Vermont Could Be First State To Guarantee Abortion Rights In Constitution

Voters will soon get to decide on an amendment that's been in the making for nearly two years.

By Lydia O'Connor
02/09/2022

As another wave of Republican-backed efforts in red states is severely limiting access to abortion, Vermont lawmakers have approved an amendment that would enshrine the right to the procedure in the state’s constitution.

The proposed article will now be put to voters, who could make Vermont the first state to put such a protection in its constitution. If passed, the amendment will affirm that “an individual’s right to personal reproductive autonomy is central to the liberty and dignity to determine one’s own life course and shall not be denied or infringed unless justified by a compelling State interest achieved by the least restrictive means.”

Continued: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/vermont-abortion-constitution_n_620419d3e4b083bd1cb9568d

09.02.2022

State legislatures in U.S. poised to act on abortion rights

Wilson Ring, The Associated Press
Published Tuesday, December 28, 2021

MONTPELIER, VT. -- Early in the new year, the Vermont House of Representatives is due to begin debate on an amendment that would enshrine the right to abortion in the state constitution and send the question to voters in the fall.

Because the process began two years ago, it's a coincidence that Vermont lawmakers will be considering the Reproductive Liberty Amendment while the U.S. Supreme Court is considering a case that could severely erode a right that has stood for half a century.

Continued: https://www.ctvnews.ca/world/state-legislatures-in-u-s-poised-to-act-on-abortion-rights-1.5721182

USA – 2019 Was a Banner Year for Abortion Laws—and Not the Kind You Think

2019 Was a Banner Year for Abortion Laws—and Not the Kind You Think
Anti-abortion legislation got the headlines, but there was an even bigger surge in state-level abortion protections.

December 22, 2019
Jessica Washington

This year will be remembered for an unprecedented red-state assault on reproductive rights. From a wave of early-term abortion bans in the South and Midwest to a host of policies aimed at preventing providers from having open conversations with patients about abortion, conservative state legislators have done everything in their power to limit the right to abortion. But out of the headlines, 2019 was actually a banner year for abortion protections, as progressives in blue states started to fight back and win major legislative battles to protect the rights enshrined in Roe v. Wade. In 2019, more legislation was passed by Democratic statehouses to protect the right to abortion than in the entire previous decade.

Continued: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/12/2019-was-a-banner-year-for-abortion-laws-and-not-the-kind-you-think/

USA – Abortion. Transgender rights. Voting access. Polarizing issues could dominate statehouse agendas in 2020.

Abortion. Transgender rights. Voting access. Polarizing issues could dominate statehouse agendas in 2020.

By Tim Craig and Emily Wax-Thibodeaux
Dec. 22, 2019

Republican-controlled state legislatures are gearing up to try to tighten abortion laws across the country, while some states controlled by Democrats are looking to enshrine the right to choose into law.

It’s one of a handful of deeply polarizing issues that could dominate state legislatures in 2020, a potential sign of the partisan gridlock that’s to come — and the efforts to rally supporters during a hyperpartisan presidential election year.

Continued: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/abortion-transgender-rights-voting-access-polarizing-issues-could-dominate-statehouse-agendas-in-2020/2019/12/22/57ae576c-2043-11ea-bed5-880264cc91a9_story.html

What explains Donald Trump’s war on late-term abortions?

What explains Donald Trump’s war on late-term abortions?
Attacks on the rare but controversial procedures are designed to please more than evangelicals

Aug 22nd 2019

WHILE LEROY CARHART, a doctor who specialises in late-term abortions, was finishing his most recent termination, the manager of his clinic in Bethesda, Maryland, outlined the procedure. Abortions in the second half of pregnancy take between two and four days, said Christine Spiegoski, a nurse wearing a T-shirt that read: “Don’t like abortion? Prevent pregnancy by f**king yourself!” First, the doctor injects potassium chloride or digoxin into the fetus’s heart, killing it within minutes. If he is unable to reach the heart and instead pumps the drug into the amniotic sac, death can take up to 24 hours. Dr Carhart euthanises the fetus at the beginning of the procedure because its tissue and skull then soften and contract, easing removal. At 25 weeks a fetus weighs around a pound and a half and is over a foot long; some of those Dr Carhart aborts are older.

Continued: https://www.economist.com/united-states/2019/08/22/what-explains-donald-trumps-war-on-late-term-abortions