Former President Donald Trump is calling on the Alabama Legislature to find a way to preserve in vitro fertilization (IVF) in Alabama following the Alabama Supreme Court ruling last week that frozen embryos are considered unborn children, asserting that the “Republican Party should always be on the side of the Miracle of Life.”
“Under my leadership, the Republican Party will always support the creation of strong, thriving, healthy American families. We want to make it easier for mothers and fathers to have babies, not harder!” Trump said in a Truth Social post on Friday.
“That includes supporting the availability of fertility treatments like IVF in every State in America,” he continued.
“Like the OVERWHELMING MAJORITY of Americans, including the VAST MAJORITY of Republicans, Conservatives, Christians, and Pro-Life Americans, I strongly support the availability of IVF for couples who are trying to have a precious baby,” Trump said, calling on the Alabama Legislature to “act quickly to find an immediate solution to preserve the availability of IVF in Alabama.”
“The Republican Party should always be on the side of the Miracle of Life – and the side of Mothers, Fathers, and their Beautiful Babies. IVF is an important part of that, and our Great Republican Party will always be with you, in your quest, for the ULTIMATE JOY IN LIFE!” Trump added:
Trump’s plea follows the Friday ruling from the Alabama Supreme Court, which determined that frozen embryos are considered unborn children under state law and that anyone who destroys them may be held liable.
As Breitbart News’s Katherine Hamilton extensively detailed:
The case is centered on whether the Center for Reproductive Medicine can be held liable under the Wrongful Death of a Minor Act after a patient accessed, dropped, and destroyed the frozen embryos of several couples in 2020. The embryos were created for a process called in vitro fertilization (IVF), in which “mature eggs are collected from ovaries and fertilized by sperm in a lab, [and] then a procedure is done to place one or more of the fertilized eggs, called embryos, in a uterus, which is where babies develop,” according to the Mayo Clinic.
The state’s high court ultimately reversed a lower court ruling that did not recognize frozen embryos as unborn children. The Alabama Supreme Court’s based its reasoning on the Sanctity of Unborn Life Amendment adopted to the state Constitution in 2018, which declared it “public policy” to recognize “the sanctity of unborn life and the rights of unborn children.”
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“The central question presented in these consolidated appeals, which involve the death of embryos kept in a cryogenic nursery, is whether the Act contains an unwritten exception to that rule for extrauterine children — that is, unborn children who are located outside of a biological uterus at the time they are killed,” the justices continued. “Under existing black-letter law, the answer to that question is no: the Wrongful Death of a Minor Act applies to all unborn children, regardless of their location.”
“It applies to all children, born and unborn, without limitation,” they wrote.
Justice Gregory Cook offered his dissent, warning that the decision “almost certainly ends the creation of frozen embryos through in vitro fertilization (IVF) in Alabama,” and that is a critique offered by the Biden-Harris campaign as well, accusing MAGA Republicans of “inserting themselves into the most personal decisions a family can make, from contraception to IVF.” Further, the Biden-Harris campaign is accusing Republicans of “preventing loving couples from growing their families.”
“If Donald Trump is elected, there is no question that he will impose his extreme anti-freedom agenda on the entire country,” the Biden-Harris campaign asserted:
The Biden campaign is out with a new statement warning Alabama’s controversial embryo decision “is only possible because Donald Trump’s Supreme Court justices overturned Roe v. Wade,” while calling the ruling “the blueprint,” for Republican’s “Extreme MAGA Reproductive Agenda.” pic.twitter.com/Onf05Zo84Y
— DJ Judd (@DJJudd) February 22, 2024
But Justice Tom Parker, who quoted the Bible in his concurring opinion, explained that Alabama Legislature can choose to create laws in the area of IVF, recognizing that it “has been largely unregulated in the United States, with some commentators even comparing it to the Wild West.”
“For instance, in Australia and New Zealand, prevailing ethical standards dictate that physicians usually make only one embryo at a time,” he wrote, as many pro-life critics of IVF point to the complicated ethical questions it poses, including the freezing of embryos — and the ramifications of that, which can include experimentation — as well as selective abortions in the event that a woman becomes pregnant with multiple babies but only wants one.
Parker pointed to other countries that allow IVF but have regulations, which addresses many of the concerns pro-life Republicans have. The vast majority of embryo transfers in Australia and New Zealand, for instance, occur one at a time.
Parker explained:
On the related issue of embryo transfers, which is the process of implanting the embryos into the uterus, in Australia and New Zealand over 90% of embryo transfers occur only one at a time. Likewise, European Union (“EU”) countries set a legal limit on the number of embryos transferred in a single cycle. In EU countries, 58% of embryo transfers involve just one embryo, and 38% involve two; thus, 96% of embryo transfers in EU countries involve two or fewer transfers at one time.
Such limitations on embryo creation and transfer necessarily reduce or eliminate the need for storing embryos for extended lengths of time. Italy went one step further, banning cryopreservation of embryos except when a bona fide health risk or force majeure prevented the embryos from being transferred immediately after their creation.21 All of these measures protect the lives of the unborn and still allow couples to become parents.
All the while, the Senate GOP is urging candidates to openly support IVF as to not sound “extreme,” as the GOP feels the heat following the ruling.
“Clearly state your support for IVF and fertility-related services as blessings for those seeking to have children,” National Republican Senatorial Committee Executive Director Jason Thielman is telling candidates, urging them to “publicly oppose any efforts to restrict access to IVF and other fertility treatments, framing such opposition as a defense of family values and individual freedom.”
