Georgia passes ‘heartbeat’ bill
Amid protests and a heavy police presence, the Georgia Senate passes a bill banning almost all abortions after a fetal heartbeat can be detected.
ATLANTA — Amid protests and a heavy police presence, the Georgia Senate on Friday passed a bill banning almost all abortions after a fetal heartbeat can be detected.
The bill, backed by Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, passed on a 3418 party-line vote and would be one of the nation’s strictest antiabortion measures if it becomes law and is not blocked in court battles. The bill will go back to the House to approve Senate changes, where it’s expected to pass again.
Women in Georgia currently can seek an abortion during the first 20 weeks of a pregnancy. A heartbeat can be detected in an embryo as early as six weeks into pregnancy, before many women know they’re pregnant.
Georgia lawmakers and GOPled legislatures in several states have pushed anti-abortion measures in hopes of getting a case before the U.S. Supreme Court to challenge its 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that legalized abortion nationwide. The push comes amid rising optimism among conservatives that the restrictions might prevail in the reconfigured high court that includes President Donald Trump appointees Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh.
Andrea Young, the executive director of the ACLU of Georgia, said in an interview Friday that the group would challenge the heartbeat abortion ban in court if it’s signed into law.
Young called the legislation “clearly unconstitutional” and said that it “flies in the face of 50 years of legal precedent.”
Several Republican senators, most of them men, spoke in favor of the bill; several Democratic senators, most of them women, argued against it.
Many Republican lawmakers in favor of the legislation outlined their position in religious terms.
“There are many scriptures that make it clear to me that God knew us and had a plan for us when we were still in our mother’s womb,” said Republican Sen. Greg Kirk, a Baptist pastor. “The word abortion is not going to be found in the Bible.”
Democratic Sen. Valencia Seay took issue with that line of reasoning, saying lawmakers were letting their “personal religious beliefs dictate everyone else’s ability to have a choice.”
Democratic Sen. Jen Jordan, questioned whether the standard being contemplated by the legislation was a human heartbeat.
“Every physician has said that the fetal cardiac activity present early in pregnancies is not a beating heart, and no matter how many times you say it, no matter what you call this bill, it does not make it so,” she said.
A large group of women at the Georgia Capitol protested the bill dressed as characters from “The Handmaid’s Tale,” which depicts a dystopian future where women are controlled by the government and forced to breed. The activists in red cloaks and white bonnets have been an almost daily presence ever since the House passed the measure this month.
A smaller contingent of antiabortion advocates held signs and urged lawmakers to pass the bill.
Debate took place amid heavy security. Over two dozen Georgia State Patrol cars flanked the Capitol building.
Two influential groups, the Medical Association of Georgia and the Georgia Academy of Family Physicians, sent letters to lawmakers opposing the legislation.
GOP lawmakers in Tennessee, Florida, South Carolina and Ohio are pursuing similar legislation; Republican governors in Mississippi and Kentucky have recently signed “heartbeat” abortion bans.