Iowa law includes exceptions for cases of rape and incest. (Representative)
Washington:
After a year-long legal battle, Iowa became the latest U.S. state to enact a near-total abortion ban on Monday, keeping the blaming issue of reproductive rights at the center of November’s presidential election.
The law bans the termination of almost all pregnancies after six weeks – the point at which the fetus’s heartbeat can be detected – even though many women do not realize they are pregnant at this stage.
Previously, abortion was allowed in the Midwestern state up to twenty weeks’ gestation.
The ban was initially passed and signed by Gov. Kim Reynolds last year, but was suspended by a judge before being reinstated after a narrow 4-3 ruling by the Iowa Supreme Court last month.
“This morning, more than 1.5 million women in Iowa woke up with fewer rights than last night, due to Trump’s new abortion ban,” US Vice President Kamala Harris, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, wrote on X.
Her Republican opponent, former President Donald Trump, appointed three conservative Supreme Court justices who in 2022 helped overturn Roe v. Wade, the landmark decision that had guaranteed a national right to abortion for nearly fifty years.
Iowa law includes exceptions for cases of rape and incest, as well as situations where the life of the fetus or mother is in danger.
However, in states with similar bans, these waivers have often proven ineffective, with hospitals and doctors reluctant to risk prosecution, forcing women to seek care out of state.
“Patients will be forced to travel hundreds of miles from home to find abortion care if they have the means,” said Nancy Northup, president of the Center for Reproductive Rights.
“Others will be forced to postpone a pregnancy, regardless of their decision about what is best for their lives, health, families and futures. People with serious pregnancy complications will be turned away from hospitals until they collapse.”
Challenging issue for Republicans
Iowa is now among 22 states that have adopted stricter abortion standards since the fall of Roe, ranging from outright bans to earlier pregnancy limits.
Trump gave Iowa a more than eight-point lead in 2020, and he is expected to win handily this time too.
Still, the issue of abortion remains a challenge for Republicans, who must deal with the risk of alienating independent and moderate voters.
A March Des Moines Register/Mediacom poll found that 61 percent of Iowans believe abortion should be legal in all or most cases, while 35 percent say it should be illegal in most or all cases — a trend consistent with national opinion polls.
Democrats, on the other hand, have been buoyed by President Joe Biden’s decision to withdraw from the race in favor of Harris, long seen as the administration’s true champion of reproductive rights.
“I don’t think people fully understand how angry women are about Roe being overturned — Harris has the ability to drive that home,” feminist author Jessica Valenti, who runs “Abortion, Every Day” on Substack, recently told AFP.
YouGov polls released last week showed Harris with a 12-point lead over Trump on abortion, significantly more than the five-point lead Biden had over Trump in early July.
On the Republican side, Trump’s running mate JD Vance has widened the divide between the two parties, expressing a desire to make abortion “nationally illegal,” voting against protecting in vitro fertilization and comparing abortion to “slavery ‘.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)