COLOMBIA, SC (WRDW / WAGT) – A bill that would make a doctor’s abortion a crime after detecting a “fetal heartbeat” was approved by the Senate Subcommittee on Medical Affairs.
The legislation, which was hotly debated in the last session, would prevent pregnant women from seeking an abortion six to seven weeks after conception. If a doctor ignored this law, he or she could face up to two years in prison, a $ 10,000 fine, or both. Subcommittee members also noted that being accused of a crime would deprive a doctor of his license to practice medicine.
The version of the bill that was approved by the subcommittee includes only one exception for abortions: if pregnancy threatens the mother’s life, but the senators talked about adding exceptions for pregnancies as a result of rape or incest and signaled that they want to discuss adding these additions when the project reaches the Medical Affairs Committee in full.
After the 3-2 subcommittee’s vote on Thursday to advance the bill, Senator Tom Davis (R-Beaufort) said he expects it to be submitted to the entire committee next week. He believes it will be approved by the commission, but can be changed before it reaches the Senate floor.
“My expectation is that the Senate will talk about the matter in a few weeks. Not several months, several weeks, ”said Davis.
Davis refuted accusations that this bill is being passed by the General Assembly.
“In the last session, people need to remember that this bill received several weeks of testimonials from people. It is a very mature project, it is a very examined project, ”he said.
The bill is officially known as S1 and Davis said it is not a mistake that this was the first bill submitted to the Senate.
“I think the fact that this project has been accepted is an indication that a substantial part of the caucus thinks this will be a priority,” he said.
Attempts to pass similar bills in the past have died in the Senate, but now Republicans have an even greater majority in the House than in previous years. Democrats lost three seats in the 2020 elections, giving them a total of 16 Senate members, while Republicans have 30. It would take 24 members, a simple majority, to pass the Senate bill.
Senate minority leader Brad Hutto, D-Orangeburg, is hopeful that some Republicans will decide not to vote with his party when the bill reaches the floor. Hutto said his caucus plans to fight vigorously against this bill and called the legislation “bad policy”.
Hutto, along with Senator Marlon Kimpson, D-Charleston, questioned whether the “Fetal heartbeat” bill is constitutional. Democrats said that because six weeks is the start of a woman’s pregnancy, she may not even know she is pregnant 40 to 50 days after conception.
Therefore, they believe that this bill would effectively be a ban on abortion in South Carolina, which would mean that it does not agree with Roe v. Wade.
Hutto said he did not even think that this potential law would reach the Supreme Court if it were passed because other states have already passed similar laws that have already gone to the higher court.
“There are other states that are way ahead of us in getting other cases in line for such a decision, if the Supreme Court decides to take that issue. It is absolutely futile for South Carolina to do that. We will expose taxpayers to legal fees that can be avoided ”.
Governor Henry McMaster made it clear during his State of the State address that he will sign this bill if or when he crosses his desk.
“Send me the heartbeat bill and I will immediately sanction it,” he said.
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