Statewide Iowa (Radio Iowa) — Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds signed into law Friday afternoon the toughest abortion law in the country.
The new law forbids abortions after a fetal heartbeat is detected, which happens around the sixth week of a pregnancy. Three hours before the governor approved the measure, officials from Planned Parenthood of the Heartland and the American Civil Liberties Union of Iowa announced they’d go to court to block the law from going into effect.
That’s Suzanna de Baca, president of Planned Parenthood of the Heartland. The Republican-led legislature passed a bill banning abortions after a fetal heartbeat is detected, which happens around the sixth week of a pregnancy. Governor Reynolds signed the bill into law Friday afternoon. Mark Stringer, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Iowa, says the abortion ban is the most restrictive in the country.
Many of the Republican legislators who spoke in favor of the bill during House and Senate debate are anxious for the matter to go to court, too, hoping it will be the catalyst for overturning Roe v Wade, the 1972 Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion. Erin Davison-Rippey, director of Public Affairs for Planned Parenthood of the Heartland, was the lead-off speaker at Friday’s rally. She says Planned Parenthood and its allies “will persist no matter what.”
Rally-goers also criticized a proposal that’s eligible for a vote in the House and Senate that would deny federal grants to Planned Parenthood sex-ed programs for teenagers. Andi Grubb, director of education for Planned Parenthood of the Heartland, says “tens of the thousands” of Iowa teens take the courses.
Grubbs says classes explain how to use contraceptives to avoid pregnancy and protection to avoid sexually-transmitted diseases. Abstinence is also discussed.
Critics say abortion providers have a “conflict of interest” and should not be involved in government-funded sex ed classes.
