Republican lawmaker questions his stance on anti-abortion bill

"What we do matters."  This Republican lawmaker got emotional after the anti-abortion bill he voted for put a pregnant teen at risk ...

Transcript

00:00That weighs on me. I voted for that bill. What we do matters.

00:15I voted for the pain capable bill, the fetal heartbeat bill. The second week that this,

00:22that the fetal heartbeat bill became law, a doctor called me out of Anderson. I live in Easley.

00:30A 19 year old girl appeared at the ER. She was 15 weeks pregnant. Her

00:38water broke and the fetus was unviable. The standard of care was to advise her

00:45that they could extract or she could go home. The attorneys told the doctors that because of the

00:51fetal heartbeat bill, because that 15 week old had a heartbeat, the doctors could not extract.

00:58So their only choices were to admit the 19 year old until that fetal heartbeat stopped. I asked

01:04how long does it take to stop? She said seconds, minutes, hours, maybe days or discharge. They

01:13discharged that 19 year old. The doctor told me at that point, there's a 50% chance. Well, first

01:19she's going to pass this fetus in the toilet. She's going to have to deal with that on her own.

01:24There's a 50% chance, greater than 50% chance that she's going to lose her uterus.

01:28There's a 10% chance that she will develop sepsis and herself die. That weighs on me.

01:35I voted for that bill. These are affecting people and we're having a meeting about this.

01:41That whole week, I did not sleep. I followed up with the doctor. A week later, she had heard

01:46nothing. Did not know about the 19 year old. Thank God I followed up. Two weeks later,

01:50she did return to ER. They did extract the now non-beating fetus. What we do matters.

02:00Thank you, Representative Collins. One second, Mr. Chairman, I'm almost finished.

02:04Out of respect for the process, I'm not voting today, but I want it to be clear that myself

02:11and many others are not in a position to vote for this bill without significant changes to the bill.