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| FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE |
| State Rep. Dan Frankel |
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Frankel: House GOP pushing abortion bills, neglecting jobs
HARRISBURG, Dec. 13 – State Rep. Dan Frankel, D-Allegheny, today criticized the House Republican majority leadership for holding votes this week on anti-abortion bills and failing to focus on jobs.
"On Tuesday, the House passed a bill to ban adult women from using their own money to buy health insurance that includes abortion coverage. House Bill 1977 would affect coverage obtained through the new health exchanges that will be created under the federal health care reform law," Frankel said.
"Today, the House Republican leadership has scheduled a vote on another anti-abortion bill, Senate Bill 732. That legislation would impose several new restrictions on clinics that offer this service to women, likely forcing most Pennsylvania clinics to close as resulted from a similar law in Texas and forcing poor women to seek illegal, unsafe abortions, the opposite of the bill's stated purpose. I offered an alternative, which was defeated, that would have actually addressed the core problem at the Philadelphia 'house of horrors' clinic – the state simply failed to do its job inspecting that clinic. As is said so often about other issues, we need to enforce the laws we already have.
"The House Republican leadership is spending valuable time on these bills instead of acting on the highest priority of most Pennsylvanians: jobs. In these economic times, there is no excuse for that. House Democrats have a plan to jumpstart Pennsylvania's economy: JumpStartPA."
More information about JumpStartPA is available online at www.pahouse.com.
Frankel was joined by other pro-choice lawmakers and advocates at the Capitol news conference.
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