Texas House: Spiller v. Swann
The Enterprise recently interviewed the two candidates running to represent Olney in the Texas House of Representatives about issues facing District 68. David Spiller, the Republican incumbent, and Stacey Swann, an author and teacher from Lampasas County, face each other in the Nov. 5 general election.
The Enterprise queried the two candidates on their positions on school vouchers, water, mental health funding, immigration and abortion.
This is the fifth in a five-part series exploring their stances on those issues.
Enterprise: What is your stance on Texas’ ban on abortions after six weeks, knowing that Texas women continue to speak out (and sue the state) for not being able to terminate nonviable pregnancies at Texas hospitals? Does this law need to be adjusted and if so, how would you adjust it?
Mr. Spiller: In Texas, it is illegal for an individual to kill an innocent baby in the womb. Abortion intentionally kills an innocent human being. As a Christian, I believe the Bible is God’s inerrant word. 2 Timothy 3: 16-17. The Bible clearly states that unborn humans are valuable persons. Psalm 139: 13-16, Jeremiah 1:5, Job 31:15, and Psalm 22: 10-11.
Further, Luke 1: 1443 clearly teaches that unborn babies – even in the first trimester – are valuable persons. Texas permits an abortion in Texas after six weeks only when a woman is facing a life-threatening or disabling medical emergency linked to her pregnancy. No woman should be required to continue a pregnancy if it puts her life at risk.
A “nonviable pregnancy” is one in which (1) the fetus has died or (2) it is determined that the child can’t live outside the uterus. Clearly, if the fetus has died, there is no intentional taking of an innocent life. Unfortunately, pregnancies terminate involuntarily for some reasons we can comprehend and some that we can’t. However, in the second instance, how is it “determined” that the child that is alive in the mother’s womb can’t live outside the mother’s womb? The potential for intentional misdiagnosis or determination to support abortion-on-demand, or insufficient evidence of that determination, is troubling. Unless and until that can be determined more objectively, I have concerns about the effect of authorizing the taking an innocent human life.
Ms. Swann: One of the main reasons I decided to run for the Texas House was because, in the last election, Rep. Spiller ran unopposed and so our House race wasn’t even on our ballots. They can “cancel” certain races in Texas when they are unopposed. It was 2022, and the Dobbs Supreme Court decision had just happened. The trigger laws banning all abortions, even worse than our six-week ban, had just gone into effect. To have those rights taken away and not even be able to vote for the position where those laws are passed felt so disenfranchising and so frustrating. So unAmerican. I wanted to run so other prochoice people in District 68 would have someone on the ballot to vote for who believed in their fundamental right to reproductive health care.
The stories that have come out since then have been horrifying. Texas laws are so strict that up to 80 percent of Texans disagree with them. So how is it that we have these laws that are impacting women every day, that are causing extreme health care problems, fertility problems? We’ve all seen the unintended consequences of these laws, that hospitals are so afraid of lawsuits and doctors so afraid of being arrested, they are literally waiting until women are on the brink of death before giving them basic miscarriage care. And the Republicans in office say nothing about it. They say nothing about changing these laws. Why isn’t David Spiller having to talk more about this? Why isn’t David Spiller having to admit that things are happening that they didn’t intend to happen?
Instead, they just sit silently and do absolutely nothing about it. I understand that a lot of people in District 68 are pro-life and they have concerns about the laws under Roe v. Wade. The fact of the matter is, even if I was elected, you’re dealing with a Republican Texas Senate and a governor that would veto any laws that fully restored Texan’s access to abortion. However, there are a lot of things we propose that would have bipartisan support. One of those is that most Texans believe there should be exceptions for rape and incest. They believe in exceptions for minors, so children aren’t forced to have children. And no woman should have to carry a non-viable pregnancy to term. It’s one thing if that is your choice; to be forced to do that, unwillingly, is an act of appalling cruelty. And, finally, we need specific laws around women who are miscarrying and how quickly you can get miscarriage care so that women don’t suffer other adverse health consequences.