IT PASSED — 119–33 VOTE — PRESIDENT TRUMP IS FURIOUS
Massachusetts Just Removed a Major Abortion Limit—But the Five Words Replacing It Are What Have Both Sides Alarmed
Massachusetts lawmakers have approved one of the most consequential changes to the state’s abortion law since Roe v. Wade was overturned.
The existing rule is clear.
After 24 weeks of pregnancy, an abortion may be performed only when a physician determines it is necessary to protect the patient’s life or physical or mental health—or when there is a lethal or grave fetal diagnosis.
The new bill removes that entire list.
In its place are five words now driving a national political fight:
“Professional judgment of the physician.”
Supporters say those words protect patients facing catastrophic complications that do not fit neatly into legal categories.
They point to cases in which hospitals allegedly refused care because lawyers and doctors could not agree whether a fetal diagnosis satisfied the exact statutory language.
One case cited by lawmakers involved a fetus that had suffered a stroke and was not expected to survive, yet the patient was reportedly turned away by hospitals uncertain about the law.
The bill’s supporters argue that a legislature cannot anticipate every medical emergency.
They say doctors—not prosecutors, hospital attorneys or politicians—should decide whether ending a pregnancy is medically appropriate.
But opponents see the same language very differently.
They argue the bill removes every specific legal condition after 24 weeks and replaces it with a standard broad enough to permit abortions much later in pregnancy.
Some anti-abortion groups have described the proposal as “abortion on demand until birth.”
That phrase is politically powerful—but it leaves out an important detail.
The bill would not say that anyone may obtain an abortion at any stage for any reason.
It would still require the procedure to be performed by a licensed physician acting under professional medical judgment.
The unresolved question is how much that requirement actually limits the physician.
The legislation does not preserve the current written list of qualifying circumstances.
It does not explicitly require a lethal fetal condition.
And it does not separately state that the patient’s life or health must be in danger.
That is why critics say the legal safeguard has been weakened dramatically, even if doctors would continue to follow medical ethics and clinical standards.
Supporters answer that abortions after 24 weeks are rare and usually involve severe fetal diagnoses, serious threats to the patient or rapidly changing medical emergencies.
Massachusetts recorded 99 abortions at 24 weeks or later in 2024, according to state data cited during the debate.
The House approved the measure 119–33.
The Senate passed it July 31 and sent it to Democratic Gov. Maura Healey, who has strongly supported abortion rights and is expected to sign it.
Until she acts, the existing four-part medical standard remains law.
The larger battle is not simply about whether Massachusetts allows abortion after 24 weeks—it already does in limited circumstances.
The fight is over who writes the final boundary.
Under current law, the legislature defines the permitted reasons.
Under the proposed law, the physician would determine whether the procedure is appropriate.
That is the change supporters call medical freedom.
It is also the change opponents fear could erase the state’s last meaningful late-pregnancy restriction.
And if Healey signs it, five words may carry more legal power than the entire list they replaced.
PRESIDENT TRUMP WALKS OUT WITH 100-0 SENATE VOTE - SCHUMER CAVES!
The Penny Is Already Gone. Congress Is Still Trying to Fix What Came Next.
The United States has already stopped making pennies for everyday use.
That part is not theoretical.
The final circulating one-cent coin was struck at the Philadelphia Mint on November 12, 2025, ending a 232-year production run. Existing pennies remain legal tender, and the Mint estimates roughly 300 billion are still out there.
But ending production created a second problem Washington still has not fully solved:
What happens when a cash register owes someone one or two cents and no fresh pennies are available?
That is the problem the Common Cents Act is designed to address.
The bipartisan bill passed the House on July 14 and was sent to the Senate the next day. It would formally lock in the end of circulating penny production, create a nationwide legal framework for optional cash rounding and give the Treasury Department authority to test a cheaper nickel.
That sounds like a minor housekeeping measure.
It is not.
The penny shortage has already forced retailers, banks and states to improvise, creating a patchwork of rules that can determine whether a cash customer pays the exact price, gets rounded down or faces a legal restriction on rounding at all. AP reported that penny shortages began creating operational and legal headaches for banks and retailers after production stopped.
And that is where the bill becomes more consequential than the coin it is trying to replace.
The first part is straightforward.
The Common Cents Act would write the end of general-circulation penny production into federal law while allowing the Mint to continue producing limited numismatic versions for collectors.
That largely codifies a transition that has already happened.
The Mint says producing the penny had become increasingly uneconomical. Over the previous decade, the production cost rose from about 1.42 cents to 3.69 cents per coin. Treasury has estimated that ending circulating production can save approximately $56 million annually in material costs.
But the penny did not disappear from Americans’ pockets.
It remains legal tender.
And according to the Mint, roughly 300 billion pennies remain in circulation — far more than officials believe commerce actually requires.
The problem is distribution.
Pennies are frequently stored rather than returned through banks and retailers. Once the Mint stopped adding new coins, shortages began appearing unevenly around the country. AP documented banks rationing supplies and retailers struggling to provide exact change as the phaseout accelerated.
That leaves businesses with an awkward question.
If a customer’s total comes to $19.82 and the register has no pennies, what happens?
The House-passed Common Cents Act provides an answer.
If exact change cannot be provided, a business may round a cash total to the nearest five cents.
Amounts ending in 1, 2, 6 or 7 cents may round down.
Amounts ending in 3, 4, 8 or 9 cents may round up.
A $19.82 cash purchase could become $19.80.
A $19.83 purchase could become $19.85.
But there is an important detail.
The House version generally does not require businesses to round.
It permits them to do so.
And those provisions apply to cash transactions, not credit cards, electronic transfers, checks, gift cards, money orders or similar payment methods.
That distinction matters because Congress is trying to solve two different problems.
One is physical:
There are fewer pennies available.
The other is legal.
Some state or local requirements can create risk for merchants that round cash payments. The House bill says businesses following its federal rounding framework would not violate conflicting federal, state, tribal or local rules simply because they rounded in the manner permitted by the legislation.
That could make checkout simpler.
But it does not mean every cash-paying shopper always benefits.
Sometimes a transaction rounds down.
Sometimes it rounds up.
And that is why the bill includes another provision that received far less attention.
Federal officials would be required to assess how penny shortages and rounding practices affect low-income communities, older consumers, and unbanked or underbanked Americans — groups for whom cash transactions can matter more.
Then comes the more surprising part of the legislation.
The penny may be disappearing because it costs too much to make.
But the nickel is an even bigger manufacturing loser.
In fiscal 2025, producing and distributing one nickel cost approximately 13.31 cents.
That was down slightly from 13.78 cents in 2024, but still more than twice the coin’s five-cent face value.
And 2025 marked the 20th consecutive fiscal year in which producing the nickel cost more than the coin was worth.
The reason is heavily connected to its metal composition.
The current nickel is 75% copper and 25% nickel.
The House-passed Common Cents Act would allow a different construction: a five-cent coin with an inner layer of zinc and an outer layer of nickel.
But Treasury would not get an unlimited license to redesign it.
The new composition would have to reduce production costs and, to the greatest extent practical, create minimal adverse impact on machines designed to accept coins.
That second requirement is crucial.
A cheaper nickel is not especially useful if vending machines, parking meters and coin-processing equipment across the country suddenly cannot recognize it.
Treasury therefore has to balance the savings from cheaper metal against the disruption of changing a coin that businesses have built equipment around for decades.
And that is where the story becomes more complicated.
Eliminating the penny can save money.
But if the absence of pennies creates greater demand for a nickel that costs more than 13 cents to manufacture, part of that benefit can be undermined.
That concern existed even before circulating penny production stopped. AP reported in 2025 that experts were warning Washington not to eliminate the penny without addressing the more expensive nickel and the need for a workable rounding system.
That is why the nickel provision matters.
The Common Cents Act is not simply about killing an inefficient coin.
It is about making sure the next-smallest coin does not become an even more expensive replacement.
But there is one more important complication.
Claims circulating now that the Senate has already unanimously approved the Common Cents Act are not yet supported by the official legislative records I could verify.
The House passed H.R. 3074 on July 14, 2026.
The Senate received the House bill and referred it to the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs on July 15.
And reporting published as recently as August 5 still described the Common Cents Act as having passed the House and awaiting Senate consideration.
That does not mean the bill cannot advance quickly.
Its House passage itself demonstrated broad bipartisan support: it cleared the chamber by voice vote under suspension of the rules, a procedure commonly used for measures expected to receive overwhelming support.
But the procedural distinction matters.
Until Senate passage is officially recorded, the legislation has not yet completed Congress.
And that means it is not yet sitting on President Trump’s desk awaiting a signature.
If the Senate approves the same House text, the measure can move toward the president.
If senators amend it, the two chambers would first have to resolve their differences.
For now, one part of America’s coin story is already settled.
The circulating penny is finished.
The law governing what happens after the penny is not.
And that may be the real story behind the Common Cents Act.
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America has already stopped making its smallest coin.
Congress is still deciding how the country should live without it — and whether it can keep the nickel from becoming the next expensive problem.
