Reynolds hadn’t indicated before Friday whether she would approve the legislation, but noted: “I’m pro-life. I’m proud to be pro-life. I’ve made that very clear.”
Maggie DeWitte, who leads the group Iowans for Life, called Reynolds’ move “historic.”
“We couldn’t be more pleased,” DeWitte said. “She is following through on her pledge to the people of Iowa that she is 100 percent pro-life.”
The bill signing came shortly after the Iowa affiliates of Planned Parenthood and the American Civil Liberties Union warned that they would sue the governor if she signed the bill, which the Republican-controlled Legislature quickly approved in after-hours votes earlier in the week.
“We will challenge this law with absolutely everything we have on behalf of our patients because Iowa will not go back,” Suzanna de Baca, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of the Heartland, said in a statement.
The legislation has propelled Iowa to the front of a push among conservative statehouses jockeying to enact restrictive regulations on the medical procedure. Mississippi passed a law earlier this year banning abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy, but it’s on hold after a court challenge.
The Iowa bill bans most abortions once a fetal heartbeat is detected, which is around six weeks of pregnancy. There are some exemptions that allow abortions at a later pregnancy stage to save a pregnant woman’s life or in some cases of rape and incest.
Backers of the so-called “heartbeat” bill — which didn’t get a single Democratic vote in the Legislature during final passage — expressed hope it could challenge Roe vs. Wade, the landmark 1973 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that established women have a right to terminate pregnancies until a fetus is viable. Conservatives say an influx of right-leaning judicial appointments under President Donald Trump could make it a possibility.
Critics argued the bill would ban abortions before some women even know they’re pregnant. That likely sets the state up for a legal challenge, including from the same federal appeals court that three years ago struck down similar legislation approved in Arkansas and North Dakota.
In Iowa, the same Republican-majority Legislature passed a 20-week abortion ban last year. It’s now in effect, though a provision requiring a three-day waiting period to get an abortion is tied up in a lawsuit filed by Planned Parenthood and the ACLU. Still, Republican lawmakers indicated they would push for more restrictions this session.
Outside of Reynolds’ office earlier Friday, critics of the bill began leaving coat hangers by her staff’s desks. The protests followed the morning rally outside of the Capitol where more than 100 people showed up to oppose the legislation. One of them was Georgia Jecklin, a retired teacher who drove in from Davenport.
“As a 66-year-old woman, I feel very strongly that women have a right to their own body decisions,” she said.
Well, it’s only money. We can stop providing pre-natal health-care to pay for these legal challenges.
From a purely political standpoint, I think it would be great news for Democrats and progressives if an abortion bill like this will gets before the Supreme Court ASAP. With the current makeup of the court, the vote to overturn Roe is 5 to 3 against with one vote unknown. The unknown vote belongs to Republican appointee (Dubyia) Justice Roberts.
The reason this is important is that if Roberts votes in favor of these restrictions it means that overturning Roe is currently 5 to 4 in favor of keeping Roe with the oldest two justices, Ginsberg 85 and Kennedy 81, being in the current 5 majority to keep Roe. With Republicans and Trump vowing to appoint justices to overturn Roe, this would make the entire Midterm elections and the 2020 election about abortion which most people want legal.
If, however, Roberts votes to uphold Roe, it would mean that once again the GOP lied to America about its commitment to make abortion illegal and therefore people who vote Republican because of opposition to abortion have no reason to vote Republican.
Therefore I see the Iowa Governor signing this bill as a win/win for Democrats providing they do not find a way to blow it. It means that after 40 years of saying they are against abortion, Republicans will either prove they really are against abortion or that for 40 years Republicans have been lying about their opposition to abortion.
“I’m pro-life. I’m proud to be pro-life. I’ve made that very clear.”
No, you are not, you are pro-birth, which is different.
Dear AP, what sets this up for a court fight is that currently settled law from the supreme court that says the first trimester is off limits for state regulation. The fact that the bill was passed and signed by a bunch of psychos who are objectively in favor of more dead women, and thus criminalizes behavior that occurs before a pregnancy is known to exist is just a bonus.
Virtue signaling theo-fascist peacocks.