Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed a package of pro-abortion bills on Tuesday that will protect abortion businesses and harm women and children. The eight bills aim to codify abortion as a right in state law and repeal pro-life laws that abortion advocates claim prevent access to abortion.
According to Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, the bills aim to remove the ban on D&X (partial-birth abortion) in the public health code, remove health and safety standards for abortion businesses, and allow abortion businesses to avoid sharing information about the risks and complications of abortion with women. The bills remove all licensing and inspection for facility cleanliness and safety and revoke the reporting of abortion complications and the need for patients’ informed consent. However, Whitmer did not sign a ninth bill which the legislation she did sign is dependent upon, according to The Detroit News.
When she does sign that ninth bill as expected next week, it will codify the language in the November 2022 constitutional amendment, repeal Michigan’s partial birth abortion ban in the penal code (though there is a federal ban on partial birth abortion), and allow abortion a “quick child” — the old standard for viability, when a mother can first feel her baby move — to be aborted. It would also end the requirement that insurance carriers make customers pay for an additional rider for abortion coverage.
Partial-birth abortion (D&X) illustration
“These are politically motivated, medically unnecessary restrictions on hallway width, ceiling height, HVAC system and janitors’ closets,” Whitmer claimed. “… These have nothing to do with providing the necessary health care. All these restrictions do is increase costs, especially for independent clinics, and decrease the number of (abortion) providers that are available to Michiganders.”
Last year, Michigan voters enshrined abortion as a state constitutional right with the passage of Proposal 3, also known as the Right to Reproductive Freedom Initiative. Largely an effort of pro-abortion groups like the ACLU and Planned Parenthood, the text of Prop 3 includes language prohibiting the state from “penaliz[ing], prosecut[ing], or otherwise tak[ing] adverse action against an individual based on their actual, potential, perceived, or alleged pregnancy outcomes.”
Two pro-abortion bills were taken off the table by legislators, including one to allow the Medicaid funding of abortion and repeal the 24-hour waiting period before an abortion. The final legislation also does not include the planned repeal of mandatory screening for coerced abortion. Those laws are still on the books for now, leading the American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan and Planned Parenthood of Michigan to call the final package a “watered-down” version of the Reproductive Health Act that “lacks key policy reforms.”
