Biden expected to emphasize his support for abortion in State of the Union address — By: Catholic News Agency

U.S. President Joe Biden is shown here delivering his 2023 State of the Union address before a joint session of the United States Congress. / Credit: Jacquelyn Martin-Pool/Getty Images

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Mar 7, 2024 / 06:45 am (CNA).

The guest list from First Lady Jill Biden and Democratic lawmakers suggests that tonight’s State of the Union address by President Joe Biden will promote both abortion and in vitro fertilization (IVF) — two campaign priorities for the party.

The president is scheduled to deliver his annual State of the Union address tonight at 8 p.m. One notable attendee will be Kate Cox, who was denied an abortion in Texas, but eventually aborted her unborn child in another state.

Cox sought an abortion after her unborn child was diagnosed with trisomy 18. An unborn child diagnosed with this disorder only has about a 5%-10% chance to live past his or her first birthday.

Other attendees will include Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine’s guest Elizabeth Carr, who was the first American child born through IVF, and Democratic Sen. Tammy Duckworth’s guest Amanda Adeleye, who is the director of an IVF clinic in the Chicago area.

Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America (SBA) vice president of state affairs Stephen Billy anticipates that Biden will use the address to promote falsehoods about pro-life policies in an effort to promote the administration’s pro-abortion agenda.

“The president will use tragic situations, heartbreaking situations, purely to advance a political agenda,” Billy said. 

Billy noted that every state to impose restrictions on abortion has included protections for when the life of the mother is in danger and assurances that women can receive proper treatment to heal from a miscarriage. He said that Democrats and pro-abortion activists have spread misinformation claiming otherwise, which has put women’s health at risk.

“They have put the safety of women on the backburner … all in pursuit of their extreme political position of second and third trimester abortion without restrictions,” Billy said.

SBA legislative director Jamie Dangers added that Biden intends to “exploit [a] tragic situation” like the one Cox went through so he can “push abortion on demand, for any reason, at any time, through all nine months of pregnancy.”

“[Biden] wants to go so much further than [Roe] and that’s clear in the policies he is pushing,” Dangers said.

Dangers extolled the work of pro-life pregnancy centers, which help women through their pregnancies, as the exact opposite of the administration’s approach. The pro-life community, she said, is “responding with passion, and with truth, and with hope.”

Biden and other Democrats have made their support for abortion a major part of their 2024 re-election campaign strategy since the United States Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. Biden and other Democrats have campaigned on codifying the abortion rules imposed by Roe through federal legislation, which would prohibit states from enacting pro-life laws.

The proposed codification language would legalize abortion nationwide until the point of viability, which is when the preborn child can survive outside of the womb. However, the language does not set a week-based limit. Instead, it allows the woman’s physician, who is often the abortionist, to determine whether the preborn child is viable.

Biden has also enacted pro-abortion policies through executive actions. This includes dropping religious freedom protections that ensure that pro-life doctors and health care providers can’t be forced to perform abortions. He has also moved to expand surgical abortion through U.S. Department of Health and Human Services guidance and to expand chemical abortion through federal regulation.

Democrats and even many Republicans have vocally embraced IVF after the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that human embryos are covered under the state’s “Wrongful Death of a Minor Act.” 

IVF is a fertility treatment in which doctors fuse sperm and eggs to create human embryos and implant them in the mother’s womb without a sexual act. Embryos that are intended to be implanted at a later date are frozen. Undesired embryos are routinely destroyed or used for scientific research.

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