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 successfully end availability of the procedure.

State lawmakers accredited the ban enforced by civil lawsuits somewhat than felony prosecution, just like a Texas law that was handed final year. The law takes impact instantly upon Stitt’s signature and prohibits all abortions with few exceptions. Abortion suppliers have mentioned they are going to stop performing the process as soon as the bill is signed.

“I promised Oklahomans that as governor I might signal each piece of pro-life legislation that got here throughout my desk and I am proud to maintain that promise right now,” the first-term Republican said in a press release. “From the moment life begins at conception is when we've a responsibility as human beings to do every thing we can to protect that child’s life and the lifetime of the mother. That is what I believe and that is what nearly all of Oklahomans believe.”

Abortion providers throughout the nation have been bracing for the possibility that the U.S. Supreme Courtroom’s new conservative majority might further limit the follow, and that has particularly been the case in Oklahoma and Texas.

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

The payments 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 excessive court that suggests justices are contemplating weakening or overturning the landmark Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion practically 50 years in the past.

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

The invoice particularly authorizes medical doctors to remove a “useless unborn child attributable to spontaneous abortion,” or miscarriage, or to take away an ectopic being pregnant, a potentially life-threatening emergency that happens when a fertilized egg implants outside the uterus, usually in a fallopian tube and early in pregnancy.

The regulation also does not apply to using morning-after drugs such as Plan B or any type 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 anticipated to cease providing companies, it's unclear what's going to occur to girls who qualify below one of the exceptions. The law’s writer, State Rep. Wendi Stearman, says doctors can be empowered to determine which women qualify and that those abortions might be carried out in hospitals. But suppliers and abortion-rights activists warn that making an attempt to prove qualification could prove difficult and even harmful in some circumstances.

In addition to the Texas-style bill already signed into regulation, the measure is considered one of a minimum of three anti-abortion bills sent this year to Stitt.

Oklahoma’s regulation is styled after a first-of-its-kind Texas law that the U.S. Supreme Courtroom has allowed to stay in place that enables personal citizens to sue abortion suppliers or anybody who helps a lady obtain an abortion. Other Republican-led states sought to copy Texas’ ban. Idaho’s governor signed the first copycat measure in March, though it has been briefly blocked by the state’s Supreme Court

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