Oklahoma governor signs 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 in the nation to effectively end availability of the process.

State lawmakers authorised the ban enforced by civil lawsuits fairly than prison prosecution, much like a Texas law that was passed final year. The law takes effect immediately upon Stitt’s signature and prohibits all abortions with few exceptions. Abortion suppliers have mentioned they may cease performing the process as quickly as the invoice is signed.

“I promised Oklahomans that as governor I might sign every bit of pro-life legislation that came throughout my desk and I am proud to maintain that promise in the present day,” the first-term Republican mentioned in a press release. “From the moment life begins at conception is when now we have a duty as human beings to do the whole lot we are able to to guard that baby’s life and the life of the mother. That is what I believe and that's what the vast majority of Oklahomans consider.”

Abortion providers throughout the country have been bracing for the chance that the U.S. Supreme Court docket’s new conservative majority would possibly additional restrict the practice, and that has especially been the case in Oklahoma and Texas.

“The impression shall be disastrous for Oklahomans,” stated Elizabeth Nash, a state coverage analyst for the abortion-rights supporting Guttmacher Institute. “It should also have severe ripple effects, particularly for Texas patients who had been traveling to Oklahoma in giant 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 high court that suggests justices are considering weakening or overturning the landmark Roe v. Wade resolution that legalized abortion almost 50 years in the past.

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

The bill specifically authorizes docs to take away a “lifeless unborn baby caused by spontaneous abortion,” or miscarriage, or to take away an ectopic being pregnant, a probably life-threatening emergency that happens when a fertilized egg implants outside the uterus, often in a fallopian tube and early in pregnancy.

The legislation additionally doesn't apply to the use of morning-after pills reminiscent of Plan B or any kind of contraception.

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

With the state’s two remaining abortion clinics expected to stop offering companies, it is unclear what is going to happen to ladies who qualify below one of many exceptions. The regulation’s author, State Rep. Wendi Stearman, says docs might be empowered to determine which girls qualify and that these abortions will probably be carried out in hospitals. However providers and abortion-rights activists warn that making an attempt to show qualification might prove tough and even harmful in some circumstances.

In addition to the Texas-style bill already signed into regulation, the measure is one in every of at the very least three anti-abortion bills sent this year to Stitt.

Oklahoma’s legislation is styled after a first-of-its-kind Texas regulation that the U.S. Supreme Courtroom has allowed to remain in place that permits personal residents to sue abortion suppliers or anyone who helps a lady acquire an abortion. Different Republican-led states sought to copy Texas’ ban. Idaho’s governor signed the primary copycat measure in March, though 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 contains no exceptions for rape or incest.