Arizona’s Anti-Abortion ‘Trigger Laws’ Aim for the Supreme Court

Arizona state Senate Republicans are drafting draconian “trigger laws” that would take effect if Roe v. Wade were struck down.

Senate Bill 1457, approved by the Senate on March 4, would make performing an abortion based on a “genetic abnormality” of an unborn child a Class 3 felony, with a minimum sentence of 2-1/2 years in jail, Phoenix New Times reports.

The bill also grants fetuses 14th Amendment status as citizens born on US soil and mandates cremating their remains.

These trigger laws would also gag individuals at educational institutions from referring pregnant women to abortion clinics.

New Times reports that one woman, Kristin Williams, who is opposed to SB 1457, said she chose to get an abortion to end a pregnancy due to “fetal anomalies” and health concerns stemming from a “history with previous high-risk pregnancies.”

Denise Burke, senior counsel for the Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative group, told Phoenix New Times, “The US Supreme Court is zealous of vindicating the rights of people even potentially subjected to disability discrimination.”

Homicide Charges Against Women and Doctors

In January, State Representative Walt Blackman was denounced by pro-choice women for the punitive measures in his abortion prohibition House Bill 2650.

The bill would force prosecutors to file homicide charges against women who have abortions and the doctors who administer them. Even some Republicans said they couldn’t vote for this cruel law.

Blackman told the PBS News Hour he does not want to see women go to jail, but he also doesn’t want to see “babies murdered.”

Blackman said he is concerned about the rate of abortions across the country, particularly in the Black community.

CDC data shows abortion rates dropped by 24 percent from 2009 to 2018. However nearly 34 percent of all abortions in 2018 were obtained by Black women, who comprise only 13 percent of US females, NPR reports.

Abortion rights advocates argue that taking away this reproductive choice would harm the Black community more than help it.

“We, as Black women, choose abortion more than any other group in the country, and I think common sense would give you countless reasons for why that is: from poverty being overrepresented in our community to systemic racism to higher infant and maternal mortality rates,” Shyrissa Dobbins, a reproductive justice attorney, told NPR.

Wacko Wendy Rogers

Meanwhile, the Senate advanced SB 1362, sponsored by state Senator Wendy Rogers, a known QAnon crackpot.

It equates emergency contraception, such as Plan B, to abortion.

Another bill proposed by Rogers, SB 1381, would make performing abortions based on the “disability of the child” or the “parent of the child” a Class 2 felony.

Currently Outlawed

Arizona maintains some of the most onerous restrictions on abortion in the US. As of March 2020, the following laws are in effect, Orent Law reports.

• A woman seeking an abortion is required to undergo in-person counseling at a designated abortion facility. This counseling is designed to discourage her from going through with the abortion. After the counseling, the woman must wait another 24 hours before undergoing the abortion.
• A minor cannot obtain an abortion without parental consent.
• Healthcare professionals cannot use telemedicine to prescribe the abortion medication, mifepristone. (This law places an undue burden on women trying to obtain an abortion during the pandemic, in violation of Planned Parenthood v. Casey, which says no undue burden shall be placed on a woman trying to have an abortion.)
• Medicaid does not cover abortions in Arizona, even if they are medically necessary.
• An ultrasound must be performed at least 24 hours before an abortion. The healthcare provider must allow the patient a chance to see the ultrasound before the abortion is performed.

Oust the Republicans

Progressives say these anti-abortion trigger laws will drive voters to the polls to oust Republican lawmakers who think they can stick their noses into women’s personal lives in violation of Roe.

If the Arizona trigger laws were to reach the Supreme Court, there is no telling what the newly conservative Court would do. However, Roe is settled law and not easily tossed aside, especially by Chief Justice John Roberts, who wants to maintain an impartial Court.

However, his four conservative brethren: Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, and Brett Kavanaugh, voted to strike down a clinic shutdown law last year.

Roberts voted with the liberal majority to uphold the abortion precedent.

Justice Amy Coney Barrett has no track record of abortion rulings in the High Court yet, although she ruled that Down Syndrome embryos should not be aborted, while serving on the US 7^th Circuit Court of Appeals. (She was overruled.)

Her youngest son, Benjamin, has Down Syndrome.