In the first 3 months of 2013, state legislators have introduced 694 provisions aimed at reproductive rights and abortion, according to Guttmacher Institute.

In 2013, as in recent years, state legislatures are devoting significant attention to issues related to reproductive health and rights. During the first three months of the year, legislators have introduced 694 provisions on these issues, and 93 have been approved by at least one legislative body.

 

Also in line with recent experience, abortion restrictions are at the center of state legislative activity. About half (47%) of all reproductive health measures introduced in the first quarter of the year seek to restrict access to abortion. But unlike in recent years when the thrust of legislative activity was on regulating abortion (e.g., requirements that women undergo an ultrasound, clinic regulations or insurance coverage restrictions), legislators this year seem to be focusing on banning abortion outright—either by declaring that personhood begins at the moment of conception or by prohibiting abortion even during the first trimester of pregnancy.

 

In a positive development, two states were poised at the end of March to enact legislation expanding access to comprehensive sex education; if enacted, it would be the first time since 2010 that any state has done so. (See here for a more detailed version of this analysis).

Read more at Guttmacher Institute

Are you listening? Do you hear? Read my lips soon there will be no abortions in states controlled by Republican legislatures. Over the last decades, abortion rights have been chipped away. The remaining few are now being hit with a large sledge hammer. Unconstitutional laws are passed that take away a woman’s right to choose. Fetal heartbeat detection is propelling the laws. Hear a heartbeat, restrict abortion.

States are vying for the most restrictive abortion laws. It does not seem to matter that in Roe vs Wade the time limits had to do with viability and established 24 weeks as the time factor. Apparently, now a fetus can survive even before it is conceived, according to some of the personhood laws or weeks before a woman even knows that she is pregnant. In early March, the Arkansas legislature overrode Governor Beebe’s veto to pass one of the strictest abortion laws in the country. The Human Heartbeat Protection law says that once a heartbeat is detected (around 12 weeks using an abdominal ultrasound) abortion is banned.  

After Arkansas passed this law, the North Dakota legislature surpassed Arkansas by sending the governor two new anti-abortion laws and considering two Personhood bills. One of the laws bans abortion at 6 weeks and the other prevents abortion based on genetic defects or fetal abnormality. One of the personhood measures would ban abortion completely and the other would complicate birth control, stem cell and invitro fertilization.  In fact the laws are so extreme that a group of Republican legislators are protesting the laws. Rep. Kathy Hawken (R-Fargo) is outraged by the attacks on women. She says that the focus is on the unborn while neglecting protections and help for the born. This past week, Governor Dairymple signed into law the most restrictive abortion laws in the country - essentially banning abortion from the state.

Legislators in Kansas were spurred into action and are planning a massive attack on women’s rights. A veritable omnibus of anti-woman legislation. These laws will outlaw abortion by defining life at conception, tax abortion services and providers, make doctors give false information about abortion, have no exceptions for rape or incest and will not allow sex education in schools.

Heartbeats and fetal pain laws push the accepted time limits for abortion. They use pseudo-science as their basis and have no regard for established law. These "right-to-lifers" callously make their laws based on their own belief system and show no concern for the women who are having their right to choice, privacy and health taken away. They are interested in the "unborn." But once the unborn is born many of them want to cut all health care, education and support for them. And the woman or the family are not even a part of the contemplation. There is nothing subtle about their goal -- they want to do away with the right to choose for all women.

We need to stand with the protests in Arkansas and North Dakota. We need to help JAC elect leaders at the federal level who will support and advance a pro-woman agenda.

One aspect of the strictest abortion law in the country?  A 800-mile long area where no abortion services are available.

On Tuesday, Gov. Jack Dairymple signed legislation that would give North Dakota the most restrictive abortion laws in the country. The legislation bans the procedure as soon as a fetal heartbeat is detected, something that can happen as early as six weeks in; imposes the first state ban on abortions based on genetic defects such as Down syndrome; and makes it generally more difficult for a doctor to perform the procedure by requiring those who do to have hospital-admitting privileges.

 

The measures, which wouldn't go into effect until Aug. 1, are likely to face a serious legal challenge in court, and many expect the heartbeat ban to be overturned, something even Dairymple hinted at when signing it into law. "Although the likelihood of this measure surviving a court challenge remains in question, this bill is nevertheless a legitimate attempt by a state legislature to discover the boundaries of Roe v. Wade," the governor said this week, referring to the Supreme Court ruling that legalized abortion up until a fetus is considered viable, usually at around 22 to 24 weeks.

 

As unlikely as the law is to survive, ABC News does a good job of illustrating the indirect—but perhaps not unintended—impact of the ban if it holds up: The likely closure of Fargo's Red River Women's Clinic, which according to the Guttmacher Institute has existed as the lone abortion provider in the state since 2001.

 

map image from Slate.com

Read more at Slate.com

What a difference three years makes.

In 2010, Nebraska passed the country’s most restrictive abortion law that barred abortions after 20 weeks. By March 2013, 12 states have done so — or passed restrictions even earlier in the pregnancy, like North Dakota’s six-week ban.

These are the states you see in orange, in this graphic below, which uses data from the Guttmacher Institute to map all the laws that ban later-term abortion in the United States. The slightly lighter states represent those where a ban exists but is not in effect, due to a pending legal challenge.

Read the whole article and explore the map at Washington Post.

This week Arkansas became the 10th state to outlaw abortion after 20 weeks by overturning the governor's veto on this law - a limit which violates the Supreme Court's legal threshold.

Arkansas adopted new abortion limits Thursday, outlawing most abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy, even as its State Senate approved a more restrictive bill that would ban abortions after 12 weeks of pregnancy.

Gov. Mike Beebe, a Democrat, had vetoed the 20-week limit on Tuesday, saying it was likely to be found unconstitutional, but the newly Republican-controlled Senate voted to override Mr. Beebe’s veto on Thursday; the House had already done so Wednesday. The measure is set to take effect immediately.

 

Arkansas is the 10th state to outlaw abortions after 20 weeks, in part based on the theory that fetuses can feel pain at that stage, a notion disputed by mainstream medical associations.

 

The 20-week limit also violates the legal threshold set by the Supreme Court, which has held that states cannot ban abortions before the fetus becomes viable. Such a limit has not yet been tested by the courts.

Read more at New York Times

After hastily removing all evidence of her last attempt that would put the victims in jail, AZ lawmaker Cathrynn Brown is back with a new bill that would charge medical providers who perform an abortion for a rape victim with a felony.

We all remember last week when Republican state legislator Rep. Cathrynn Brown introduced a bill that would charge rape survivors seeking an abortion with a felony, right?

And we all remember when she was promptly Internet shamed and removed all evidence of the bill from her website, posthaste?

Well, she’s back. And so is the bill.

After finding out that the public doesn’t take too kindly to putting rape survivors in jail, Rep. Brown amended the legislation. Now, instead of charging women who terminate a pregnancy caused by rape with “tampering with evidence,” the updated bill will charge state abortion providers. Why? For “facilitating” the destruction of evidence.

So abortion after rape would still be a crime in New Mexico. And that is still a problem.

Read more at Salon.com

Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell has quietly signed into law severe restrictions on abortion clinics.

Gov. Bob McDonnell has certified health regulations that impose strict hospital construction standards on Virginia abortion clinics -- triggering the next step in a multitiered approval process that could make the revised rules permanent by this summer.

 

Unlike the public relations ballyhoo that accompanies many executive actions, McDonnell, an anti-abortion Republican, certified the regulations and had them posted to the Virginia Town Hall website without a public announcement on the Friday between the Christmas and New Year's holidays.

 

The signoff comes more than three months after the rules were adopted in September by the state Board of Health at a contentious meeting during which abortion-rights advocates claimed board members were being intimidated into changing their decision in June to grandfather existing clinics from the building requirements.

 

Members of abortion-rights advocacy groups reacted strongly to the governor's approval in statements released Monday.

Read more at Huffington Post

A district court has ruled that Gov. Rick Perry's attack on women in Texas can continue by stating Planned Parenthood can legally be cut from the new state-funded health plan for women.

A district judge ruled on Monday that Texas can legally cut Planned Parenthood out of its new state-funded health program for women, which launches on Tuesday.

 

The Texas Women's Health Program, which provides basic health care and family planning services to low-income women, previously received about 90 percent of its $35 million annual funding from the federal government. When state legislators voted to cut Planned Parenthood out of the program because some of its affiliates provide abortions, the Department of Health and Human Services warned the state that if it broke federal Medicaid rules by discriminating against a qualified provider, it would no longer receive federal funding for the program. Instead of reinstating Planned Parenthood funding, Gov. Rick Perry (R) decided to start a new women's health program funded entirely by the state so that it could continue to exclude Planned Parenthood from the program.

 

Planned Parenthood currently serves about half of the 130,000 women in the Women's Health Program, and none of the Planned Parenthood clinics that participate in the program offer abortions. Attorneys for the family planning provider filed for a temporary restraining order against the new rules so that it could continue to serve women through the program until a final court ruling is issued in January.

Read more at Huffington Post

During their lameduck session, Michigan lawmakers are pushing through a pack of bills that would restrict access to reproductive health for women across the state, significantly restricting access to abortion services statewide.

State lawmakers in Michigan are using their lame-duck session to pass a bundle of bills that would significantly restrict women's ability to access and pay for abortions in the state.

 

The state Senate passed three bills on Thursday that would ban abortion coverage in state-based health insurance exchanges and all private insurance plans, and another bill that would allow employers and medical professionals to refuse to cover or provide health treatment to which they morally object. State lawmakers are also expected to pass a so-called omnibus bill on Thursday that would impose prohibitive building regulations on abortion clinics and ban the use of telemedicine to prescribe abortion medication.

 

"It feels like [state legislators] are completely tone-deaf to what Americans want in general, which is for legislators to pay attention to the economy, particularly in Michigan, and to women and their power to say, 'This is what we want, and this is what we don't want,'" Desiree Cooper, a spokeswoman for Planned Parenthood Advocates of Michigan, told The Huffington Post.

 

Senate Bills 612, 613 and 614, which passed along party lines in the State Senate on Thursday, will prevent all insurance plans in Michigan from covering abortion unless a woman would die without the procedure. The measures do not include exceptions for rape, incest or pregnancy complications that would jeopardize the mother's health. Private insurance companies will be given the option to carry a separate abortion coverage policy that the woman would have to pay for in addition to her regular coverage.

Read more at Huffington Post

Oklahoma Supreme court has struck down 2 laws related to abortion - one that required women to obtain an ultrasound prior to an abortion, and another which expanded the rules allowing doctors to prescribe abortion-inducing medication.

The Oklahoma Supreme Court struck down as unconstitutional state laws that expanded rules for doctors prescribing pregnancy-ending drugs and required women seeking abortions to have ultrasound scans.

 

The court said today it was bound by standards imposed by the U.S. Supreme Court in a 1992 decision called Planned Parenthood v. Casey, which upheld Roe v. Wade and blocked regulations that impose a substantial obstacle to women seeking abortions before a fetus can survive outside the womb.

 

The Oklahoma law limiting the use of abortion-inducing drugs required doctors to provide the medicines in accordance with procedures tested and authorized by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and barred any off-label uses of abortion drugs.

 

Abortion providers that sued said they couldn’t provide medication-induced abortions under the law because complying with its requirements isn’t possible. The FDA doesn’t test or authorize protocols for the two-drug treatment commonly used to end pregnancies.

 

State officials argued there’s evidence that off-label use of abortion-inducing drugs lead to serious infections and death.

Read more at Bloomberg News

Ohio's Senate Leader has tabled a fetal "heartbeat bill" that, if passed, would have been the most restrictive abortion law in the country.

The leader of the Ohio Senate put a stop Tuesday to a bill that would have imposed the most stringent restriction on abortions in the nation.

 

The chamber doesn't plan to vote on the so-called "heartbeat bill" before the end of the legislative session next month, Republican Senate President Tom Niehaus said, citing concerns the resulting law might have been found to be unconstitutional.

 

"I want to continue our focus on jobs and the economy," Niehaus told reporters. "That's what people are concerned about."

 

The bill proposed banning abortions after the first fetal heartbeat is detected, as early as six weeks into pregnancy. It had fiercely divided Ohio's anti-abortion community, while energizing abortion rights proponents who protested against it.

Read more at Huffington Post

Michigan may become the first state to implement tax credits allowing a fetus of 12 weeks in development of longer to qualify as a dependent, under a proposed bill.

Michigan lawmakers may consider allowing a fetus of at least 12 weeks to qualify as a dependent for state income tax purposes -- a move that if put into law might be the first of its kind in the nation.

House Bills 5684 and 5685 were given a hearing in the House Tax Policy Committee on Tuesday. And critics quickly question its motives, saying it appeared to be a back door way to try and crack down on abortions.

It was not immediately clear if the bills will be made a priority during the Republican-led Legislature’s “lame duck” session that begins in earnest next week and will conclude in December.

"In our view these bills are an attempt to give some legal recognition to the unborn in tax law, which would then be used as a reason to give legal recognition to the unborn in other contexts such as in criminal law or in health law," said Mary Pollock of the National Organization of Women's Michigan chapter. "And so they are a not so subtle reason to establish personhood for a fetus at 12 weeks gestation so that abortion could be banned or punished thereafter."

A House Fiscal Agency analysis estimates the state would lose between $5 million and $10 million a year in tax revenue through the change.

Read more at MLive

Abortion is still legal in the US, but AP's Lindsey Tanner take a comprehensive look at how many states are making it harder and harder to get one.

It's legal to get an abortion in America, but in many places it is hard and getting harder.

 

Just this year, 17 states set new limits on abortion; 24 did last year, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a pro-abortion rights nonprofit whose numbers are widely respected. In several states with the most restrictive laws, the number of abortions has fallen slightly, pleasing abortion opponents who say the laws are working.

 

Some of the states with the toughest laws are spread across a big middle swath of the country, stretching from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico.

Read more at AP's Big Story

Indiana GOP Senate candidate Richard Mourdock opposes rape exceptions for abortion because pregnancy from rape is what "God intended."

Indiana GOP U.S. Senate candidate Richard Mourdock declared Tuesday night he opposes aborting pregnancies conceived in rape because "it is something that God intended to happen."

 

Debating Rep. Joe Donnelly (D-Ind.) in their final Senate race showdown, a questioner asked them and Libertarian candidate Andrew Horning to explain their views on abortion.

 

All three said they were anti-abortion. But Mourdock went further, putting himself in territory near Missouri GOP Senate candidate Rep. Todd Akin, the anti-abortion congressman who infamously asserted that women don't get pregnant from "legitimate rape."

Read more at Huffington Post

A lawsuit is challenging Arizona's new abortion law which bans abortions effectively 18 weeks after the woman's last menstrual cycle has been filed.  Many have said this law essentially says a woman is pregnant 2 weeks prior to possible fertilization.

A group of doctors and women’s rights advocates challenged Arizona’s new abortion limits in a federal lawsuit on Thursday, claiming that they violate the Constitution and pose a threat to women’s health.

The law, set to take effect on Aug. 2, prohibits abortions once 20 weeks have passed since a woman’s last menstrual period, which is about 18 weeks after fertilization. This is the earliest deadline set by any state and is weeks earlier than the threshold set by the Supreme Court.

In Roe v. Wade and related decisions, the court ruled that women have a right to abortion until the fetus is viable outside the womb, often about 24 weeks, and that any ban on later abortions must allow exceptions to protect the life and health of the mother.

Read more at New York Times