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On Friday, California’s Assembly passed a radical pro-abortion bill that would provide free abortions to all college and university students by a vote of 55-19.
Introduced by Connie Leyva (D-Chino), Senate Bill 24 mandates that all public colleges and universities provide abortion drugs to students up to 10 weeks pregnant for free by 2023. The bill has been sent to Governor Gavin Newsom’s desk for his signature.
“The state has an interest in ensuring that every pregnant person in California who wants to have an abortion can obtain access to that care as easily and as early in pregnancy as possible,” the bill states.
As such, SB 24 requires all student healthcare services clinics on a California State University or University of California campus to offer abortion by medication. It requires the Commission on the Status of Women and Girls to administer the College Student Health Center Sexual and Reproductive Health Preparation Fund, which is established by the bill and funded under the bill.
“The bill would continuously appropriate the moneys in that fund to the commission for allocations to each public university student health care services clinic for specified activities in preparation for providing abortion by medication techniques, thereby making an appropriation,” it continues.
If it becomes law, the initiative would be funded by “nonstate entities, including, but not necessarily limited to, private sector entities and local and federal government agencies,” the bill says.
SB 24 affects 34 college campuses, the New York Times reports.
The bill covers medical abortions, which involve taking two pills over two days within the first 10 weeks of pregnancy to bring about a miscarriage. To perform an abortion with medication, doctors use a combination of mifepristone and mioprostol, Newsweek explains. Chemical abortions differ from the morning-after pill in that the morning-after bill provides a high dose of a hormone found in birth control pills that either delay or prevent the release of an egg to avoid fertilization. By contrast, the medical abortion pill offered under SB 24 terminates a confirmed pregnancy.
The bill was opposed not only by pro-life groups, but by colleges and the state finance department, all of whom expressed concerns about the safety and costs associated with the legislation.
Students for Life of America (SFLA) President Kristan Hawkins said, “California legislators are recklessly experimenting with students’ lives and health by advancing a plan to force school health centers to become abortion vendors, pushing chemical abortion pills to force an intentional miscarriage.”
“These Toilet Bowl Abortions would create havoc on campuses, as girls are sent to their dorm bathrooms to bleed and pass an aborted infant in a toilet, without medical supervision or assistance,” Hawkins added.
CBN News notes the FDA has documented “at least 4,000 cases of serious adverse events, including more than 1,000 women who required hospitalization” after taking the chemical abortion pill covered under this legislation.
These findings say nothing of the significant biological and behavioral effects on women following abortions. A three-year study conducted by Franciscan University of Steubenville psychologists and a medical school professor and Ph.D. student in Chile’s Universidad San Sebastián, Conceptión, and published in Frontiers in Neuroscience found pregnancy termination results in negative biological, behavioral, and biochemical effects.
Not only does this put college students in physical danger, but it also increases the financial burden created by the legislation, notes Fresno Pro-Life Future president Bernadette Tasy in a letter campaigning against the legislation.
“These women would effectively be getting two abortions — how will these numerous follow-up surgical abortions, transportation, and any other expenses due to complications be funded?” she said.
Governor Newsom’s Department of Finance announced its opposition to SB 24 last month, citing “significant” costs generated by the measure.
“While this bill and its sponsors indicate that private financing would cover all the costs associated with this bill, Finance notes this bill could create future General Fund cost pressures to the extent sufficient private funding cannot be raised to support readiness grants, the costs to comply with this bill’s requirements exceed the proposed grant funding, or to the extent the UC and CSU incur ongoing costs after January 1, 2023,” the Department of Finance reported.
Tasy voiced similar concerns, stating that the appropriations in the bill will not cover the incurred costs, and would eventually force students to pay for the abortion meds their peers obtain on campus.
Leyva introduced a similar bill in 2018, SB 320, which was vetoed by California’s then-Governor Jerry Brown. At the time, Governor Brown said the bill was “not necessary,” as the services provided under the bill were already “widely available.” Brown also cited a study sponsored by the bill’s supporters that found the “average distance to abortion providers in campus communities varies from five to seven miles,” which Brown remarked was “not an unreasonable distance.”
Following Brown’s veto, Leyva vowed to reintroduce the bill under the next governor. “As the Trump Administration continues to unravel many of the critical health care protections and services for women, legislation such as this is urgently needed to make sure that Californians are able to access the full range of reproductive care regardless of where they may live,” Leyva said in a statement.
