Oklahoma governor signs the nation’s strictest abortion ban

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

State lawmakers accepted the ban enforced by civil lawsuits reasonably than felony prosecution, just like a Texas regulation that was handed final yr. The legislation takes effect immediately upon Stitt’s signature and prohibits all abortions with few exceptions. Abortion suppliers have mentioned they may stop performing the procedure as soon as the invoice is signed.

“I promised Oklahomans that as governor I might sign each piece of pro-life legislation that got here across my desk and I'm proud to maintain that promise immediately,” the first-term Republican said in a statement. “From the moment life begins at conception is when we now have a responsibility as human beings to do every little thing we will to guard that child’s life and the life of the mom. That's what I consider and that's what the majority of Oklahomans believe.”

Abortion suppliers across the country have been bracing for the possibility that the U.S. Supreme Court docket’s new conservative majority would possibly further limit the follow, and that has particularly been the case in Oklahoma and Texas.

“The impact will likely be disastrous for Oklahomans,” mentioned Elizabeth Nash, a state coverage analyst for the abortion-rights supporting Guttmacher Institute. “It'll even have severe ripple effects, particularly for Texas sufferers who had been traveling to Oklahoma in massive numbers after the Texas six-week abortion ban went into effect in September.”

The payments 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 court docket that suggests justices are contemplating weakening or overturning the landmark Roe v. Wade resolution that legalized abortion almost 50 years ago.

The only exceptions in the Oklahoma law are to avoid wasting the lifetime of a pregnant lady or if the being pregnant is the result of rape or incest that has been reported to regulation enforcement.

The bill particularly authorizes doctors to take away a “lifeless unborn little one attributable to spontaneous abortion,” or miscarriage, or to remove an ectopic pregnancy, a doubtlessly life-threatening emergency that occurs when a fertilized egg implants outdoors the uterus, usually in a fallopian tube and early in being pregnant.

The legislation also does not apply to the use of morning-after tablets equivalent to Plan B or any kind of contraception.

Two of Oklahoma’s four 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 cease providing providers, it is unclear what's going to occur to ladies who qualify under one of the exceptions. The regulation’s writer, State Rep. Wendi Stearman, says doctors will probably be empowered to resolve which ladies qualify and that these abortions might be performed in hospitals. However suppliers and abortion-rights activists warn that making an attempt to prove qualification might prove tough and even dangerous in some circumstances.

In addition to the Texas-style bill already signed into law, the measure is certainly one of at the very least three anti-abortion bills despatched this yr to Stitt.

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

The third Oklahoma bill is to take impact this summer time and would make it a felony to carry out an abortion, punishable by as much as 10 years in prison. That bill accommodates no exceptions for rape or incest.