COLUMBIA, SC (AP) – The South Carolina House on Wednesday overwhelmingly passed a bill banning almost all abortions, following the leadership of other states with similar measures that would go into effect if the U.S. Supreme Court annulled Roe v. Wade.
The bill faces a final procedural vote Thursday that is unlikely to change the outcome and will be sent to the governor for signature. Republican Gov. Henry McMaster has pledged to sign the measure as soon as possible.
The Senate passed the measure on Jan. 28, after years of failed attempts. Republicans won three seats in the 2020 election and the newly energized Republican majority between 30 and 16 made Bill no. 1 of the Senate.
“This is the largest pro-life bill this state has ever passed,” said Republican Rep. David Hiott of Pickens.
The “Heartbeat and Fetal Abortion Protection Act of South Carolina “It requires doctors to perform ultrasounds to check for a heartbeat in the fetus. If one is detected, abortion can only be performed if the pregnancy was caused by rape or incest or the mother’s life. is in danger.
The bill would not punish a pregnant woman for having obtained an illegal abortion, but the person who performed the abortion could be charged with a felony, sentenced to up to two years and fined $ 10,000 if convicted. .
About a dozen other states have passed similar or more restrictive abortion bans, which could take effect if the U.S. Supreme Court – with three judges appointed by former Republican President Donald Trump – overturns Roe v. Wade. the 1973 court decision supporting abortion rights.
Groups that oppose the bill are likely to sue, preventing the law from coming into force. All bans passed by other states are tied to judicial challenges.
While Wednesday’s House approval was almost a lost conclusion, the road ahead was rocky. A Republican lawmaker who wanted a stricter law that said fetuses have the rights of all citizens at the time of conception, threw out his papers and burst into a balance sheet that angered the speaker. Most Democrats left the House to protest the bill. They had to return when a member of the party who left and returned made the rare request that the secretary read the entire bill aloud before the vote, prompting Republicans to demand the presence of all legislators.
During the outing, Republicans ended up with more than 100 proposed amendments. After holding a press conference to speak out against the bill, several Democrats reiterated their opposition to the measure, which has come out for debate in the legislature several times over the past decade. Lawmakers passed the bill by a vote of 79-35. Two Democrats voted in favor of the ban and two Republicans voted against it.
“You love the fetus in the womb. But when it is born, it is a different reaction, “said Rep. Gilda Cobb-Hunter of Orangeburg, the oldest member of the House at 29. Cobb-Hunter noted how the General Assembly made the bill abortion law was a priority over education, several COVID-19 bills and almost everything else, and how some supporters of the ban opposed any requirement earlier this year that they wear masks to land and at committee meetings.
“The government that doesn’t have any companies that demand masks” seems very close to me “that the government doesn’t have any business that tells a woman what to do with her body,” Cobb-Hunter said.
Numerous Republican lawmakers spoke in favor of the bill and many cheered after the vote. Supporters of the ban stood outside the House of Commons applauding and embracing lawmakers who put more pressure on the measure.
Rep. Melissa Lackey Oremus said she was 16 and was leading her class when she had “a little, too much” fun and got pregnant.
The Aiken Republican and now three-year-old mother, 42, said she wasn’t sure what to do until she was rubbed with an ultrasound wand on her belly and felt her son’s heartbeat.
“That sound to me was that I had a human being inside me,” Oremus said. “This sound was the most beautiful sound for me. How could he have an option to kill that sound, to make it disappear? “
A Republican briefly stopped the debate when Rep. Jonathon Hill, apparently angry at his amendments to completely ban all abortions, was not considered, burst into the central aisle of the House, tossed his amendments in the air, and came out.
Another representative picked up the papers.
“If it had been me, I would have stayed on the floor and would not have allowed him to return to the House until I had picked him up,” said House Speaker Jay Lucas. “We are a legislative body. We have a debate. We are not children. We don’t lose our temper when we lose. “
Hill was not immediately punished for his behavior.
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Follow Jeffrey Collins on Twitter at https://twitter.com/JSCollinsAP.