VIDEO: Ohio Bill Is a Trojan Horse That Stifles Parental Rights – The American Spectator

A proposed Ohio bill has the potential to insidiously diminish parents’ rights in relation to their children’s medical care.

The amendment, “The Right to Reproductive Freedom with Protections for Health and Safety,” to Article I of the Ohio Constitution was proposed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). This past week, Ohioans United for Reproductive Rights submitted nearly 500,000 petitioned signatures, qualifying it to appear on the ballot in the upcoming November election.

The details of the amendment indicate the real goals of the ACLU “reproductive rights bill,” as its broad language would open the door for current abortion restrictions, as well as parental consent and notification laws, to be outlawed.

In a report for the Washington Examiner, Breccan F. Thies wrote:

Proponents of the measure said it only pertains to abortion, but Protect Women Ohio and other organizations opposed to the initiative said the language would allow for much more. 

“Every individual has a right to make and carry out one’s own reproductive decisions, including but not limited to decisions on contraception, fertility treatment, continuing one’s own pregnancy, miscarriage care, and abortion,” the measure states.

Using words and phrases such as “individual,” “reproductive decisions,” and “including but not limited to” are evidence of the broad-reaching intent, according to PWO.

“The language in this amendment is so broad and so vague, and it puts no age limits on this,” PWO’s Amy Natoce told the Washington Examiner. “It specifically says ‘including but not limited to,’ so that leaves this so open-ended. Sex-change operations affect someone’s reproductive organs. Gender reassignment surgery, hormone blockers, hormone replacement therapy.”

The writers of the ACLU amendment carefully chose broad language that extends beyond the sole focus of abortion. 

Concerned Women for America’s Legislative Action Committee (CWALAC) outlined the bill’s issues in a press release, which included comments from CWALAC President and CEO Penny Nance:

The ACLU is attempting to trick voters by touting this as an abortion rights amendment when the details indicate it is a power grab for our children. The radical repercussions of this bill would go much farther than can be imagined in allowing the state, not the parents, to raise children, which gives an eerily familiar ring to the philosophies of Karl Marx, who advocated the “destruction, dissolution, and abolition of the family” and called for children to be educated by the state and not by their parents.

The proposed legislation in Ohio should concern all Americans, as it is indicative of the Left’s national goals. Beyond Ohio, many states have proposed similar legislation, such as Michigan’s Proposal 3, which was passed on last year’s November ballot.

Parents need to be vigilant of policies that could impact them.

Watch the video to find out more.

A current intern at The American Spectator, Grace Reilly is a rising senior at Grove City College, where she is a marketing fellow at the Institute for Faith and Freedom. In her role as a fellow, she is the host of the Post-Roe America Conference Series and Meet the Scholars and co-host of the Liberty Mail podcast. Grace has appeared on Fox News, Newsmax, and America’s Voice News, in addition to a variety of podcasts, radio, print, and television in her home state of Connecticut. Follow her on Instagram @conservativegrace and on Twitter @conservgrace.

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