Arkansas GOP eyes Planned Parenthood funds next

March 7, 2013 @ 3:33 pm


| Zoom

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) - Not content with enacting the most restrictive abortion law in the country, Arkansas Republicans plan to press the legislative advantage their party hasn't enjoyed since Reconstruction by making it even more difficult for women to get abortions in the state.

The GOP-controlled Legislature on Wednesday overrode Democratic Gov. Mike Beebe's veto of a bill banning nearly all abortions beginning in the 12th week of pregnancy, when a fetus' heartbeat can typically be detected through an abdominal ultrasound. That law wouldn't take effect until 90 days after the legislative session ends in a month or so, but the Legislature last week overrode a veto of a near-ban on abortions starting in the 20th week. That law took effect immediately.

State Sen. Jason Rapert, who was behind the 12-week ban, now wants to cut all public funding to Planned Parenthood. And the state's top anti-abortion advocacy group is urging lawmakers to ban providers from remotely administering the abortion pill via a video hookup _ a practice they've derided as "webcam abortions."

The moves mark a major shift in a state already considered to have some of the most tightest restrictions on abortion in the nation, and they're worrying Democrats who say the newly Republican-controlled legislative majority is obsessing over abortion at the expense of issues such as education, health care and economic development.

Knowing the Legislature needed only a simple majority in each chamber to override his vetoes, Beebe nonetheless rejected both bans and said they clearly contradict the Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision and the state will end up wasting money having to defend the laws.

The American Civil Liberties Union has already said it will sue to block the 12-week restriction from taking effect, and courts are already weighing the legality of similar 20-week bans passed in other states, which are based on a theory rejected by most experts that a fetus can feel pain by then. On Wednesday, a federal judge deemed Idaho's 20-week ban unconstitutional.

"I was hoping we were finished with what I think is, intended or not, an attack on women," said Sen. Joyce Elliott, a Democrat from Little Rock who has been an outspoken critic of the new abortion restrictions.

Rapert is now calling for the state to prohibit any state or federal funds from going toward any entity that performs abortions. It's a measure that's aimed at cutting off public funding to Planned Parenthood, which doesn't perform surgical abortions in Arkansas but distributes the abortion pill at two facilities in the state. Arkansas' only clinic that performs surgical abortions is in Little Rock.

The proposal would cut off money Planned Parenthood receives from the state for non-abortion programs, including federal grants disbursed by the state to the group for education programs in Little Rock schools on sexually transmitted diseases.

"I'm glad for them to do education and do those sorts of things, but I do not like them utilizing funds, indirectly even, to support their efforts with abortion in our state," Rapert, a Republican from Conway, said Thursday.

Planned Parenthood officials vowed to fight the legislation.

"For many Arkansas women we care for, we are the only health care provider they rely on every year for affordable care including well woman exams, lifesaving cancer screenings, contraception, and STD prevention," said Jill June, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of the Heartland. "Planned Parenthood will fight this dangerous bill just as we fought Senator Rapert's abortion ban - politics should never come between a woman and her medical care."

Republicans, who in January took control of the Legislature for the first time in 138 years, have benefited over the past two elections from President Barack Obama's unpopularity in the state. The abortion laws Republicans have already pushed through are more restrictive than any adopted during the 10 1/2 years that Republican Gov. Mike Huckabee, a vocal abortion opponent and Baptist minister, was in office.

Rapert won re-election last year after defeating a Democratic lawmaker who chaired the House committee that rejected several anti-abortion measures in the 2011 session.

"For years in the state of Arkansas, these types of bills have been filed but have never been able to see the light of day because they were killed in committee who were not pro-life," Rapert said. "That's why you see these bills making it today."

Rapert's 12-week ban goes beyond the restrictions Arkansas Right to Life, the state's chief anti-abortion group, said it would push for during this year's legislative session. The group has already seen two of its three main agenda items _ the 20-week prohibition and legislation banning most abortion coverage in the insurance exchange _ become law.

The group didn't endorse Rapert's 12-week ban but didn't oppose the measure either, Executive Director Rose Mimms said.

"We are incrementalists. That's our strategy," Mimms said. "We try to make inroads where we can. We would love for the heartbeat to be able to be held constitutional."

Mimms said the next step for the group is a measure that would ban the distribution of the abortion pill using telemedicine. Planned Parenthood has said it has no plans to do so in Arkansas, although the idea has been tried in other states to help women in rural areas where abortions aren't readily available.

Republican Sen. Missy Irvin of Mountain View said she's working on wording of the proposed ban and expected to finalize it before the Monday deadline to file legislation.

Beebe, who signed the abortion coverage ban into law this year and has backed other limits on the procedure in the past, repeated his concerns Thursday about the costs of defending the new abortion laws.

"My concern going forward is that they're unconstitutional," Beebe told reporters Thursday. "You know, you put your hand on the Bible and you're supposed to swear to uphold the constitution. It should mean something."

___

Associated Press writer Chuck Bartels contributed to this report.

___

Andrew DeMillo can be reached at www.twitter.com/ademillo


(Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)
More National News
Top Stories

  • One
    Microsoft calls its new Xbox 'truly intelligent TV'

  • Otherworldly
    Amazon has new plans for huge biospheres on its new campus

  • 15 Minutes
    UW meteorologist says science of predicting tornadoes better but needs more muscle
MyNorthwest.com - Purpose of Comments statement
Bonneville Media encourages site users to express their opinions by posting comments. Our goal is to maintain a civil dialogue in which readers feel comfortable. At times, the comments can descend to personal attacks. Please do not engage in such behavior. We encourage your thoughtful comments which: have a positive and constructive tone, are on topic, are respectful toward others and their opinions. Bonneville reserves the right to remove comments which do not conform to these criteria.

Comments (5)


  • Add A Comment

  • FormerMarineSgt wrote...
    I see that the usual Republican 'smaller, less intrusive government is working well in Arkansas
    February 27, 2013 3:52 pm
    Yup. The 'smaller, less intrusive Republican form of government - except when it comes to what WE want to force everyone to accept' is alive and well in The south... I guess that if you happen to believe in actual science and/or differently than they do, you're out of luck - you MUST abide by the specifically allowed set of morals, beliefs and 'lifestyles' or you are criminal - no matter what the US Constitution says... Too bad that the Taliban didn't learn this trick - oh, wait... That's exactly how they do it over there!
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • SickofSeattleite wrote...
    @formermarinesgt
    March 7, 2013 5:39 am
    how is it not morale to scrape and suck out a half grown baby from a mothers womb? 36-40 weeks is full term and premature babies can survive as early as 24 weeks.....just four weeks longer than the current 20 week abortion law. We are talking about human life here. Remember these women are the ones who ALLOWED themselves to be put in a position where there was a POSSIBILITY of conception....why do they get to terminate a life out of simple LAZINESS? Adoption is the answer not scrape, suck and kill.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • FormerMarineSgt wrote...
    @sickofseattleite
    March 7, 2013 6:28 am
    Here's the rub. What's moral to one person may not be moral to another. We have the right to have differing morals in this country - as long as we are not violating the law with those morals (and that includes not violating the law by placing illegal morals based restrictions on legal behavior or actions). -- YOU are talking about taking a human life. OTHERS would not necessarily agree with you, nor are they required to agree with you. I would never ask a woman to have an abortion. HOWEVER - it's not my right to force my morals on everyone else. My morals (yours too) are not inherently superior to anyone elses simply because you or I think the way we do. Whether abortion is or is not murder (that's what you're calling it but you are dancing around using that word) can be debated, however the Supreme Court ruling that allowed abortion cannot be. Abortion is legal. Laws subverting that are ALWAYS deemed unconstitutional restrictions on legal grounds - not moral grounds.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • Rangerhawk wrote...
    A small blow to eugenics
    March 7, 2013 2:14 pm
    This argument will disappear once a male "pill" is invented and made as easily available as women's birth control.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • hnuh wrote...
    formermarinegt...
    March 8, 2013 8:51 am
    Your second comment...Your morals differ from mine... and as long as you're not violating the law there's no foul... What you are saying here is that it was not immoral for one of your apparent ideology's spiritual progenitors the Nazis to stuff all those innocent people into the gas chambers, to shoot them into ditches, to rape, dismember, torture and vivisect them... It was legal in their regime after all. Your "reasoning" is EXACTLY what is wrong with the American left. You should be ashamed to espouse such a twisted, ignorant idea. For your information, murdering innocents is ALWAYS WRONG regardless of what some law says.(and if you have even a speck of humanity you know that is true)
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }