Democratic Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs signed a bill Thursday to repeal a ban on most abortions. The action relegates the 1864 law approved before Arizona became a state to the past.
Democratic Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs has relegated a Civil War-era ban on most abortions to the past by signing a bill Thursday to repeal it.
Hobbs says the move is just the beginning of a fight to protect reproductive health care in Arizona. The repeal of the 1864 law that the state Supreme Court recently reinstated won’t take effect until 90 days after the legislative session ends, which typically happens in June or July.
Abortion rights advocates say they’re hopeful a court will step in to prevent what could be a confusing landscape of access for girls and women across Arizona as laws are introduced and then reversed.
The effort to repeal the long-dormant law, which bans all abortions except those done to save a patient’s life, won final legislative approval Wednesday in a 16-14 vote of the Senate, as two GOP lawmakers joined with Democrats.
1864 ABORTION BAN
Hobbs denounced “a ban that was passed by 27 men before Arizona was even a state, at a time when America was at war over the right to own slaves, a time before women could even vote.”
“This ban needs to be repealed, I said it in 2022 when Roe was overturned, and I said it again and again as governor,” Hobbs said during the bill signing.
In early April, Arizona’s Supreme Court voted to restore the 1864 law that provided no exceptions for rape or incest and allows abortions only if the mother’s life is in jeopardy. The majority opinion suggested doctors could be prosecuted and sentenced to up to five years in prison if convicted.
Democrats, who are the minority in the Legislature, struck back with the help of a handful of Republicans in the House and Senate to advance a repeal in a matter of weeks to Hobbs’ desk.
A crowd of lawmakers — mostly women — joined in the signing ceremony with celebratory airs, including taking selfies and exchanging congratulations among Democrats.
The scene stood in sharp contrast to Wednesday’s vote in the Senate that extended for hours as Republicans described their motivations in personal, emotional and even biblical terms — including graphic descriptions of abortion procedures and amplified audio recordings of a fetal heartbeat.
Meanwhile, across the country, an abortion rights initiative in South Dakota submitted far more signatures than required to make the ballot this fall. In Florida, a ban took effect against most abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, before many people even know they are pregnant.
In Arizona, once the repeal takes effect in the fall, a 2002 statute banning abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy will become the state’s prevailing abortion law.
Whether the 1864 law will be enforced in the coming months depends on who is asked. The anti-abortion group defending the ban, Alliance Defending Freedom, maintains county prosecutors can begin enforcing it once the Supreme Court’s decision becomes final, which hasn’t yet occurred.
Planned Parenthood Arizona filed a motion Wednesday asking the court to prevent a pause in abortion services until the repeal takes effect. Democratic Attorney General Kris Mayes has joined in that action.
On Thursday, former Democratic state Rep. Athena Salman celebrated approval of the repeal she initially proposed in 2019 — three years before Roe v. Wade was overturned.
Until then, Arizona’s near-total abortion ban had been blocked because the U.S. Supreme Court decision guaranteed the constitutional right to an abortion nationwide. Then-Attorney General Mark Brnovich, a Republican, swiftly made a case for enforcing the 1864 ban.
Still, the law hasn’t been carried out because it was stuck in legal limbo until the Arizona Supreme Court weighed in.
Salman, who resigned in January to lead an abortion rights group, said she can’t stop thinking about what the repeal means for her daughters.
“Future generations will not have to live under the restrictions and the interference that we have had to experience,” she said.
Arizona Rep. Stephanie Stahl Hamilton, a Democrat who was key in repealing the ban, said she spent her early years on the Navajo Nation where her parents were schoolteachers and saw firsthand people being denied reproductive rights. The main health care option on the reservation is the Indian Health Service, which operates under the Hyde Amendment that bars the use of federal funding for abortions except in cases of rape, incest or threats to the patient’s life.
She said she also watched her sister-in-law struggle with two difficult pregnancies that resulted in stillbirths.
“We have people who need reproductive care now,” Stahl Hamilton said.
President Joe Biden’s campaign team believes voters’ anger over the fall of Roe v. Wade gave him the political advantage in battleground states like Arizona, where he beat former President Donald Trump by about 10,000 votes.
The issue has divided Republican leaders.
People in the gallery of the Arizona Senate on Wednesday jeered and interrupted Republican Lawmaker Shawnna Bolick as she explained her vote in favor of the repeal.
Republican lawmakers more broadly are considering putting one or more abortion proposals on the November ballot. Such efforts could compete with Democratic-backed efforts to enshrine abortion access in the state constitution — up until a fetus could survive outside the womb, typically around 24 weeks, with some exceptions — to save the patient’s life, or to protect her physical or mental health.
Dr. Ronald Yunis, a Phoenix-based obstetrician-gynecologist who also provides abortions, called the repeal a positive development for patients who might otherwise leave Arizona for medical care.
“This is good for ensuring that women won’t have to travel to other states just to get the health care they need,” Yunis said. “I was not too concerned because I have a lot of confidence in our governor and attorney general. I’m certain they will continue finding ways to protect women.”
Abortion is still consuming US politics and courts 2 years after a Supreme Court draft was leaked
Two years after a leaked draft of a U.S. Supreme Court opinion signaled that the abortion landscape was about to change, the issue is still consuming the nation’s courts, legislatures and political campaigns.
Two years after a leaked draft of a U.S. Supreme Court opinion signaled that the nation’s abortion landscape was about to shift dramatically, the issue is still consuming the nation’s courts, legislatures and political campaigns — and changing the course of lives.
On Wednesday, a ban on abortion after the first six weeks of pregnancy, often before women realize they’re pregnant, took effect in Florida, echoing laws in two other states. In Arizona, meanwhile, lawmakers voted to repeal a total ban on abortion dating back to 1864, decades before Arizona became a state — and the governor signed it a day later. Also this week, the Kansas Legislature increased funding for anti-abortion centers, while advocates in South Dakota submitted the required number of signatures for a ballot measure to enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution.
The status of abortion in states across the country has changed constantly, with lawmakers passing measures and courts ruling on challenges to them. Currently, 14 states are enforcing bans on abortion at all stages of pregnancy, with limited exceptions. Most Democratic-led states, meanwhile, have taken steps to preserve or expand access.
“Some of it’s exactly what we knew would happen,” said David Cohen, a professor at the Thomas R. Kline School of Law at Drexel University who studies abortion policy, “and others have been big surprises that have put, frankly, the anti-abortion movement on their heels.”
Kansas has new abortion laws while Louisiana may block exceptions to its ban
Although more than 20 states have begun enforcing abortion bans of varying degrees since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022, studies have found that the number of monthly abortions nationally is about the same — or higher — than it was before the ruling. Asked to weigh in on the emotional debate, voters have supported the position favored by abortion rights advocates on all seven statewide ballot measures since then.
The Supreme Court’s decision in the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case was released officially on June 24, 2022, upending nearly 50 years of abortion being legal nationwide. But the world caught a glimpse of it about six weeks earlier, on May 2, after a news outlet published a leaked draft.
“With the Dobbs decision, the will of the people is now able to be adhered to,” said Stephen Billy, vice president of state affairs for Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America. He said abortion rights supporters have sought to create uncertainty about laws he says are clear — especially with assertions that the bans bar abortion in medical emergencies: “They’ve tried to sow political division just to advance their policy agenda,” he said.
At the time Politico published the leaked draft, Amanda Zurawski was undergoing fertility treatment and was about two weeks away from learning she was finally pregnant.
The Austin, Texas, woman had always supported abortion rights, and was mad that the right to abortion was on the verge of disappearing. But she didn’t expect a direct impact in her life.
That changed months later when she was denied an abortion despite a premature rupture of membranes, which can lead to dangerous internal bleeding. Days later, she was diagnosed with sepsis, a life-threatening reaction to infection. Her daughter, Willow, was ultimately aborted, but Zurawski nearly died in the process because of the delay.
She emerged from the experience an activist.
“I thought I would be a new mom with a newborn,” she said in an interview. “Instead, I was in Tallahassee, Florida, meeting the vice president.”
Zurawski has been a plaintiff in a court challenge seeking to clarify Texas abortion law and has spoken about her experience before Congress and across the country. She recently left her tech job to spend the next several months supporting abortion rights and President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign.
“I’m definitely somebody who wants to fight for justice,” she said. “This is not the path that I would have guessed.”
Zurawski’s widely publicized experience is a reflection of the central role abortion has assumed on the political stage during this highly charged election year.
In Arizona, one of a handful of battleground states that will decide the next president, the state Supreme Court issued a ruling last month saying that a near-total abortion ban passed in 1864 could be enforced now that Roe v. Wade had been overturned. That decision ultimately led to the repeal proposal that passed the state House last week and the Senate on Wednesday after vitriolic debate. Gov. Katie Hobbs, a Democrat, signed the repeal on Thursday. The 1864 law is still expected to be in effect for a time, though.
Florida, Maryland and New York will have measures on the ballot in November to protect abortion access.
“Women are going to be put into an impossible situation of not having access to health care, whether it is in an emergency situation or just family planning,” said Nikki Fried, chair of the Florida Democratic Party. “Floridians are going to have the opportunity to take control back.”
Susan B. Anthony’s Billy said his group was focused on defeating the ballot questions in Florida and other states where passing them would roll back bans in place now.
Arizona is one of at least eight states with a push for a similar measure. A few states also have pushes for measures to enshrine bans in the state constitution.
The issue is also weighing heavily in the presidential election.
President Joe Biden has been blasting his likely opponent, former President Donald Trump, for appointing the Supreme Court justices who swayed the Roe v. Wade decision. Vice President Kamala Harris traveled to Florida on Wednesday to decry the six-week ban passed in the nation’s third most-populous state.
Trump, who said in April that he believes abortion laws should be decided by states, went further this week, telling Time magazine that states should also be able to prosecute women who seek abortions. Proposals to do that have not picked up steam in any state legislatures so far.
Source: AP
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