Mon Jul 17, 2023 – 2:17 pm EDT
DES MOINES (LifeSiteNews) – Iowa Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds signed into law Friday a ban on aborting babies with detectable heartbeats, sending a message to justices on the state’s highest court who had questioned whether the policy was still the will of the state’s elected representatives.
CNN reports that the law bans abortion starting at around six weeks, with exceptions for rape, incest, fatal fetal abnormalities, threats to the mother’s life, and miscarriages, while allowing abortion for any reason prior to the detection of a fetal heartbeat. The law says it is “not to be construed to impose civil or criminal liability on a woman upon whom an abortion is performed in violation of the division,” but rather punishes abortionists.
Iowa already has a heartbeat abortion ban on the books from 2018, but last month the Iowa Supreme Court deadlocked on its legality, with a 3-3 vote that resulted in it continuing to be blocked from enforcement. Three argued that the law should be allowed to take effect in light of the U.S. Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade last year; three held that, as Justice Thomas Waterman
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