With Oklahoma's legislative session ending Friday, there is pressure to act on Senate Bill 368, a bill initially submitted to clarify that the state's pro-life legislation does not prohibit contraceptives.
Representative Jim Olsen (R) explains that it started out as a "pretty non-controversial bill" assuring women of their right to use contraception, but it has been amended to become a pro-abortion measure that he opposes.
"Now we have a bill that would open up our abortion laws to exceptions for rape and incest and then also for the things that might sometimes be in the contraceptive, just depending on when it hits as it were, but are sometimes abortifacients: the morning-after [pill], Plan B -- that kind of thing," Olsen details.
The House and Senate bills are a bit different, so members are trying to settle that and get it to the floor for a vote in both chambers before the session ends.
"It is possible for it to come out of conference and be heard on," the House representative notes. "It would be first to the floor of the Senate and then the House, but I'm thinking that more than likely, that's probably going to die on the vine as well this year."
But since he cannot know that for sure, he is asking Oklahomans to ask their elected representatives to vote against the measures and keep the strong pro-life laws that have already been passed.
In Oregon, Republicans are standing strong against abortion legislation, and they appear willing to sacrifice their jobs if necessary.
The Oregon Senate was putting a rush on passing a major abortion bill and a proposed ballot initiative that would guarantee a constitutional right to abortion on demand in the state.
Lois Anderson of Oregon Right to Life calls it abortion radicalism at its best, "allowing minors, children of any age, to seek and procure an abortion with no parental involvement at all."
"It's just full of protections for the abortion industry in a state where we already have the most permissive abortion laws in the country," she adds.
Democrats approved House Bill 2002 earlier this month to, among other policies, require Medicaid and private insurers to cover more procedures under the umbrella of "gender-affirming care" and allow minors of any age to get an abortion without needing to notify a parent. The only way parents would be informed of a minor's abortion is if the child gives clinic staff her permission to tell them.
In the Senate, Republicans, who are the minority party, walked out of the discussion.
"There's just this real attitude of the leadership in that well, we're in charge, and we can basically do whatever we want, and you have to follow us," Anderson observes about the Democrats. "These [Republican] men and women are really standing up against this, and it really does come down to this radical abortion bill."
Without the Republicans, there is no quorum, which means the Senate cannot take action on any of the bills before the body.
The session ends June 25th.
