Anti-abortion lawmakers on Capitol Hill, increasingly frustrated with inaction from the Trump administration, are introducing legislation to force federal agencies to curb access to abortion pills nationwide via ramped-up drug regulation and environmental laws.
The new wave of House and Senate bills, while they face long odds to become law, reflect the anti-abortion movement’s mounting impatience with President Donald Trump and his agency leaders — a rift activists warn could compromise Republicans’ prospects in this November’s midterm elections.
On Wednesday, GOP Reps. Mary Miller of Illinois, Diana Harshbarger of Tennessee and Sheri Biggs of South Carolina will unveil the “Clean Water for All Life Act,” the first federal bill to advance abortion opponents’ yearslong effort to use environmental laws to roll back abortion access.
The bill would require any doctor prescribing abortion pills to physically examine the patient first and furnish her with a medical waste “catch kit” to dispose of the expelled fetus, and threatens those who don’t comply with a five-year prison sentence.
