The House passed Thursday the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act in a largely symbolic vote, given the Senate killed the bill the day before.

But the gesture was nonetheless important to people like Melissa Ohden.

Ms. Ohden said she was born at an estimated 31 weeks’ gestation after surviving a saline-infusion abortion, then whisked to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit by a nurse who was “unwilling to leave me to die.”

“That is the reality that yes, babies do survive abortions, and I am one of them,” Ms. Ohden, founder of the Abortion Survivors Network, said on a Thursday press call hosted by Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America.

The House voted 217-204 to pass H.R. 21, which would require medical providers to offer the same care to newborns who survive abortions as any other newborn of the same gestational age.

One Democrat voted “yes” and one voted “present.”

The vote comes the day before the 52nd annual March for Life, which is slated to feature Vice President J.D. Vance in person and a video message from President Trump.

Senate Republicans failed to muster the 60 votes necessary to overcome a Democratic filibuster at Wednesday’s vote. Given the GOP’s slim 52-47 Senate majority, such legislation has little chance of passing in the 119th Congress.

Still, pro-life advocates like Ms. Ohden were gratified to see the bill being debated, saying that it offers an opportunity to bring the concerns of abortion survivors to the forefront.

“We often hear these things, that abortion survivors are these figments of the Republican machine made to restrict reproductive rights,” she said. “That’s a very dehumanizing way to handle people like me who have gone through incredibly traumatizing circumstances.”

Democrats argued the bill is redundant because it’s already illegal to kill a newborn, while Republicans countered that such scenarios occur more often than pro-choice advocates are willing to acknowledge.

They pointed to the 2019 comments by then-Gov. Ralph Northam of Virginia, himself a doctor, who said that babies born after botched abortions would be resuscitated “if that’s what the mother and the family desired.”

Rep. Kelly Morrison, Minnesota Democrat, said that the “shameful legislation would insert the government into this tragic situation and deny families the care they want for their baby.”

“Instead of allowing parents to hold their dying baby, this bill would require doctors to forcibly take the dying baby from their parents and even though there is no chance of survival, place the baby directly on a medical table under bright lights and perform interventions that will not work,” said Ms. Morrison, an obstetrician-gynecologist.

Sen. Maria Cantwell, Washington Democrat, called the bill “legislation in search of a problem,” saying it would force families to “prolong the suffering of babies born with a fatal diagnosis.”

And yet some babies given a “fatal diagnosis” actually pull through when provided with medical treatment, based on Ms. Ohden’s experience.

She was born five days after the abortion process began weighing 2 lbs., 14 oz., with complications including seizures, respiratory distress, and jaundice.

“I was in so much distress, they thought I had a fatal heart defect,” Ms. Ohden said.

She spent three months in the NICU before being released and later adopted. She credits being born in a hospital with a neonatal unit with saving her life.

“I’m one of the lucky ones who survived a late term abortion in a hospital where I ultimately made it to the NICU,” Ms. Ohden said. “If I hadn’t been at a hospital, I don’t think I’d be here today.”

Her organization has grown to 900 members, she said, challenging the argument that abortion-surviving babies are a rare and isolated phenomenon.

She said many abortion survivors were born in the second or third trimesters, or after 13 weeks’ gestation, which raises concerns about the Food and Drug Administration’s recent moves to expand access to abortion pills.

The FDA limits the pills to pregnancies up to 10 weeks’ gestation, but the drugs may now be obtained through the mail without a physical examination or ultrasound, meaning that some women may be farther along gestationally than they realize.

“We hear this very frequently in our abortion survivors: Adequate exams were not performed, or the woman didn’t know how far along she was, and ultimately it does result in a born-alive infant,” Ms. Ohden said.

“I see this very frequently now with chemical abortions, with women taking the abortion pills not knowing how far along they are, and they end up being further along, and the pills are not successful,” she said.

The House passed a similar bill in 2023, but this year’s legislation sponsored by Rep. Ann Wagner, Missouri Republican, includes criminal penalties for medical professionals who fail to provide the abortion survivors with appropriate medical care.

Women having the abortions would not be prosecuted.

“It was passed as a good gesture but it had no teeth. It had no enforcement whatsoever,” Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of SBA Pro-Life America said of the 2023 bill before contrasting it with the one passed Thursday. “This is a bill that actually means it.”

• Valerie Richardson can be reached at vrichardson@washingtontimes.com.