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 effectively finish availability of the process.

State lawmakers approved the ban enforced by civil lawsuits quite than prison prosecution, similar to a Texas regulation that was handed final yr. The regulation takes effect instantly upon Stitt’s signature and prohibits all abortions with few exceptions. Abortion providers have said they may stop performing the procedure as quickly because the invoice is signed.

“I promised Oklahomans that as governor I might sign each piece of pro-life laws that came across my desk and I'm 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 we've a duty as human beings to do all the pieces we will to guard that baby’s life and the lifetime of the mom. That's what I imagine and that is what the majority of Oklahomans consider.”

Abortion suppliers across the country have been bracing for the possibility that the U.S. Supreme Court’s new conservative majority may further limit the observe, and that has particularly been the case in Oklahoma and Texas.

“The impact might be disastrous for Oklahomans,” said Elizabeth Nash, a state policy analyst for the abortion-rights supporting Guttmacher Institute. “It'll also 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 impact in September.”

The payments 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 courtroom that suggests justices are considering weakening or overturning the landmark Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion almost 50 years in the past.

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

The invoice particularly authorizes docs to take away a “dead unborn child attributable to spontaneous abortion,” or miscarriage, or to remove an ectopic being pregnant, a probably life-threatening emergency that occurs when a fertilized egg implants exterior the uterus, often in a fallopian tube and early in being pregnant.

The regulation additionally doesn't apply to using morning-after drugs equivalent to 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 cease providing providers, it is unclear what will occur to girls who qualify under one of the exceptions. The regulation’s creator, State Rep. Wendi Stearman, says doctors shall be empowered to determine which ladies qualify and that those abortions can be performed in hospitals. However suppliers and abortion-rights activists warn that attempting to show qualification could show difficult and even dangerous 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 sent this year to Stitt.

Oklahoma’s regulation is styled after a first-of-its-kind Texas law that the U.S. Supreme Court docket has allowed to remain in place that permits private residents to sue abortion providers or anyone who helps a woman receive 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 invoice is to take impact this summer time and would make it a felony to perform an abortion, punishable by up to 10 years in jail. That invoice contains no exceptions for rape or incest.