One of two Virginia Senate Democrats who sided with Republicans to pass a bill that forces women to undergo an ultrasound prior to getting an abortion now says the bill went “way too far.”
Sen. Phil Puckett, D- Tazewell, joined Republicans earlier this year to approve the controversial legislation on a slim 21-19 vote. Gov. Bob McDonnell later signed the bill into law.
But Puckett now laments that the bill even got to the floor and said it was indicative of the conservative social legislation Republicans forced through the legislature this year.
“That’s a piece I voted for primarily because of my stance on pro-life,” Puckett told The Washington Examiner. “There’s a lot of people in my district that won’t have the money to pay for [the additional ultrasound procedure].”
Puckett added that the state should have to foot the bill for the ultrasound procedure if lawmakers are going to mandate it.
The bill was one of the last measures the Senate took up before leaving Richmond in mid-March. At one point, the bill would have required doctors to perform a internal transvaginal ultrasound prior to an abortion. National headlines and mocking from late-night comedians forced McDonnell and Republicans to rewrite the bill so it required only the less invasive jelly-on-the-belly ultrasound procedure.
Puckett said fellow Democrats pressed him about his support for the bill as he and Sen. Chuck Colgan, another pro-life Democrat, weighed their options.
“Those bills were held to the last hour. Deals were trying to be made,” Puckett said. “Sen. Colgan eventually said, ‘This is where we are, we’re not changing.’ When we said that they began to work on other people.”
One Republican, Sen. John Watkins of Midlothian, ultimately voted against the ultrasound bill so if Puckett and Colgan hadn’t bucked their party and supported it, the measure might have died.
But in a chamber evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats and where re-voting and political gamesmanship are common, nothing is guaranteed.
“It’s hard to know,” Puckett said. “It might have been a 20-20 vote. You might not have gotten any votes from a Republican.”
“One of the things I’ve tried to do is be consistent,” he added. “I’ve tried to have some reasoning about what I’m doing in voting. After the ultrasound vote, I got an email saying I should move to Mississippi. At least people know what my position is.”
