Ultrasound Bills Take Language From Anti-Abortion Group

Mandatory ultrasound bills — including a recent one in Virginia — are popping up in legislatures around the country. Americans United for Life, an anti-abortion group, wrote what is called a model bill, “The Woman’s Ultrasound Right to Know Act,” and appears to be responsible for at least some of the language showing up in subsequent bills being offered in state capitols. The Sunlight Foundation, which uses technology to promote government transparency, used SuperFastMatch, an automated textual analysis, to locate similar language between the model bill and 13 bills that have popped up around the country. The findings indicate that the AUL model bill’s language is present in a number of these bills.