Our testimony against anti-abortion propaganda in schools
Blog | November 13, 2025
Jaime Miracle testifies before the Ohio House Education Committee on November 13, 2025.
Jaime Miracle, Deputy Director
House Education Committee
Testimony in Opposition to HB 485
November 13, 2025
Chair Fowler Arthur, Vice Chair Odioso, Ranking Member Brennan, and members of the House Education Committee, I am here this morning to present opponent testimony on House Bill 485. As I begin, I would like to thank my Policy Fellow Milena Wood for her assistance with this testimony. On behalf of Abortion Forward and our thousands of members and supporters across the state, we stand in firm opposition to this bill. Ohio students deserve better.
Our schools should exist to provide students with an education that gives them the tools to be robust, critical thinkers. We often hear from members about how it is not the job of our public schools to instill political beliefs in children; that it is the job of parents to guide their children on the path they deem most fit. It is interesting that this principle no longer applies when certain groups with perspectives that match the perspectives of the majority party want to capitalize on an opportunity to push their own agenda.
Sponsors and proponents of HB 485 claim that the bill is about “instruction in human growth and development.” In fact, it mandates the insertion of a single political agenda and worldview into our public-school curriculum, a worldview many Americans do not subscribe to.
The video recommended by the Baby Olivia Act is also full of medical inaccuracies and misleading talking points.1 This use of inaccurate and misleading content is part of a greater trend—and arguably the organizational mission—of Live Action, creator of the Baby Olivia video. Live Action has been reviewed and confirmed by third parties to promote pseudoscience and whose “sole mission is to discredit Planned Parenthood and to advocate for Pro-Life policies.”2 While we do not oppose their right to express their viewpoint in the public arena, pseudoscience and misinformation do not have a place in education—least of all in mandated curriculum for elementary-aged students.
I remind the committee that Ohio is the only state without health education standards, and this bill does not remedy that failure. The bill does not require any actual, age-appropriate human growth and development curriculum that would give students the context for concepts related to pregnancy and fetal development. It is most certainly not a substitute for comprehensive, age-appropriate health education that equips students with the information they need to make healthy decisions across their life span.
When we say “age-appropriate curriculum,” that means the content of the curriculum changes by grade to be appropriate for students of that age. An elementary aged student has a much different understanding of complex concepts like pregnancy, conception, and childbirth than an 18-year-old in 12th grade. As much as the bill’s sponsors would like to claim, it is impossible for one video to be age-appropriate for that entire timespan.
Given its medical inaccuracies, the Baby Olivia video is inappropriate for any age group. It is especially inappropriate for elementary students that lack an understanding of the concepts the video purports to show and the critical thinking skills to assess the accuracy of those concepts.
Any curriculum standard to be enforced in Ohio schools should also contain a requirement that the information provided be factually accurate. HB 485 has no such requirement. A teacher or a school could literally make anything up they wanted to and it would be presented as fact to students with no context for them to discern if the information being presented as fact is actual fact. We would never accept a math teacher teaching our children that 2+2=6, we cannot allow factually inaccurate information in any of our school curriculum requirements.
Ohio law contains explicit allowances for parents who want to opt their children out of sex education, child abuse education, and several other subjects. We have heard over and over again from members of this body that parents must be in control of their child’s education. Why does this provision—the requirement to show a political propaganda video with demonstrated medical inaccuracies—not contain a similar opportunity for parental opt-out? If this committee truly believes that parents should be in control of their child’s education, that principle should be applied consistently and not change based on the worldview of the video creator and the majority party.
Additionally, the bill as written is confusing at best, impossible at worst, for school districts to implement. The way the bill is written it sounds like teachers should be able to show one video and meet the requirement, but that is not possible with the current language. If schools are to create a whole new video to show to students, this bill should certainly come with funding for districts to ensure the curriculum can meet these standards and also provide students with age-appropriate and scientifically accurate information.
Given how impossible this bill will be to comply with, the consequences of how this bill will be enforced are especially concerning. The bill gives the Attorney General the power to enforce the law and allows the AG to bring a lawsuit against any “person or entity” that violates the curriculum requirements. This means that any district or individual teacher that fails to show the “Meet Baby Olivia” video could risk being sued by the AG for both damages and injunctive relief to force their compliance. The bill also requires that the Department of Education conduct an annual audit of districts to confirm compliance with the Baby Olivia and ultrasound video requirements and publish their findings online. This bill will punish districts and schools for not complying with a non-compliable set of requirements with no clear way to accurately calculate “damages” as outlined in the bill.
Bill sponsors and proponents claim that HB 485 has nothing to do with abortion, but if that is the case, why was every single proponent who testified either an anti-abortion group or a person or organization with close ties to an anti-abortion group? If this bill is really about human development organizations where are the unbiased experts in human development?
Ohio already gives more than 20 million dollars in funding to anti-abortion, fake clinics. This bill is just another attempt to use state funds and resources to spread anti-abortion propaganda and misinformation. By mandating engagement with the Baby Olivia video, this committee would flood our schools with a level of misinformation that should not be tolerated at any level of education. We strongly oppose HB 485 and ask that you consider deeply the ramifications of allowing such rhetoric to be a normalized component of our children’s educations.
Public schools are not a place to make religious assertions out to be fact, nor a battleground for the political ends the adults who are supposed to protect our children’s education decide to take up.
