Oklahoma governor signs the nation’s strictest abortion ban

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt on Wednesday signed into regulation the nation’s strictest abortion ban, making the state the primary within the nation to successfully finish availability of the procedure.

State lawmakers approved the ban enforced by civil lawsuits somewhat than felony prosecution, just like a Texas regulation that was handed final year. The law takes impact immediately upon Stitt’s signature and prohibits all abortions with few exceptions. Abortion providers have stated they'll cease performing the procedure as soon as the bill is signed.

“I promised Oklahomans that as governor I would signal every bit of pro-life laws that got here throughout my desk and I am proud to maintain that promise at this time,” the first-term Republican mentioned in an announcement. “From the moment life begins at conception is when now we have a duty as human beings to do every thing we will to guard that baby’s life and the life of the mom. That's what I believe and that is what the vast majority of Oklahomans imagine.”

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

“The affect might be disastrous for Oklahomans,” mentioned Elizabeth Nash, a state coverage analyst for the abortion-rights supporting Guttmacher Institute. “It should even have severe ripple effects, particularly for Texas patients who had been traveling to Oklahoma in large numbers after the Texas six-week abortion ban went into effect in September.”

The payments are part of an aggressive push in Republican-led states to reduce 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 resolution that legalized abortion almost 50 years in the past.

The one exceptions within the Oklahoma regulation are to save lots of the life of a pregnant girl or if the being pregnant is the result of rape or incest that has been reported to regulation enforcement.

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

The legislation also doesn't apply to using morning-after capsules corresponding to 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 providing companies, it's unclear what's going to occur to girls who qualify beneath one of many exceptions. The law’s writer, State Rep. Wendi Stearman, says medical doctors will be empowered to resolve which girls qualify and that those abortions can be carried out in hospitals. However suppliers and abortion-rights activists warn that making an attempt 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 a minimum of three anti-abortion payments despatched this yr to Stitt.

Oklahoma’s regulation is styled after a first-of-its-kind Texas regulation that the U.S. Supreme Court docket has allowed to remain in place that allows personal citizens to sue abortion suppliers or anybody who helps a woman get hold of 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 Courtroom

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