Oklahoma governor indicators the nation’s strictest abortion ban

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt on Wednesday signed into regulation the nation’s strictest abortion ban, making the state the primary in the nation to effectively end availability of the procedure.

State lawmakers authorized the ban enforced by civil lawsuits slightly than legal prosecution, just like a Texas law that was passed final 12 months. The regulation takes effect instantly upon Stitt’s signature and prohibits all abortions with few exceptions. Abortion providers have stated they'll stop performing the process as quickly as the invoice is signed.

“I promised Oklahomans that as governor I would sign every piece of pro-life legislation that got here throughout my desk and I'm proud to maintain that promise as we speak,” the first-term Republican mentioned in a press release. “From the moment life begins at conception is when we've got a duty as human beings to do everything we can to guard that child’s life and the lifetime of the mom. That's what I consider and that is what the vast majority of Oklahomans believe.”

Abortion providers across the nation have been bracing for the possibility that the U.S. Supreme Court docket’s new conservative majority might additional prohibit the observe, and that has particularly been the case in Oklahoma and Texas.

“The impression shall be disastrous for Oklahomans,” said Elizabeth Nash, a state policy analyst for the abortion-rights supporting Guttmacher Institute. “It'll also have severe ripple effects, particularly for Texas patients who had been traveling to Oklahoma in large numbers after the Texas six-week abortion ban went into effect in September.”

The bills are a part of an aggressive push in Republican-led states to reduce abortion rights. It comes on the heels of a leaked draft opinion from the nation’s high courtroom that means justices are contemplating weakening or overturning the landmark Roe v. Wade resolution that legalized abortion nearly 50 years ago.

The only exceptions in the Oklahoma law are to save the life of a pregnant lady or if the pregnancy is the results of rape or incest that has been reported to regulation enforcement.

The invoice particularly authorizes doctors to take away a “dead unborn child brought on by spontaneous abortion,” or miscarriage, or to remove an ectopic being pregnant, a doubtlessly life-threatening emergency that occurs when a fertilized egg implants exterior the uterus, typically in a fallopian tube and early in pregnancy.

The legislation additionally doesn't apply to the usage of morning-after capsules reminiscent of Plan B or any sort of contraception.

Two of Oklahoma’s 4 abortion clinics already stopped offering abortions after the governor signed a six-week ban earlier this month.

With the state’s two remaining abortion clinics expected to stop providing providers, it's unclear what is going to happen to ladies who qualify under one of many exceptions. The regulation’s creator, State Rep. Wendi Stearman, says doctors will likely be empowered to determine which ladies qualify and that these abortions will be carried out in hospitals. But providers and abortion-rights activists warn that trying to prove qualification might show tough and even harmful in some circumstances.

In addition to the Texas-style invoice already signed into legislation, the measure is certainly one of at the least three anti-abortion payments sent this yr to Stitt.

Oklahoma’s law is styled after a first-of-its-kind Texas regulation that the U.S. Supreme Court docket has allowed to remain in place that permits non-public citizens to sue abortion providers or anybody who helps a girl obtain an abortion. Other Republican-led states sought to copy Texas’ ban. Idaho’s governor signed the primary copycat measure in March, although it has been temporarily blocked by the state’s Supreme Court docket

The third Oklahoma bill is to take impact this summer time and would make it a felony to perform an abortion, punishable by up to 10 years in jail. That invoice incorporates no exceptions for rape or incest.