New law puts Wyoming at forefront of pill bans

CHEYENNE>> Wyoming has pushed to the front of state efforts to prohibit the most common type of abortion by instituting the nation’s first explicit ban on pills that terminate pregnancies.

Medication abortions, which usually involve taking two prescription medications days apart at home or in a clinic, became the preferred method for ending pregnancy in the U. S. even before the Supreme Court overturned Roe vs. Wade — and now account for more than half of all abortions, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that supports abortion rights.

More than a dozen states now effectively ban abortion pills by prohibiting all forms of abortion, moves made after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned its landmark Roe vs. Wade ruling last year.

Fifteen states restrict access to the pills. Of those, six — Arizona, Indiana, Nebraska, North Carolina, North Dakota and South Carolina — require a doctor to administer them in person. Arizona also bans mailing abortion pills.

But before a law signed Friday by Wyoming Republican Gov. Mark Gordon, no state specifically banned abortion pills. The law passed alongside a new abortion ban that seeks to sidestep issues with an earlier state ban that’s been held up in court.

Whether the abortion pill ban he signed takes effect July 1 as planned remains to be seen.

It could be delayed in the courts if an abortion provider in the state sues over

it. Meanwhile, a federal judge in Texas is considering a case with implications for abortion pill access nationwide

Here’s a look at where abortion stands in Wyoming:

Is abortion now illegal in Wyoming?

Yes. As of Sunday, abortions in all forms are illegal.

The state’s lone clinic providing abortions until the ban was in the tourist mountain town of Jackson. Another clinic in Casper was set to open last year before an arson delayed plans. The clinic, Wellspring Health Access, was hoping to open next month but those plans are now uncertain.

Even before the ban, many women in Wyoming drove to Colorado and elsewhere to get abortions because it was more convenient.

Why Wyoming?

Wyoming has long been a deeply conservative state but one that often avoided weighing in on social matters — live and let live is a credo of rural life in the West.

That’s changing. With a state Legislature more dominated by Republicans than at any point in a century, leaders are able to delve into culture-war issues with hardly any opposition.

Last year, Gordon signed an abortion ban that took effect a month after the Supreme Court overturned Roe. Within hours, Teton County District Judge Melissa Owens suspended the ban, ruling that a lawsuit’s claim it would harm pregnant women and their doctors could have merit.

The two nonprofits and four women who sued also argued that the ban violated a 2012 state constitutional amendment guaranteeing the right to make one’s own health care decisions.

Attorneys for the state said that wasn’t the intent — the amendment passed in response to the Affordable Care Act.

The new, blanket abortion ban specifies abortion is not health care and therefore not protected by the state constitution.