Gov. Kasich Will Decide On Ohio ‘Heartbeat’ Abortion Bill

Similar 20-week bans are on the books in 17 states. State and federal courts have struck down such measures from Arkansas and North Dakota, with North Dakota’s bill going all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.

On Tuesday, the Ohio Legislature passed a bill that would make it illegal to get an abortion once a heartbeat has been detected in the fetus. After more than 90 minutes of emotional debate, the House voted 56-39 late Tuesday in favor of the changes.

Hickey, who spoke during the Senate’s Agriculture Committee hearing a day before the floor vote, testified: “The bond between handler and dog is strong and unique”.

“The six-week ban is a shameful, gross government invasion of deeply personal and private decisions made by families and women in consultation with medical professionals”, Strahorn said. There are no exceptions for pregnancies in cases of rape or incest.

The bill, if passed and signed, would likely be challenged, violating Supreme Court precedent set in Roe v Wade, which explicitly prohibited states from setting laws not allowing women to have first-term abortions.

Both pieces of legislation await the signature or veto of Republican Ohio Governor John Kasich, who critics said on Thursday was using the dueling legislations as politic cover.

If this law does make it through, and Kasich does not veto it, the only hope for the women of OH is that the federal courts will protect their reproductive rights, as they have done before for women in other states. He explained that “a new President, new Supreme Court justice appointees change the dynamic”, and increase the bill’s chances of winning a court battle. There’s no fixed time period in such laws, but the nonprofit American Pregnancy Association says that viability generally can begin as soon as 24 weeks.

The unprecedented ban was amended into House Bill 493, legislation that strengthens Ohio’s child abuse reporting system.

“Republican Rep. Jim Buchy said he thought passage of the Heartbeat Bill would encourage personal responsibility”.

“I thought we were open for business people”.

For those concerned about this attack on reproductive rights, there is most definitely reason to be concerned. “We’ve been looking for this for some time, several years, for this historical bill”. The Guttmacher Institute, a nonprofit research organization that supports abortion rights and tracks abortion legislation, said it would be one of the most restrictive abortion laws if enacted. Not only is this risky bill a risk to women’s health, it is unconstitutional.