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 within the nation to successfully end availability of the procedure.

State lawmakers approved the ban enforced by civil lawsuits somewhat than felony prosecution, just like a Texas legislation that was passed last 12 months. The law takes effect immediately upon Stitt’s signature and prohibits all abortions with few exceptions. Abortion providers have said they will cease performing the process as quickly because the bill is signed.

“I promised Oklahomans that as governor I'd sign each piece of pro-life legislation that came across my desk and I'm proud to keep that promise right this moment,” 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 all the pieces we can to protect that child’s life and the life of the mom. That is what I consider and that's what the majority of Oklahomans believe.”

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

“The impression can be disastrous for Oklahomans,” said Elizabeth Nash, a state coverage analyst for the abortion-rights supporting Guttmacher Institute. “It'll even have extreme ripple effects, particularly for Texas patients who had been traveling to Oklahoma in large 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 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 considering weakening or overturning the landmark Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion nearly 50 years in the past.

The one exceptions within the Oklahoma legislation 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 invoice specifically authorizes medical doctors to take away a “dead unborn little one caused by spontaneous abortion,” or miscarriage, or to take away an ectopic pregnancy, a probably life-threatening emergency that happens when a fertilized egg implants exterior the uterus, typically in a fallopian tube and early in pregnancy.

The legislation additionally doesn't apply to the use of morning-after drugs such as Plan B or any type 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 anticipated to stop offering services, it's unclear what's going to happen to girls who qualify underneath one of the exceptions. The law’s writer, State Rep. Wendi Stearman, says medical doctors will likely be empowered to decide which women qualify and that these abortions shall be performed in hospitals. However suppliers and abortion-rights activists warn that attempting to prove qualification might prove tough 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 sent this year to Stitt.

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

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