Georgia Supreme Court Allows Six-Week Abortion Ban to Remain in Effect as Legal Challenge Continues

October 24, 2023
ACLU
Case: SisterSong v. State of Georgia / Affiliate: ACLU of Georgia

ATLANTA — The Georgia Supreme Court issued a ruling today that allows H.B. 481, a ban on abortion after approximately six weeks of pregnancy, to remain in effect. The court’s majority opinion disregards long-standing precedent that a law violating either the state or federal Constitution at the time of its enactment is void from the start under the Georgia Constitution. Georgia’s ban was blatantly unconstitutional when enacted in 2019 against the backdrop of Roe v. Wade and almost five decades of federal precedent, and therefore unenforceable, as the trial court found. But today’s ruling reversing the lower court’s decision concludes that the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe last year effectively erased that history.

Continued: https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/georgia-supreme-court-allows-six-week-abortion-ban-to-remain-in-effect-as-legal-challenge-continues

USA – Is a Fetus a Person? An Anti-Abortion Strategy Says Yes.

Fetal personhood, which confers legal rights from conception, is an effort to push beyond abortion bans and classify the procedure as murder. In Georgia, it also means a $3,000 tax credit.

By Kate Zernike
Aug. 21, 2022

Even as roughly half the states have moved to enact near-total bans on abortion since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June, anti-abortion activists are pushing for a long-held and more absolute goal: laws that grant fetuses the same legal rights and protections as any person.

So-called fetal personhood laws would make abortion murder, ruling out all or most of the exceptions for abortion allowed in states that already ban it. So long as Roe established a constitutional right to abortion, such laws remained symbolic in the few states that managed to pass them. Now they are starting to have practical effect. Already in Georgia, a fetus now qualifies for tax credits and child support, and is to be included in population counts and redistricting.

Continued: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/21/us/abortion-anti-fetus-person.html

USA – What’s It Like to Get an Abortion in Georgia

What’s It Like to Get an Abortion in Georgia

by Kimberly Lawson
Nov 25 2019

Georgia made national headlines in May when Governor Brian Kemp signed into law a bill that would ban abortion after 6 weeks and define fetuses as people. While the law has been blocked as legal challenges proceed against it, the reality is that it's already difficult to get an abortion in the state.

What Georgia state law says about abortion:

People seeking abortions in Georgia face a number of restrictions. Abortions are prohibited after 20 weeks unless the pregnant person's life is in danger, their physical health will be severely compromised, or there's a lethal fetal anomaly.

Continued: https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/8xwyqg/whats-it-like-to-get-an-abortion-in-georgia

USA – Abortion Bans are an Attack on Democracy

Abortion Bans are an Attack on Democracy
The South has traditionally been a battleground for the some of the biggest conflicts that shape today’s democracy. Current abortion bans in states like Georgia and Alabama are no exception.

9/13/2019
by Deborah Brown

These laws deny people basic freedom to make decisions over their own bodies, and they are part of a centuries-long assault on civil rights that began at our nation’s founding. Attacks on reproductive rights are deeply intertwined with years of attacks on voter rights, particularly for people of color. Restrictions on the fundamental right to decide if, when and how to have children are part of a larger effort to distort democracy, in the service of a small number of extremists, by suppressing freedom and rights for the majority.

It’s not an accident that recent attacks on abortion and voting rights coincide with a rising tide of corporate influence in politics and a wave of political extremism that have made racist tweets from lawmakers, shootings at elementary schools and images of immigrant children in cages common features of American life. These attacks are often even set into motion by the same people.

Continued: https://msmagazine.com/2019/09/13/abortion-bans-are-an-attack-on-democracy/

13.09.2019

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abortion bans an attack on democracy

Inside the ‘fake clinics’ where women are persuaded to carry pregnancies to term

Inside the 'fake clinics' where women are persuaded to carry pregnancies to term
‘Crisis pregnancy centers’ give counseling, pregnancy tests – and outnumber abortion providers three to one in Georgia

by Khushbu Shah in Milledgeville, Georgia
Fri 16 Aug 2019

In her office at the Crossroads Pregnancy Center in Milledgeville, Georgia, Pam Alford hung a picture of a grave-filled cemetery in memory of the thousands of the abortions taking place every day in America. Or so says the caption.

Other indications of the center staff’s attitude to abortion fill public areas of the building. Someone has stenciled “life is beautiful” in a hallway. Figurines of Jesus and the cross line the lunch area walls.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/aug/16/georgia-abortion-crisis-pregnancy-centers

USA – Abortion restrictions hurt business, 180 CEOs say in open letter

Abortion restrictions hurt business, 180 CEOs say in open letter
States that limit reproductive rights undermine efforts to build a diverse workforce and attract talent, the leaders say.

By Rachel Siegel
June 10, 2019

More than 180 CEOs signed an open letter opposing state efforts to restrict reproductive rights, as business leaders weigh how to most effectively exert pressure against abortion bans.

Square chief executive and Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey as well as fashion icon Diane von Furstenberg and others wrote that restrictions on abortion access threaten the economic stability of their employees and customers and make it harder to build a diverse workforce and recruit talent.

Continued: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/06/10/more-than-ceos-sign-letter-opposing-state-restrictions-abortion/?utm_term=.c8b14aee3cb0

Alabama Senate passes nation’s most restrictive abortion ban, which makes no exceptions for victims of rape and incest

Alabama Senate passes nation’s most restrictive abortion ban, which makes no exceptions for victims of rape and incest

By Emily Wax-Thibodeaux and Chip Brownlee
May 14, 2019

MONTGOMERY, Ala. — Alabama lawmakers voted Tuesday to ban virtually all abortions in the state — including for victims of rape and incest — sending the strictest law in the nation to the state’s Republican governor, who is expected to sign it.

The measure permits abortion only when necessary to save a mother’s life, an unyielding standard that runs afoul of federal court rulings. Those who backed the new law said they don’t expect it to take effect, instead intending its passage to be part of a broader strategy by antiabortion activists to persuade the U.S. Supreme Court to reconsider the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling, which legalized abortion nationwide.

Continued: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/alabama-senate-passes-nations-most-restrictive-abortion-law-which-makes-no-exceptions-for-victims-of-rape-and-incest/2019/05/14/e3022376-7665-11e9-b3f5-5673edf2d127_story.html

USA – How Gerrymandering Leads to Radical Abortion Laws

How Gerrymandering Leads to Radical Abortion Laws
Georgia's "fetal heartbeat" bill never would have passed if the state legislature truly reflected the voters' political preferences.

By David Daley
May 14, 2019

Stacey Abrams still hasn’t conceded that she lost to Brian Kemp in last year’s gubernatorial race in Georgia, and perhaps justifiably so. Kemp, formerly the secretary of state there, administered his own election, shuttered precincts in black communities, and presided over a last-minute voting roll purge that targeted predominantly minority voters. Despite all that help, he eclipsed Abrams by fewer than 55,000 votes—another sign of how purple Georgia has become.

Last week, however, the state legislature enacted—and Kemp signed—one of the most extreme “fetal heartbeat” abortion prohibitions in the nation. HB 481, which declares that “unborn children are a class of living, distinct persons,” limits abortions to the first six weeks of pregnancy. If the law is allowed to take effect in January—rather than being held up in the courts—women who miscarry could be investigated by the state to determine whether their pregnancy ended unintentionally or with the help of a doctor or an abortion pill.

Continued: https://newrepublic.com/article/153901/gerrymandering-leads-radical-abortion-laws

USA – What Happens When an Activist Bullies Anti-abortion Protesters

What Happens When an Activist Bullies Anti-abortion Protesters
Health clinics say that staging counterprotests isn’t just counterproductive—“it’s completely inadvisable.”

Elaine Godfrey
May 11, 2019

It’s been a rough week for Brian Sims.

The Pennsylvania Democrat has been pelted with criticism and demands for his resignation from his state House seat in the days since he posted a video of himself aggressively confronting an anti-abortion protester outside a Planned Parenthood clinic. “An old white lady telling people what to do with their bodies? Shame on you!” Sims shouts at the woman in a clip he live-streamed on Periscope. “Push back against Planned Parenthood protesters, PLEASE!” Sims wrote in a message accompanying the video.

Continued: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/05/brian-sims-confronts-protesters-planned-parenthood/589174/

As States Race to Limit Abortions, Alabama Goes Further, Seeking to Outlaw Most of Them

As States Race to Limit Abortions, Alabama Goes Further, Seeking to Outlaw Most of Them

By Timothy Williams and Alan Blinder
May 8, 2019

MONTGOMERY, Ala. — Amid a flurry of new limits on abortion being sought in states around the nation, Alabama is weighing a measure that would go further than all of them — outlawing most abortions almost entirely.

The effort in Alabama, where the State Senate could vote as soon as Thursday, is unfolding as Republicans, emboldened by President Trump and the shifting alignment of the Supreme Court, intensify a long-running campaign to curb abortion access.

Continued: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/08/us/abortion-alabama-ban.html