The law bans abortions at 12 weeks if a heartbeat is detected, with some exceptions. | REUTERS Fight brewing over Ark. abortion law

Abortion rights groups are gearing up for a legal fight against Arkansas’s new law banning abortions after 12 weeks, the most restrictive early abortion ban in the nation.

The Republican-led Arkansas House voted Wednesday to override Democratic Gov. Mike Beebe’s veto of a bill that bans most abortions after 12 weeks. The Senate upheld the ban Tuesday.


Cecile Richards, president of Planned Parenthood Action Fund, called it “the most restrictive ban on safe and legal abortion in the country.”

The law, known as the Human Heartbeat Protection Act, bans abortions at 12 weeks into pregnancy if a heartbeat is detected, with exceptions for cases of rape or incest, to save the life of the mother or for a lethal fetal condition. It will take effect 90 days after the Legislature adjourns.

Abortion rights groups said they plan to challenge it in court within the next few weeks and predicted it would be easily overturned as the 12-week limit flies in the face Supreme Court precedent established in Roe v. Wade.

It’s the second veto override of an Arkansas abortion measure in two weeks. Last week, both Republican-controlled chambers voted to override Beebe’s veto of a separate bill setting a 20-week limit on most abortions.

That law, which went into effect immediately, prohibits abortions after 20 weeks except in cases of rape, incest or to save the life of the mother. That law does allow abortion if the woman has a health emergency but does not make an exception for a lethal fetal condition.

Together, abortion rights advocates say, the two laws create some of the most stringent restrictions any state has attempted in years.

In his veto statement Monday, Beebe had said the 12-week limit — roughly the first trimester of pregnancy — “blatantly contradicts” Supreme Court precedent because it would impose a ban on elective, nontherapeutic abortions before a fetus reaches viability, or the ability to survive outside the womb. That is usually considered around 23 or 24 weeks — earlier than when Roe was passed 40 years ago as neonatal care has advanced.

Beebe also warned that if passed, the law could trigger a legal battle that could prove costly to Arkansas taxpayers.

Before the vote, Arkansas state Rep. Ann Clemmer, a Republican, asked lawmakers to override the veto because the state law declares “a 12-week-old baby in utero a person … [whose] life is to be protected not only from a third party, but from a mother herself.”

After the House vote, abortion rights groups blasted the law as the most extreme in the nation.

Anthony Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union, said “The Arkansas Legislature has the shameful distinction of passing the worst impediment to women’s reproductive health in decades.”

The ACLU said it will partner with the abortion rights organization the Center for Reproductive Rights to challenge it. Their suit will challenge just the 12-week ban, not the 20-week one, as the two laws would require separate lawsuits.

“We are preparing the papers to go to court as we speak. In fact, we’ve been working on them since the bill was filed,” said Rita Sklar, executive director of the ACLU of Arkansas, in an interview before the House vote.

“It is flat-out unconstitutional. … it would be the most extreme, severe abortion law in the country,” Sklar said.

Nancy Northup, president of the Center for Reproductive Rights, called the law “just bumper-sticker legislation with really no chance of standing up in court.”

“It could be challenged in either state or federal court and we would expect to get an injunction immediately,” she added.

Nine other states besides Arkansas have enacted laws that ban abortions after 20 weeks, based on the assertion that the fetus can experience pain at that point in pregnancy. The leading organization of U.S. obstetricians and gynecologists says there is no legitimate scientific information to support that statement.

Abortion rights groups have been slower to bring legal challenges to fight those laws, but two – in Arizona and Georgia — have already been challenged in court.

In both cases, the plaintiffs are arguing the 20-week ban constitutes a pre-viability abortion ban that should not stand. Both laws have been temporarily blocked while the courts consider the cases.

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