Rep. Judy Chu Responds to Heartbreaking Case of Atlanta Nurse Forced to Be Kept on Life Support Due to Georgia’s Extreme Abortion Laws

WASHINGTON, D.C. — In response to a heartbreaking report from Atlanta’s 11Alive News, which revealed that Georgia’s extreme abortion law has denied a brain-dead woman’s family the right to remove her from life support because she was pregnant at the time of her tragic brain death.

Rep. Judy Chu, author of the Women’s Health Protection Act, issued the following statement: 

“This is a tragedy. A brain-dead woman is being forced to stay on life support against her family’s wishes, because of Georgia’s extreme abortion ban. Let’s be clear: this is not a gray area. Georgia’s extreme abortion law has robbed Adriana Smith and her family of choice in the last moments of her life. This is what Republican abortion laws look like in practice: total disregard for women’s lives, and even their deaths. It’s beyond disgraceful.

“In the quest to control women’s bodies, anti-abortion extremists have saddled us with laws that reduce women to nothing more than a womb. Adriana Smith is not an incubator. Adriana is a person. She is a mother, a nurse, and a daughter. She deserves dignity and the right to rest in peace.

“We do not have to stand for this in America. My bill, the Women’s Health Protection Act, would restore the right to abortion care nationwide and stop states from enforcing cruel, medically unnecessary restrictions, like the one in Georgia that has trapped Adriana. We only need four Republicans in the House to join with us to pass this vital legislation to restore bodily autonomy to every person in this country, regardless of their state or zip code.”