In making a plea for the restoration of Roe vs. Wade, John Mannion is using his mother's experience:
"She lost her pregnancy at seven months," he says in his new campaign ad. "That was before Roe vs. Wade, so she was forced to carry the fetus for another two months and deliver a stillborn baby."
Anne LeBlanc of New York State Right to Life says the legal status of abortion has nothing to do with caring for a woman with a miscarriage, which is sometimes described as a "spontaneous abortion."
"If his mother is telling the truth, then his mother needed a better doctor," she says. "If his claim is not true, then he's being disingenuous. Doctors have always been able to take care of miscarriages -- always. There has never been any law on the books anywhere that says anything about forbidding the removal of a dead child. Abortion is only concerned with live babies who are being killed in the process."
New York is not among the 25 states that have one or more strong gestational limits on abortion.
Still, each of those states permits miscarriage and ectopic pregnancy management, and even induced abortion in specific medical conditions that potentially qualify as "life-threatening" for the mother. So, LeBlanc reiterates that pro-life laws do not justify a doctor's refusal to treat a woman with a stillborn baby.
The Democratic Primary for New York's 22nd Congressional District is June 25th.
