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 finish availability of the procedure.

State lawmakers authorized the ban enforced by civil lawsuits quite than felony prosecution, just like a Texas law that was handed final yr. The regulation takes impact instantly upon Stitt’s signature and prohibits all abortions with few exceptions. Abortion suppliers have said they will stop performing the procedure as quickly because the invoice is signed.

“I promised Oklahomans that as governor I would sign every piece of pro-life laws that got here across my desk and I am proud to maintain that promise at present,” the first-term Republican stated in a press release. “From the second life begins at conception is when we now have a duty as human beings to do every part we will to protect that baby’s life and the life of the mother. That's what I imagine and that is what the vast majority of Oklahomans believe.”

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

“The impression can be disastrous for Oklahomans,” said Elizabeth Nash, a state policy analyst for the abortion-rights supporting Guttmacher Institute. “It's going to even have severe ripple results, especially for Texas patients who had been touring 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 scale back abortion rights. It comes on the heels of a leaked draft opinion from the nation’s excessive court docket that suggests justices are contemplating weakening or overturning the landmark Roe v. Wade determination that legalized abortion practically 50 years ago.

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

The invoice specifically authorizes doctors to remove a “useless unborn little one brought on by spontaneous abortion,” or miscarriage, or to take away an ectopic being pregnant, a potentially life-threatening emergency that occurs when a fertilized egg implants outdoors the uterus, usually in a fallopian tube and early in pregnancy.

The regulation additionally does not apply to the use of morning-after capsules equivalent to Plan B or any kind 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 cease providing providers, it's unclear what will occur to ladies who qualify below one of many exceptions. The regulation’s author, State Rep. Wendi Stearman, says doctors will likely be empowered to resolve which ladies qualify and that those abortions can be performed in hospitals. However suppliers and abortion-rights activists warn that making an attempt to show qualification could show troublesome and even harmful in some circumstances.

Along with the Texas-style invoice already signed into law, the measure is one in every of at the very least three anti-abortion bills despatched this yr to Stitt.

Oklahoma’s legislation is styled after a first-of-its-kind Texas legislation that the U.S. Supreme Court docket has allowed to stay in place that permits non-public citizens to sue abortion suppliers or anyone who helps a lady obtain an abortion. Other Republican-led states sought to repeat Texas’ ban. Idaho’s governor signed the primary copycat measure in March, though it has been quickly 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 prison. That bill contains no exceptions for rape or incest.