Arizona governor’s signing of abortion law repeal follows political fight by women lawmakers
PHOENIX — Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs’ signing of a repeal of a Civil War-era ban on nearly all abortions was an exciting occasion for the women who helped make the 19th-century law a thing of the past.
Current and former state lawmakers and reproductive rights advocates crowded the 9th floor rotunda outside Hobbs’ office Thursday afternoon, hugging and taking selfies to capture the moment. Some cried.
“It’s a historic moment, and it’s a place and time where exciting moments all come together,” Democratic Rep. Stephanie Stahl Hamilton said at the signing ceremony. does not fit into the present.”
Stahl and Sen. Anna Hernandez, also a Democrat, were the two current lawmakers required to speak at the ceremony for their efforts to secure the repeal of the long-dormant law that bans all abortions except those performed to save the life of a patient to save.
The effort received final legislative approval Wednesday in a 16-14 Senate vote, as two Republican lawmakers joined Democrats in a roughly three-hour session detailing motivations for voting in personal , emotional and even biblical terms. There were graphic descriptions of abortion procedures and amplified audio of a fetus’s heartbeat, along with warnings against “legislating religious beliefs.”
Supporters of the abortion ban in the Senate booed Republican Sen. Shawnna Bolick as she explained her vote for repeal, only to be berated by Republican colleagues. Bolick is married to Supreme Court Justice Clint Bolick, who voted with the majority in April to restore the 1864 law. He faces a retention election in November.
The House of Representatives previously approved the repeal, with three Republicans breaking ranks in that chamber.
Hobbs says this move is just the beginning of a fight to protect reproductive health care in Arizona. The repeal will take effect 90 days after the end of the legislative session, usually in June or July once the budget is approved.
“This means everything to get this archaic, inhumane territorial law off the books,” said Dr. Gabrielle Goodrick, founder of Phoenix-based Camelback Family Planning, which performs a third of Arizona’s abortions.
A 2022 statute banning the procedure after 15 weeks of pregnancy will then become Arizona’s governing abortion law.
Abortion rights advocates, led by Planned Parenthood Arizona, have filed a motion in the state Supreme Court seeking to block the 1846 law from taking effect before its repeal does. If it is rejected, girls and women can expect a pause in abortion services.
The 19th century law had been blocked in Arizona since 1973 with the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Roe v. Wade, which guaranteed the constitutional right to abortion nationwide. When the federal law was overturned in 2022, Arizona was left in legal limbo.
The Arizona Supreme Court last month set the state back decades and reinstated the ban, which provides no exceptions for survivors of rape or incest. The judges suggested that doctors could be prosecuted for breaking the law, with a maximum prison sentence of five years if convicted.
The anti-abortion group defending the ban, Alliance Defending Freedom, argues that prosecutors could begin enforcing it once the Supreme Court’s decision becomes final, which has not yet occurred. Democratic Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes is pushing to delay enforcement of the ban until sometime in late July.
Meanwhile, abortion rights advocates are collecting signatures to enshrine reproductive rights in the Arizona Constitution. A proposed ballot measure would allow abortions until a fetus can survive outside the womb, typically around 24 weeks, with exceptions to save the parent’s life or protect her physical or mental health.
Republican lawmakers are considering putting one or more competing abortion proposals before voters in November.
In other parts of the US, supporters of an abortion rights initiative in South Dakota this week submitted far more signatures than needed to reach a vote this fall, while in Florida a ban on most abortions took effect after six weeks of pregnancy, before many people even know they are pregnant.
President Joe Biden’s campaign team believes anger over the fall of Roe v. Wade will give them a political advantage in battleground states like Arizona, while the issue has divided Republican leaders.
For the Democratic women leading the repeal effort in Arizona, Thursday was a moment of celebration, but it also showed there is still more work to be done, they said.
In an interview before the signing ceremony, Stahl Hamilton spoke about her early years on the Navajo Nation, where her parents were teachers and where federally funded clinics still restrict abortion services.
She told of a sister-in-law who she said struggled with two difficult pregnancies, one that resulted in a stillbirth and a non-viable pregnancy where “they had to make the heartbreaking decision to terminate that pregnancy because there was no brain development.” ”
“And I imagine if any of these laws had been in place at the time she needed care, it would have really wreaked havoc,” Stahl Hamilton said.
When the Civil War-era ban was passed, all 27 lawmakers were men, America was at war over the right to own slaves and women could not vote, Hobbs said. Now the Arizona legislature is about evenly split between men and women.
Hernandez became involved in politics after her younger brother, Alejandro, was killed in a police shooting in April 2019. She and her two other siblings have tattoos of his portrait on their left arms.
Her sister is a labor and delivery nurse and she has two nieces, ages 16 and 12, she said.
“Right now, I think about them being able to grow up in the state we love so much and having the rights that they have,” she said.
Former Democratic state Rep. Athena Salman was so overcome with emotion Thursday that she could barely speak when she was called to the lectern during the signing ceremony. She proposed a repeal of the 19th century law in 2019, three years before Roe v. Wade was overturned.
Salman, who resigned in January to head an abortion rights group, said she can’t stop thinking about her daughters.
“Future generations will not have to live under the restrictions and interference we have had to experience,” she said.