Mr. Chairman, this is one of the amendments that the committee report lied about. This amendment would prevent terrible and, I assume, unintended injustices. The amendment creates an exception to the provisions that make it a crime to accompany a minor across State lines who is seeking abortion services if the person accompanying the minor is a grandparent or a member of the clergy.

These are responsible adults to whom young people often turn when they are in trouble and cannot go to their parents. In an ideal world, that would never happen; but where that is the case, where they feel they cannot turn to their parents, I think we want our young people to able to turn to a grandparent or their minister, priest, or rabbi.

At the very least, I do not think Members want to put grandmothers and members of the clergy behind bars simply because they did not want to leave a young person alone and unaided during a very difficult moment.

Do we really want to put grandmothers and clergy in jail? Surely the supporters of this bill would not want to put a grandmother or reverend in jail who is only trying to help a minor.

I know they argue that the evil abortion providers are spiriting them away, but we are not talking about if that ever occurred. We are talking about the grandmother of the minor. We are talking about the trusted minister, priest, or rabbi of the minor whom she seeks out and confides in.

The opponents of this amendment have argued that it is the fundamental right of a parent to be involved in any decision concerning the pregnancy of their child. This is certainly true.

But in the real world, there are situations where it is impossible for a minor to tell a parent about a pregnancy, for instance, in cases of incest, where the parents physically abuse their children or in the case that I mentioned while in general debate of the young 13-year-old girl whose father had raped her, found out she was pregnant, and murdered her. In these cases, a minor needs to be able to turn to a responsible adult, such as a grandparent or a clergy member, for assistance. We should not criminalize this assistance. We should not be throwing caring grandmothers, grandparents, or ministers in jail.

Now, it may be that a properly drafted amendment that would say if it was a ring of people doing this for money, maybe that would be reasonable, but not a grandparent or a clergy member who was helping a young person in trouble.

Some have argued that we should defeat this amendment because there are cases, albeit few and isolated, where a grandparent or a member of the clergy may be a sexual predator. Sadly, this is true sometimes. Thankfully, it is rarely true. It is also true that sometimes a parent is a sexual predator, and this bill not only does not protect the minor in those cases. It requires the doctor to ring the sexual predator's doorbell to tell him what is going on, and it gives the sexual predator the ability to sue the doctor. That is what the bill does.

Even with this exception, with the exception in this amendment, any sexual predator will still face the full force of the law. Those crimes can, and should still, be punished. This amendment in no way shields these criminals from the consequences of their acts. It does, however, protect caring grandparents and clergy from going to jail just because they cared enough about a young person to stand with them in a difficult time.

Mr. Chairman, it should be the duty of the government and Congress to provide help to young women in these trying times, not to make life more difficult than it needs to be.