Sponsors (11)
The bill increases parental notification, involvement, and legal enforcement for unemancipated minors seeking abortion while preserving a narrow emergency exception and state authority, but it also creates delays, legal burdens, confidentiality risks, and criminal penalties that may reduce access and put some minors at increased risk.
Parents of unemancipated minors are notified when their child requests an abortion, increasing parental awareness and potential involvement in the minor’s health decisions.
Provides parents a clear legal enforcement path (ability to sue) and requires courts to quickly issue temporary injunctions, creating immediate legal clarity for providers and families about notification enforcement.
Preserves a narrow medical-emergency exception allowing immediate care when two physicians certify a life‑threatening risk and notification is impossible, maintaining an emergency treatment safeguard.
Unemancipated minors face at least a 96‑hour delay plus the possibility of injunction-related litigation, which can delay or effectively block abortion care and increase medical risk and emotional stress.
The bill shifts the burden onto minors by enabling parental suits and requiring courts to enter permanent injunctions unless unlawful, undermining minors’ reproductive autonomy and ability to obtain care.
Mandatory parental notification can endanger minors in abusive or coercive households if waiver processes are inaccessible or untimely, increasing the risk of harm to those teens.
Based on analysis of 5 sections of legislative text.
Requires written parental notice and a 96-hour waiting period before abortions for unemancipated minors, creates a parental right to sue to enjoin such abortions, and imposes criminal penalties for willful violations.
Official title: To provide for parental notification and intervention in the case of an unemancipated minor seeking an abortion.
Introduced January 28, 2025 by Mary E. Miller · Last progress January 28, 2025
Makes it a federal crime for providers who operate in or affect interstate commerce or accept federal funds to perform or assist in an abortion for an unemancipated minor under age 18 unless the provider gives written parental (or guardian) notice, observes a 96-hour waiting period after notice, and follows any court injunctions; allows parents who were notified to sue in federal court to stop the abortion and creates criminal penalties for willful violations. Creates a medical-emergency exception requiring certification by a second physician, preserves state laws that are more stringent, and takes effect on enactment.