Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signed the Texas Heartbeat Bill into law on Wednesday morning. The bill bans most abortions after six weeks.
Parents usually hear the baby’s heartbeat at the six-week checkup via ultrasound.
Abbott tweeted, “In Texas, we will always lead the way to protect the unborn.” He finished it with #ProLife.
Abbott signed the law on Facebook Live.
“Our creator endowed us with the right to life, and yet millions of children lose their right to life every year because of abortion,” said Abbott. “In Texas, we work to save those lives, and that’s exactly what the Texas Legislature did this session. They worked together on a bipartisan basis to pass this bill I’m about to sign that ensures that the life of every unborn child who has a heartbeat will be saved from the ravages of abortion.”
The state legislature passed the bill on May 13.
The legislation states basic biology: “pregnancy begins with fertilization” and “occurs when the woman is carrying the developing human offspring.” The authors said pregnancy is also determined by the date of a female’s last period.
Also from the bill:
Sec. 171.202. LEGISLATIVE FINDINGS. The legislature finds, according to contemporary medical research, that:(1) fetal heartbeat has become a key medical predictor that an unborn child will reach live birth;(2) cardiac activity begins at a biologically identifiable moment in time, normally when the fetal heart is formed in the gestational sac;
The gestational sac is the “structure compromising the extraembryonic membranes that envelop the unborn child and that is typically visible by ultrasound after the fourth week of pregnancy.” It is not the placenta.
The law forbids a physician from knowingly performing or inducing “an abortion or a pregnant woman.”
The physician can perform or induce an abortion if “the physician has determined, in accordance with this section, whether the woman’s unborn child has a detectable fetal heartbeat.”
So the abortion can only happen in a medical emergency. Rape and incest do not count. The person who impregnated the woman “through rape or incest could not sue.”
The Texas Heartbeat Act allows private citizens to “bring a civil action against any person who”:
(1) performs or induces an abortion in violation of this chapter;(2) knowingly engages in conduct that aids or abets the performance or inducement of an abortion, including paying for or reimbursing the costs of an abortion through insurance or otherwise, if the abortion is performed or induced in violation of this chapter, regardless of whether the person knew or should have known that the abortion would be performed or induced in violation of this chapter.
The person cannot “have a connection to an abortion provider or a person seeking an abortion.”
No.
We could have a pro-life SCOTUS and they wouldn’t overturn Roe v. Wade. They’re cowards who use “precedence” as an excuse.
SCOTUS agreed to hear the Mississippi case, which bans abortions after 15 weeks. That ruling will give us some insight, but it likely won’t happen until 2022.
Either way, expect this bill to get shot down in all the courts and eventually SCOTUS. I hate to be such a Debbie Downer, but I have no faith in SCOTUS.
CLICK HERE FOR FULL VERSION OF THIS STORY