Wisconsin legislature approves abortion restrictions News
Photo Credit: Carrie Thompson
Wisconsin legislature approves abortion restrictions

The Wisconsin State Assembly approved a package of abortion restrictions Wednesday.

The Assembly passed a series of six different bills all aimed at stricter regulation of abortion in the state. AB180 requires doctors in the state to inform women undergoing a chemically induced abortion that they can stop the procedure while the first set of drugs are being administered. In addition, the bill proposes a public registry that discloses the names and locations of doctors and hospitals that perform abortions. AB179 is a “born alive” law, similar to the ones recently passed in Georgia, that requires doctors to care for a child that is born as a result of a failed abortion. AB183 and AB181 restricts the availability of funding to hospitals, doctors and clinics that provide abortions. Finally, AB182 bans women from seeking an abortion because of the race, sex or disability of a fetus. The votes were almost entirely along party lines, with the Republican majority of the Assembly voting in favor of the restrictions. The bills have not yet been presented in the state’s upper legislative house, the Wisconsin Senate, and Democratic governor Tony Evers has already announced that he plans to veto some of the bills if they come before him.

The Wisconsin bills mirror many other states that are attempting to heavily regulate a woman’s access to an abortion. On Wednesday Alabama passed a sweeping near-total ban on abortions in the state, while “fetal heartbeat” bills that prohibit abortions after six weeks into the pregnancy have been approved in Georgia, Ohio and Tennessee.