Red state legislatures across the board are gleefully embracing their extremism and passing draconian anti-abortion laws with no exceptions for rape and incest, despite the overwhelming approval (84%!) of such exceptions among American voters.
Republicans in the state of Ohio are the latest to pass an anti-abortion bill without exceptions, and as their policies grow crueler and more deranged, so do their justifications.
The sponsor of House Bill 598, Rep. Jean Schmidt, publicly argued that "rape is a difficult issue and it emotionally scars the individual, all or in part, for the rest of their life, just as child abuse does. But if a baby is created, it is a human life…It is a shame that it happens but there is an opportunity for that woman, no matter how young or old she is, to make a determination about what she's going to do to help that life be a productive human being."
Add your name to demand the Justice Department take legal action to stop Ohio's vicious and unconstitutional abortion ban!
It is beyond horrifying to hear an elected representative speak so dismissively of the trauma of sexual assault victims while further depriving them of agency of their own bodies, and speaks to how little the supporters of this bill care for the pregnant people who will have major life decision made for them by a complete stranger.
HB 598 flies in the face of the long-established legal precedents established in Roe v. Wade. The Biden administration must step in to protect the reproductive rights of Ohioans!
Stop Ohio's draconian anti-abortion bill!
