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 within the nation to successfully end availability of the process.

State lawmakers permitted the ban enforced by civil lawsuits rather than legal prosecution, similar to a Texas law that was handed final year. The regulation takes effect instantly upon Stitt’s signature and prohibits all abortions with few exceptions. Abortion providers have stated they may stop performing the procedure as quickly as the bill is signed.

“I promised Oklahomans that as governor I might signal each piece of pro-life laws that came throughout my desk and I am proud to maintain that promise in the present day,” the first-term Republican said in a statement. “From the second life begins at conception is when we've got a accountability as human beings to do every little thing we are able to to guard that child’s life and the life of the mother. That's what I believe and that is what the vast majority of Oklahomans consider.”

Abortion providers throughout the nation have been bracing for the possibility that the U.S. Supreme Court’s new conservative majority would possibly additional prohibit the apply, and that has especially been the case in Oklahoma and Texas.

“The impact will probably be disastrous for Oklahomans,” mentioned Elizabeth Nash, a state policy analyst for the abortion-rights supporting Guttmacher Institute. “It can even have severe ripple results, particularly for Texas sufferers who had been traveling to Oklahoma in large numbers after the Texas six-week abortion ban went into effect in September.”

The bills 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 high court docket that suggests justices are contemplating weakening or overturning the landmark Roe v. Wade choice that legalized abortion almost 50 years in the past.

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

The bill particularly authorizes docs to take away a “lifeless unborn youngster attributable to spontaneous abortion,” or miscarriage, or to take away an ectopic being pregnant, a doubtlessly life-threatening emergency that occurs when a fertilized egg implants outside the uterus, usually in a fallopian tube and early in pregnancy.

The regulation additionally does not apply to using morning-after drugs akin 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 expected to stop providing providers, it is unclear what will occur to girls who qualify under one of many exceptions. The legislation’s creator, State Rep. Wendi Stearman, says doctors will probably be empowered to determine which girls qualify and that those abortions might be carried out in hospitals. However suppliers and abortion-rights activists warn that attempting to prove qualification could show tough and even harmful in some circumstances.

Along with the Texas-style invoice already signed into law, the measure is one among at the very least three anti-abortion bills despatched this 12 months to Stitt.

Oklahoma’s legislation is styled after a first-of-its-kind Texas law that the U.S. Supreme Court docket has allowed to stay in place that permits personal residents to sue abortion suppliers or anyone who helps a girl receive an abortion. Other Republican-led states sought to copy 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 prison. That bill comprises no exceptions for rape or incest.