- Begin this hour with Virginia lawmakers.

They were considering aplan to legalize abortion

up to birth, but the measure failed to get

out of the sub-committee last night,

and the delegate leading the fight

to save the lives of theunborn says it isn't over.

Our Mark Martin isfollowing this story for us,

and joins us in the CBN Newsroom.

Mark tell us about the billand if it could come up again.

- Efrem, I spoke withVirginia Republican delegate,

Todd Gilbert, who is the majority leader

and chairman of the sub-committeethat killed the bill.

He talked about thestatus of House Bill 2491,

which was defeated alongparty lines five to three.

The bill is known as the Repeal Act,

and would remove all existing restrictions

on abortion in Virginia.

- I think the bill in question is

done and over with for the session.

We will not see it again.

What is very tellingabout this particular bill

and the ideas behind it, however,

is that the Governor ofVirginia signaled last week,

in fact, very clearly, that hewould sign this bill into law

if it was placed on his desk,

and the only thing keeping that bill

from being placed on his desk

is our very narrow 51 to 49Republican majority in the House

and 21-19 Republican majorityin the Virginia Senate.

- Virginia Democraticdelegate, Kathy Tran,

who you see there,proposed the bill this week

to allow a woman to have an abortion

even while she is in labor, and just

moments away from giving birth.

Gilbert questioned Tran aboutthe bill during the hearing,

asking her what exactlyher bill would allow.

- [Gilbert] Where it'sobvious that a woman

is about to give birth,she has physical signs

that she is about to give birth,

would that still be a point at which

she could request an abortionif she was so certified?

She's dilating.

- Mr. Chairman, that would be a

decision that the doctor,the physician, and the woman

would make at that point.- I understand that.

I'm asking if your bill allows that.

- My bill would allow that, yes.

- Gilbert went on to tellme that it's possible

that similar bills could be brought up

in the Virginia state legislature.

- Obviously this agenda is not going away.

The forces behind thisagenda are very well funded,

and very well energized,and they are not going away,

and they have taken afoothold in the platform

of the Democratic party, andcertainly they continue to

drive them to be as extremeas possible on this issue,

so we will continue to seebills like this in the future.

Whether we are in a position to stop them

is certainly up to the voters of Virginia,

but I hope they werepaying attention to this

when it happened.

- The bill comes on the heelsof a new abortion measure

that was signed into lawlast week in New York.

That state's Reproductive Health Act

removed restrictionson late-term abortions,

again, allowing unbornbabies to be aborted

up until the day of birth, and Efrem,

New York Governor AndrewCuomo called that measure

a giant step forward for women's rights.

Lila Rose, founder and president of the

pro-life organization, Live Action,

called the law barbarism.

Back to you.