Oklahoma governor indicators the nation’s strictest abortion ban

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

State lawmakers authorized the ban enforced by civil lawsuits slightly than legal prosecution, much like a Texas legislation that was passed last 12 months. The legislation takes impact immediately upon Stitt’s signature and prohibits all abortions with few exceptions. Abortion suppliers have mentioned they'll stop performing the procedure as soon as the invoice is signed.

“I promised Oklahomans that as governor I'd sign each piece of pro-life legislation that came across my desk and I am proud to keep that promise at present,” the first-term Republican mentioned in a press release. “From the second life begins at conception is when we have a duty as human beings to do all the things we can to protect that child’s life and the life of the mother. That's what I consider and that's what the majority of Oklahomans consider.”

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

“The affect might be disastrous for Oklahomans,” stated Elizabeth Nash, a state policy analyst for the abortion-rights supporting Guttmacher Institute. “It will also have extreme ripple results, particularly for Texas sufferers who had been traveling to Oklahoma in massive numbers after the Texas six-week abortion ban went into impact in September.”

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

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

The invoice specifically authorizes medical doctors to take away a “lifeless unborn child caused by spontaneous abortion,” or miscarriage, or to take away an ectopic pregnancy, a potentially life-threatening emergency that occurs when a fertilized egg implants outdoors the uterus, typically in a fallopian tube and early in being pregnant.

The law additionally does not apply to the usage of morning-after capsules resembling 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 offering providers, it is unclear what is going to occur to ladies who qualify below one of many exceptions. The legislation’s author, State Rep. Wendi Stearman, says medical doctors will be empowered to resolve which ladies qualify and that those abortions will probably be carried out in hospitals. But suppliers and abortion-rights activists warn that attempting to prove qualification could prove difficult and even dangerous in some circumstances.

In addition to the Texas-style invoice already signed into law, the measure is one in all not less than three anti-abortion bills despatched this yr to Stitt.

Oklahoma’s law 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 suppliers or anybody who helps a girl get hold of 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 briefly blocked by the state’s Supreme Court

The third Oklahoma invoice is to take effect this summer season and would make it a felony to carry out an abortion, punishable by as much as 10 years in jail. That bill incorporates no exceptions for rape or incest.