Arizona GOP again blocks effort to repeal 1864 abortion ban
PHOENIX —State House Republicans in Arizona on Wednesday scuttled another effort to repeal the state’s 1864 law banning abortion, defying pressure from prominent Republicans, including former President Donald Trump, who had urged them to toss the ban that many voters viewed as extreme and archaic.
“The last thing we should be doing today is rushing a bill through the legislative process to repeal a law that has been enacted and reaffirmed by the Legislature several times,” House Speaker Ben Toma, a Republican, said as he blocked an effort to vote on the repeal.
The Arizona Supreme Court’s ruling last week to uphold the Civil War-era near-total abortion ban infuriated supporters of abortion rights, exhilarated abortion opponents and set off a political firestorm in Arizona.
Republicans narrowly control both houses of the Arizona Legislature, but foresaw a grave political threat in backing a measure widely seen as out of touch with voters.
Repealing the law, which allows only an exception to save the life of the mother, and says doctors prosecuted under the law could face fines and prison terms of two to five years, would revert Arizona to a 15-week abortion ban.
Republicans initially resisted Democrats’ attempts to repeal the law last week. But Mr. Trump and Kari Lake, the Senate candidate and close Trump ally, said the court had overreached and urged the Legislature to act quickly. Ms. Lake, facing a highly competitive race in November, dialed lawmakers herself and asked how she could help with the repeal effort.
On Wednesday, it initially appeared as though their cajoling might pay off. Democrats signaled that they were optimistic of having enough Republican support to secure a majority and send the repeal bill to the State Senate.
But when one Democrat rose to bring forward her bill to repeal the ban, Republicans successfully prevented a vote on procedural grounds, capping a chaotic morning of maneuvering that saw members huddle to dispute rules and shout out objections.
“The fact that we will not even entertain a motion to allow those who have been raped or pregnant by incest to be able to have an abortion is extremely, extremely disappointing,” State Representative Alma Hernandez, a Democrat, said.
Moments later, the chairman gaveled the House into recess.
The dynamic inside the House reflected the broader one at the heart of the abortion debate. Anti-abortion activists, often conservative
Christians, have become a force in many Republicancontrolled statehouses, giving them outsize influence compared to abortion rights supporters, whose views align with more voters on the issue.
Before the session began on Wednesday morning, the House gallery filled early, largely with anti-abortion supporters who came early at the direction of activist groups to oppose the repeal effort.
At one point, most of the attendees in the balcony stood and extended their hands toward the House floor below, and prayed. “Deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom and the power,” they declared loudly.
Minutes before the session began, Cathi Herrod, president of Center for Arizona Policy, a conservative group that opposes abortion, told the crowd to be respectful and not shout. Another woman stood to say, “We have truth on our side.”
“Whose truth?” one of the few abortion rights supporters retorted. The crowd murmured in disapproval.
Supporters of abortion rights were largely relegated to the overflow, as seats in the gallery were already taken. Rolande Baker, 72, left Tucson at 6:30 a.m. with three fellow abortion rights supporters to make sure she got a seat. She remembered having an abortion when she was 19, and had to drive with her boyfriend to New York from Indiana, where the procedure was not yet legal.
After Republicans succeeded in blocking a vote, she was furious.
“Why won’t these cowards allow the vote to come to the floor?” Ms. Baker asked. “What are they afraid of, that it might just pass? That Arizona just might get ourselves out of the year 1864? Before the end of the Civil War? Before women had a right to vote?”
In the gallery after the vote, Melinda Iyer, 49, of Phoenix, was outraged at the use of procedure to prevent the repeal vote. “This focus on rules and decorum when women do not have basic control over their own bodies is an extreme affront to democracy,” she said.
Democrats’ immediate attempts to repeal the ban failed last week as well. A Republican member of the House had sided with Democrats and put forward a measure to repeal it, but GOP leadership adjourned.
As a second attempt at a repeal loomed this week, both parties scrambled to count votes and game out legislative strategies. Activists and lobbyists jockeyed behind the scenes to sway or hold the handful of Republican lawmakers whose actions could determine the law’s fate.
Democrats gained a new House member on Tuesday, when Junelle Cavero was appointed to fill a vacancy for a Democrat who resigned in April. She arrived in time for the repeal fight on the floor.