Bills to restrict abortion to get hearings

WASHINGTON, Feb. 7 (UPI) -- Expanded restrictions on federal funding of abortion get separate committee hearings this week in the U.S. House of Representatives.

While one or both bills could pass the House, observers say they don't foresee the measures making it through the Senate, much less escape President Obama's veto, McClatchy Newspapers reported.

"They can't expect this legislation to go beyond the House of Representatives," Steve Smith, a political science professor at Washington University in St. Louis, told McClatchy in the article published Sunday. "It allows the House Republicans to do something symbolically important for their coalition base."

The No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act would make permanent provisions of the Hyde Amendment that prohibits federal funding for abortion but must be renewed by Congress annually. A House Judiciary subcommittee scheduled a hearing on it Tuesday.

The Protect Life Act would restrict the use of federal funds under the new healthcare law, and would include in the healthcare law a "conscience clause" for doctors and hospitals objecting to performing abortions. The House Energy and Commerce health subcommittee plans to conduct a hearing on the bill Wednesday.

The bills have alarmed abortion-rights advocates, who say the bills are attempts to attack legalized abortion through the tax code and deny women access to the procedure.

"These bills represent a new front in the abortion war," said Donna Crane, policy director for NARAL Pro-Choice America. "The idea … of using the tax code to impose political views, that's extremely alarming."

Abortion opponents warn the attacks are just the beginning now that Republicans control the House, McClatchy said.

"The Republicans in the House are definitely following the promise they made to undo the damage that's been done," said Kerry Brown, a spokeswoman for Susan B. Anthony List, an anti-abortion group.