(LifeSiteNews) — Maine is considering on Friday seven bills that would impose varying restrictions on abortion — the killing of preborn human beings — from an outright ban to abortion pill hurdles.

The liberal state currently has loose abortion laws that allow the lethal procedure to be performed past the point of viability when “it is necessary in the professional judgment of a physician,” a loophole that can render the viability restriction practically meaningless. 

LD 975, the most pro-life of the bills being proposed, would repeal Maine’s law authorizing abortion and classify the unborn as legal “persons” by modifying the definitions of “human being” and “person” in the state’s Criminal Code to include “all human beings beginning at the moment of conception.” 

If LD 975 fails, LD 682 would significantly discourage abortions after viability by requiring that they be performed only when it is “medically necessary to preserve the life or health of the mother,” or when the baby is diagnosed with anomaly that will result in his or her death within three months of birth.

LD 682 would also impose criminal penalties on those who perform abortions after viability, or without a license, as well as require the reporting of the race, marital status, and education level of the woman who is having the abortion performed.

The great majority of abortions in Maine are performed via medication, making the bills addressing their use especially important. LD 866 would outlaw the purchase of abortion pills online and require a licensed healthcare professional to supervise in person the ingestion of abortion medication.

LD 887 would make it a lower-class felony, with a penalty of up to five years in prison, to attempt to provide an abortion medication to a woman without physically examining her, being physically present during her abortion, scheduling a follow-up visit, and providing her with “a catch kit and medical waste bag” for the remains of the baby. 

LD 1007 would tighten informed consent requirements for the administration of abortion pills, mandating that medical professionals inform patients about their “potential ability” to “reverse the effects” of medication abortion.

LD 253 would remove coverage of abortion under MaineCare, the state’s Medicaid program, which began in 2019.

Finally, LD 1154 would not restrict abortion in any manner but would attempt to support women who have abortions performed when their child has been diagnosed with a condition resulting in death before or shortly after birth. It would provide for counseling and medical care, including potentially by a clergy member, social worker or “specialty nurse focused on alleviating fear and ensuring that the woman and the woman’s family experience the life and death of the child in a comfortable and supportive environment.”

Condoning the killing of babies diagnosed with a fatal condition is an affront to the sanctity of life and contradicts Catholic moral teaching, which has since the first century “affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion.”

In late 2023, Nicole LeBlanc, who gave birth earlier that year to conjoined twins, baptizing and confirming them during the few hours they lived after birth, affirmed the importance of protecting children even with a fatal diagnosis. She told LifeSiteNews in an exclusive statement:

Any baby with a life-limiting diagnosis should have the highest protection coming from all directions. The parents, the family, the hospital, and the law. Every life is worth protecting, no matter how long or short. No matter how the baby is developing. We live in a time of modern medicine. We live in a time where we can make the baby comfortable for as long as we can instead of slaughtering the innocent in the place they are most protected. 

Our job as mothers is to love, nourish, and protect our children from any dangers or harm.

The Maine House is composed of 76 Democrats, 73 Republicans, and one Independent, and the Senate has 20 Democrats and 15 Republicans.