest abortions account for around 1.5% of that total, or less than 10,000 nationally.
This is one of the first Congressional moves to codify abortion nationally since the United States Supreme Court overturned 1973's Roe v. Wade decision making abortion legal in the country.
The high court ruled that the Constitution did not include a federal right to abortion and sent the issue back to the states to decide.
Several states then initiated "trigger laws" based on the decision, outlawing abortions from being performed after a certain point in fetal development.
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