Eight protesters were reportedly arrested outside the Wisconsin state Senate chambers on Thursday after attempting to deliver coat hangers to Republican politicians who supported a bill requiring women to undergo an ultrasound prior to getting an abortion, according to the Capital Times.
A representative from the group of about two dozen protesters, Kelley Albrecht, told the Capital Times that representatives from the offices of two state senators, the state assembly speaker and Gov. Scott Walker (R) refused the coat hangers. Afterward, she said, the group tried to gain access to the Senate chambers where lawmakers were debating the state budget but were locked out by staffers. Police arrested eight individuals outside the chambers and charged them with disorderly conduct, according to protester Peter Adamczak.
Protesters used the coat hanger, a symbol of illegal abortions, to draw attention to the bill, which would require women seeking an abortion to receive an ultrasound and be told what the ultrasound shows. The bill’s critics argued that for a woman less than eight to 12 weeks pregnant, that procedure would likely require a transvaginal ultrasound even though the bill doesn’t mandate one.
“This bill has nothing to do with abortion,” Albrecht, who once had to undergo a transvaginal ultrasound because of pregnancy complications, said. “It has to do with controlling women.”
