Campaign photo Minnesota state Rep. Bernie Perryman (R-St. Cloud) from May 22, 2024 of her holding a printout of the state's budget bill. (Photo via Representative Bernie Perryman on Facebook)

Three freshman GOP lawmakers in the Minnesota House of Representatives attempted to prevent abortion access and spread misinformation about reproductive rights in their first terms.

On Jan. 19, 2023, just 16 days after taking office, Reps. Natalie Zeleznikar (R-Fredenberg Township), Bernie Perryman (R-St. Augusta) and Roger Skraba (R-Ely) all voted against House File 1, a bill to establish the fundamental right to reproductive health care into state law.

After the law was signed into law by Gov. Tim Walz (DFL), Zeleznikar took to Facebook to accuse Democrats, without evidence, of opening an avenue to more sex trafficking in Minnesota by making abortion more accessible. She also equated the bill to laws in North Korea and China.

“The truth is, Democrats passed a bill that goes beyond Roe v. Wade, making Minnesota’s abortion laws more extreme than those in European countries, and on par with those in North Korea and China,” Zeleznikar wrote. “Moreover, they removed all abortion recording, despite Minnesota being third in the nation for sex trafficking.”

Meanwhile, in a video posted to her official Facebook page, Perryman argued that the bill was extreme and said she had a feeling its passage would make young girls more vulnerable to sex trafficking.

“But now that there is no parental notification to get an abortion, I have a feeling that some of these individuals are going to prey on younger women to be prostitutes and know that they can get an abortion very easily,” Perryman said.

In a separate video, Perryman contended that passing abortion rights bills without any amendments approved by Republicans would make Minnesota “as extreme as North Korea and China.” According to Perryman, one of these amendments would have blocked abortions from being performed in certified medical facilities like hospitals.

According to a report from United Against Sex Trafficking from 2022, reducing abortion access increases the vulnerability that human traffickers prey on. One method is using pregnancy and childbirth to keep victims under their control, making victims feel obligated to stay in toxic situations for the sake of the child.

Zeleznikar, Skraba and Perryman also voted against a law to establish health plan coverage for abortions and a law that blocks other states from enforcing their anti-abortion laws within Minnesota. The trio also co-penned House File 4601, a bill that would have increased funding for crisis pregnancy centers.

According to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, these crisis pregnancy centers are nonmedical facilities that are unregulated under HIPPA laws. They also typically employ volunteers who are medically untrained despite offering medical advice. These centers also use deceptive tactics aimed at steering patients away from receiving abortion care and toward discredited methods like abortion reversal treatment.

In April, Skraba voted against a plan to let voters choose whether to pass equal rights protections into the Minnesota constitution. Opponents argued the legislation was a “deceptive and vague way to enshrine the right to an abortion in the state’s constitution.” When asked by PBS why he voted against the measure, Skraba said Democrats changed the language of the amendment. When asked specifically what changed, Skraba said, “Well, I don’t know exactly.”

Perryman and Zeleznikar have attempted to distance themselves from their actions against abortion, which included falsely accusing clinics of committing human trafficking and comparing women to dogs.

Perryman and Zeleznikar have scrubbed their campaign websites of anti-abortion rhetoric that was previously featured in 2022. Perryman recently told the St. Cloud Times she hopes to “leave the issue [abortion] in the past.”

The Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party currently holds a slim six-seat majority in the Minnesota House of Representatives. Every seat will be on the ballot on Nov. 5, with Skraba, Perryman and Zeleznikar all projected to be in competitive races. University of Minnesota Political Science professor Dan Myers projects that Zeleznikar’s race is a tossup, while Perryman and Skraba’s races are rated as likely Republican.

All three representatives were elected by razor-thin margins in 2022, with Skraba and Zeleznikar winning by just 15 and 33 votes respectively.