IN ATLANTA — On Wednesday, protesters from both sides of the abortion issue filled a hallway without any windows in the Georgia Capitol with chants and signs. Lawmakers were there to hear a bill that would almost always ban the procedure.
The bill will not move forward this year because both houses missed the deadline for consideration. However, the hearing that the House’s Republican leadership agreed to give anti-abortion activists a chance to speak out on an issue that was important to their voters.
Dozens of people walked around and yelled words in support of or opposition to the idea. As people tried to get into the hearing room, sheriff’s officers kept an eye on the area. One guy spoke out loud, “I’m so grateful that my mom gave me life” and didn’t “sacrifice” her kids.
People who were in favor of the bill cheered every time someone left the room after speaking.
Tens of thousands of kids made in God’s image are still killed in our state every year, and the law doesn’t change, said Rep. Emory Dunahoo, a Republican from Gillsville who is sponsoring the bill.
The bill says that most abortions are illegal from the moment of fertilization, because that’s when a person is formed, and the process is called a murder. Georgia’s broad “personhood” law already gives unborn children rights like tax breaks and child support. This bill would make that law even stronger. At least five states have rules about who a person is.
In Georgia, abortions are already illegal once a “detectable human heartbeat” is found. This can happen as early as six weeks into pregnancy, when many women still don’t know they are pregnant. A lot of faith leaders said the bill doesn’t go far enough, though.
But there were religious people who were against the plan because they thought it went too far with criminalizing abortion.
Critics of the bill say it would keep women from getting life-saving care when there are problems during birth or during in vitro fertilization. Many people were worried that women who have had miscarriages or who have health problems that could be dangerous would not get the care they need.
Representative Shea Roberts, a Democrat from Atlanta, talked about how she had an abortion to save her life.
Roberts said, “It was one of the worst times of my life. The doctors told me that the dream of my child was going to die either inside me or within minutes outside my body, and it would be in pain.”
Some situations would be exempt under the bill, such as a “spontaneous miscarriage” or treatments done to save a woman’s life “while accompanied by reasonable steps, if available, to save the life of her unborn child.”
Opponents, on the other hand, say that doctors would be too scared to give this kind of care, even when it is needed. They brought up the cases of two women who died because they were delayed in getting care because of Georgia’s abortion rule after taking abortion pills. These cases were reported by ProPublica.
Doctors also said that Georgia already has some of the highest rates of death among mothers in the country, especially for Black women. Opponents of the law said that lawmakers should help them get more care.
Doctors also said that the plan would make in vitro fertilization illegal and would force fertility clinics to close. The bill comes about a month after the House of Representatives of Georgia passed a bill to protect the right to IVF with backing from both parties. Rep. Lehman Franklin, a Republican from Statesboro, pushed for that bill. His wife used IVF to get pregnant.
Dr. Karenne Fru, who runs a fertility center that does IVF, said that the bill would make her unable to work.
“I do God’s work all the time.” “He told us to go out and have children,” Fru said, her voice shaking. “I’ll do that.” Just let me keep doing that, please. I can’t go to jail since I want to help people have kids.
