The Senate will vote later this month on a bill requiring medical care for a child born after a failed abortion, the latest tough vote for Democrats after Republicans assumed control of the chamber.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) announced Wednesday that the Senate will vote on the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act as activists head to Washington for the annual March for Life.
“This vote will ask Democrats to answer whether a living baby born after an attempted abortion should be provided with medical care or left to die,” Thune said from the Senate floor.
The march is scheduled for Jan. 24, four days after President-elect Donald Trump is inaugurated for a second term.
Thune has been acting in concert with the House in the days before Trump assumes office, teeing up votes that squeeze vulnerable Democrats on politically divisive topics with the 2026 midterm elections approaching.
On Friday, the Senate will vote on a bill requiring authorities to detain illegal immigrants charged with theft-related crimes until they can be deported. The bill passed the House earlier this week with the support of 48 Democrats.
Thune will then move a bill sanctioning the International Criminal Court after it issued an arrest warrant for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the war in Gaza.
Democrats objected to the Born Alive legislation when it passed the GOP-led House in 2023, arguing it interfered with the medical decisions made between mothers and their doctors. Just one Democrat voted for the bill, while a second voted “present.”
Republicans, for their part, have framed the legislation as a matter of common sense. Thune co-sponsored the bill in 2019 after then-Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam suggested that nonviable fetuses should not necessarily be resuscitated after a failed abortion, a remark Republicans interpreted as an endorsement of infanticide.
“It shouldn’t be a hard question,” Thune said Wednesday.
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The bill provides Republicans with a rare opportunity to go on offense on abortion after the overturning of Roe v. Wade sent them into disarray on messaging. Thune attempted to pass the bill by unanimous consent last June but was blocked by the Democratic-led Senate.
The Supreme Court decision, which returned restrictions on abortion to the states, was credited with Republicans’ defeat in the 2022 elections. Since then, Trump has steered the party toward a platform that rejects federal restrictions.
