Ohio’s ‘Heartbeat Bill’ May Not Be the True Threat to Abortion Rights

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An Ohio bill that would ban abortions as early as six weeks after conception — when many women don’t even know they’re pregnant — has sparked outrage. But while it is unlikely that such a law would hold up in court, another bill in the Buckeye State that has gone widely unnoticed may represent a more imminent danger to women’s rights.

From NBC News:

… it is a mostly unnoticed ban on abortion at 20 weeks, which is expected to advance out of the Ohio House as early as Thursday, that may ultimately present the greater risk to abortion access.

The heartbeat bill, a perennial in the Ohio legislature, has never passed both chambers before, and it came this time as a last-minute attachment to a child abuse-related bill being considered in the lame duck session.

“We’ve been fighting this for about five years now,” said Kellie Copeland, Executive Director of NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio. “We’ve always been able to bottle it up in the Senate.”

That changed, Senate President Keith Faber told reporters this week, because of the election of Donald Trump: “New president, new Supreme Court justice appointees change the dynamic.” … Ohio Right to Life’s preferred vehicle for chipping away at Roe v. Wade is a ban on abortion at 20 weeks, mirroring the priorities of the National Right to Life Committee, which has championed such a ban at the federal level. As a ban on abortion several weeks before viability, it flies in the face of the current Supreme Court standard, but the hope is to nudge the court with the right test case.

— Posted by Natasha Hakimi Zapata