Editor’s note. In response to a highly misleading recent article in the Minnesota Star Tribune, MCCL submitted a letter to the editor, written by Communications Director Paul Stark, correcting the record on Minnesota’s extreme policies surrounding abortion and babies who are born alive.
The letter to the editor is reposted below under the headline “Not so fast on that fact-check”:
The recent article fact-checking former President Donald Trump’s debate claims about Minnesota (“Trump falsely claims that Walz supports infanticide,” Sept. 12) is heavily slanted and consistently omits relevant information.
The article claims that Gov. Tim Walz has never said abortion in the ninth month is OK. Really? Walz signed legislation under which such abortions, performed for any reason, are legal in Minnesota. Lawmakers had rejected any and all amendments to provide gestational limits — and didn’t dispute the upshot of their votes. Egregiously, the article obfuscates this fact by saying that it is “Republicans and groups that oppose abortion” who claim the law allows “abortion up to birth.” No, it’s everyone who has read the law who says that.
The article tries to downplay the frequency of abortions later in pregnancy by citing statistics from before recent legal changes (all signed by Walz) that are now sending an open invitation to practitioners of late abortion. It also claims that Walz doesn’t support infanticide and that it is illegal. Infanticide via active killing is indeed illegal, but Walz signed legislation repealing a guarantee of lifesaving treatment for born-alive infants.
Intentionally leaving viable babies to die is allowed under Walz’s policy.
The article works hard to spin this, citing advocates who say the new policy “doesn’t get in the way of parents or doctors trying to save the life of the child.” That’s right — it just makes saving that life optional. The article also repeats uncritically the false claim that the former law required unnecessary interventions in hopeless cases. In truth, the old law only required “reasonable measures consistent with good medical practice.”
Space doesn’t permit additional criticism here. But telling the truth about Minnesota’s abortion policies matters.