Senate Republican who supports IVF prevents bill protecting procedure from quickly passing

Mississippi Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith, a supporter of in vitro fertilization, blocked a bill from quickly passing that would establish federal protections of IVF and other fertility treatments over concerns the legislation goes too far.

Hyde-Smith prevented the Access to Family Building Act from passing Wednesday in the Senate after the bill's sponsor, Illinois Democratic Sen. Tammy Duckworth, attempted to pass it by unanimous consent in response to an Alabama Supreme Court decision that classified embryos as children. That legislative procedure allows any single senator to block a bill. 

Hyde-Smith said on the Senate floor that she supports IVF and she clarified that the Alabama high court's decision does not ban IVF, nor does any state have a ban on the procedure.

She said the bill goes too far.

"The bill before us today is a vast overreach that is full of poison pills that go way too far — far beyond ensuring legal access to IVF," Hyde-Smith said, using the term poison pill to refer to parts of the legislation that the other party is likely to oppose. "

"The act explicitly waives the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and would subject religious and pro-life organizations to crippling lawsuits," she also said.

She argued that the bill "would legalize human cloning," "gene-edited designer babies," "commercial surrogacy, including for young girls without parental involvement" and human-animal hybrids known as chimeras, and it would "lift the federal ban on the creation of three-parent embryos." 

After Hyde-Smith blocked the legislation, Duckworth, who had both of her children through IVF, said, "I’m heartbroken that I was right and disappointed that they blocked our efforts tonight, but I will never stop working to protect every American from being criminalized just for trying to start or grow their family through IVF."

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