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Wisconsin Governor signs abortion bill requiring ultrasounds

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MADISON, Wis. — Gov. Scott Walker quietly signed a contentious Republican bill Friday that would require women seeking abortions to undergo an ultrasound and ban doctors who lack admitting privileges at nearby hospitals from performing the procedures.

Opponents contend legislators shouldn't force women to undergo any medical procedure and the bill will force two abortion clinics where providers lack admitting privileges to shut their doors. The law takes effect Monday. Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin and the American Civil Liberties Union filed a federal lawsuit within hours of the signing alleging the bill is unconstitutional and asking for a temporary restraining order blocking the measure.

"What the Legislature has done is to set up a system where the ability to provide abortions is contingent on the decision of a private institution and that's unconstitutional," Planned Parenthood's attorney, Lester Pines, said in an interview.

A spokeswoman for the state Department of Justice, which defends state laws, said agency attorneys would review the lawsuit and respond in court.

The bill is part of a broad GOP push to dramatically curtail abortions nationally.

North Dakota's governor, Republican Jack Dalrymple, signed a law this spring that outlaws abortions as early as six weeks into a pregnancy, making North Dakota the most restrictive state in the nation to get an abortion. The state's lone abortion clinic has filed a federal lawsuit seeking to block the law.

Republicans in Arkansas this spring passed a law that bans most abortions after 12 weeks. The American Civil Liberties Union of Arkansas and the Center for Reproductive Rights. A federal judge has temporarily blocked that law. A trial has been tentatively scheduled for next year.

Alabama passed a law similar to the Wisconsin bill in April requiring abortion providers to have admitting privileges at a local hospital. The ACLU and Planned Parenthood filed a lawsuit contending the law would shut down three clinics because doctors at the clinics haven't been able to get admitting privileges at nearby hospitals. A federal judge temporarily blocked the law in June. Another federal judge has temporarily blocked Mississippi officials from closing down that state's only abortion clinic because providers there lack admitting privileges.

Under the new Wisconsin law, any woman seeking an abortion would have to get an ultrasound. The technician would have to point out the fetus' visible organs and external features. Abortion providers would have to have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles to perform the procedures.

Supporters argue ultrasounds will help the woman bond with the fetus and convince her to save it. The admitting privileges requirement ensures a woman who suffers an abortion-related complication has an advocate who can explain what happened when she reaches a hospital, they say.

Opponents maintain the law authorizes the government to dictate medical procedures. They've blasted the admitting privileges as ridiculous, saying an ambulance would take an ailing woman to the nearest hospital regardless of whether the abortion provider has admitting privileges.

Walker, a Republican, didn't sign the bill in public, instead sending out a statement early Friday afternoon saying the bill was now law.

"This bill improves a woman's ability to make an informed choice that will protect her physical and mental health now and in the future," the statement said.

The fight now shifts to court, just as it has in other states.

Planned Parenthood and the ACLU allege the admitting privileges will force a Planned Parenthood abortion clinic in Appleton to close as well as the Affiliated Medical Services abortion clinic in Milwaukee to close. The physicians in both clinics lack local admitting privileges and don't have time to secure any before the law takes effect, the lawsuit alleges.

Hospitals often grant privileges only to physicians who guarantee a minimum number of annual referrals, a requirement the abortion providers can't meet because abortion problems that require hospitalization are rare, according to the lawsuit. And some hospitals won't grant admitting privileges to abortion providers out of political, ideological or religious reasons, the lawsuit added.

Without a clinic in Appleton northern Wisconsin women will have to travel hundreds of miles to obtain abortions at Planned Parenthood's remaining clinics in Madison and Milwaukee, the lawsuit said.

The case fell to U.S. District Judge William Conley. It was unclear whether he would take any action before Monday.

Barbara Lyons, executive director of Wisconsin Right to Life, praised Walker for following through on promises to sign the bill. She said the law is on solid legal ground, noting eight other states have similar admitting privileges requirements for abortion privileges.

"It's no surprise they'll be challenging," she said of Planned Parenthood. "They see their livelihood threatened, their income threatened. We don't think in the long run they'll be successful."

The ACLU has already filed a federal lawsuit and a motion to stay the bill, so that's good at least. And if you thought Walker was unpopular before, well, lol.
 

FreakyLocz14

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This is a great bill! Liberals always say that abortion should be "safe, legal, and rare", well this bill complies will all three. It requires qualified doctors to perform the risky and life-changing procedure, makes sure that women make a fully-informed decision, but ultimately keeps abortion legal.
 

Aeon.

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This is a great bill! Liberals always say that abortion should be "safe, legal, and rare", well this bill complies will all three. It requires qualified doctors to perform the risky and life-changing procedure, makes sure that women make a fully-informed decision, but ultimately keeps abortion legal.
I'm fine with that kind of stuff. It makes people make sure if they really want to do it. It's not like they're completely trying to outlaw it...
 

ANARCHit3cht

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I see nothing wrong with this. It is an improvement in the safety of the procedure, and urges women to forgo an abortion without encroaching upon their rights to any considerable extent. I have always been strongly pro-choice in all matters abortion, but I could really get behind something like this.
 
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You know, it's funny. When the federal health care bill (The Affordable Care Act) was being debated, Republicans in both the House and the Senate were crying foul over what they saw as government intrusion in the people's health care. And then they go ahead and do something like this, forcing people to undergo an unnecessary medical procedure at the expense of the patient. And when it comes to the requirement to have the doctors at abortion clinics have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals, this is simply a way to eliminate abortion clinics since very few hospitals allow doctors who perform abortions admitting privileges.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again, the U.S. is a completely backwards country when it comes to people's civil rights. Beyond the freedom of speech (which even then some governments in the U.S. attempt to restrict) and the freedom to bear arms, the U.S. has to be dragged kicking and screaming into the modern world. It has tailed in every civil rights movement, from women's rights to slavery, to abortion, to equal rights for the LGBT community.
 
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Forcing clinics to have admitting privileges ensures that many will shut down because they don't have or can't get them. It has nothing to do with the skill of the medical staff or the quality of care at the clinic so to say that these restrictions are making things safer for women is ingenuous at best.

Ultrasounds are medically unnecessary and they cost money. They're like a poll tax - an extra burden designed to reduce the number of people looking to exercise their freedom of choice. Only instead of voting it's access to abortion services.

Abortions are already safe when people have free access to them. It's when you restrict the options that people get desperate. Forcing more clinics to close, forcing extra procedures makes it harder to get an abortion. It should not be hard to get one because that will cause some women to suffer. Either they will have to pay more money or make other sacrifices, they will seek alternate and unsafe methods, or they will be forced to keep a pregnancy they don't wish to have. That is not the "safe, legal, and rare" that people talk about. "Safe, legal, and rare" is about having free access so that no one is forced into unsafe and illegal methods. The rare part is about not having so many unwanted pregnancies in the first place, not about keeping the same numbers of unwanted pregnancies while reducing the number who can get abortions. That should be obvious. I mean, imagine that there are on average 100 women for every 10,000 women who are pregnant and looking for abortions. You can either provide education and contraceptive help to reduce that number of pregnancies in the first place, and therefore the number of abortions, or you can just restrict the number of abortions that are allowed regardless of the number of pregnancies.
They are not, as Freaky seems to imply, the same thing and what people who advocate for abortion rights mean when they say they want abortions to be rare.

tl;dr laws like these only make it harder to get an abortion and force people into extra, unnecessary hardship
 
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I see nothing wrong with this. It is an improvement in the safety of the procedure, and urges women to forgo an abortion without encroaching upon their rights to any considerable extent. I have always been strongly pro-choice in all matters abortion, but I could really get behind something like this.

Except it isn't. It's requiring forced ultrasounds in a devious way designed to try to guilt trip the woman into walking back her decision, and making her submit to an unwanted procedure.

I'm fine with that kind of stuff. It makes people make sure if they really want to do it. It's not like they're completely trying to outlaw it...

See above.

I don't agree with requiring ultrasounds, but wouldn't having the admitting privileges be beneficial?

Not necessarily. Those admitting privileges are a clever way of masking the real intentions of the bill by making it look like they care about making the process safe and legal. The easiest way to get to the clinic staff is via those admitting privileges.

This is a great bill! Liberals always say that abortion should be "safe, legal, and rare", well this bill complies will all three. It requires qualified doctors to perform the risky and life-changing procedure, makes sure that women make a fully-informed decision, but ultimately keeps abortion legal.

Or it's just another clever way to curb abortions overall and making women willing to seek less-than-quality healthcare options form elsewhere in their desperation, a la Kermit Gosnell.
 

TRIFORCE89

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Not necessarily. Those admitting privileges are a clever way of masking the real intentions of the bill by making it look like they care about making the process safe and legal. The easiest way to get to the clinic staff is via those admitting privileges.
Meaning, if the Democrats proposed it it'd be a wonderfully thoughtful idea.

Or it's just another clever way to curb abortions overall and making women willing to seek less-than-quality healthcare options form elsewhere in their desperation, a la Kermit Gosnell.
On the first part of that, I'd think that would be wanted by any government of any political stripe since higher birth rates means more tax-paying citizens.

Second half, of course, that's not desirable at all

Forcing clinics to have admitting privileges ensures that many will shut down because they don't have or can't get them. It has nothing to do with the skill of the medical staff or the quality of care at the clinic so to say that these restrictions are making things safer for women is ingenuous at best.
Some may close down in the short term, yes. That's unfortunate. But wouldn't others open up later who meet the criteria? It's not like all clinics go away forever.

It's like saying we can't enforce new food standard guidelines because that may cause some current producers to close up shop. Adapt and get better.
 
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Meaning, if the Democrats proposed it it'd be a wonderfully thoughtful idea.

It'd be a bad proposal regardless who proposed it. A bad idea doesn't suddenly become right when it's proposed by someone else.

Some may close down in the short term, yes. That's unfortunate. But wouldn't others open up later who meet the criteria? It's not like all clinics go away forever.

No, they wouldn't, because the same problem that those clinics faced would stop a new clinic from opening. Many hospitals do not want to grant admitting privileges to doctors who perform abortions, and so any clinic that attempts to open will be prohibited from doing so. Also, if you look at abortion clinics that have shut down, you'll discover that new ones rarely, if ever, replace them. That is because governments in the U.S. are making it so difficult to do so. Here's another interesting titbit of information, if, as the governments say, instituting laws such as this would improve patient care by making it safer for women to have an abortion, why then do they not do the same for cosmetic surgeons running their own clinics? There is a double standard going on here. Plain and simple, the goal of laws such as these is to shut down abortion providers, effectively making the state abortion-free.

Of course, we all know that just because you make it difficult to have an abortion, doesn't mean they won't be done. And many more women will be having them, and some wont survive.
 
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TRIFORCE89

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Many hospitals do not want to grant admitting privileges to doctors who perform abortions
How come?

Here's another interesting titbit of information, if, as the governments say, instituting laws such as this would improve patient care by making it safer for women to have an abortion, why then do they not do the same for cosmetic surgeons running their own clinics? There is a double standard going on here.
I think it should be the same all around. Surgery is surgery.

Plain and simple, the goal of laws such as these is to shut down abortion providers, effectively making the state abortion-free.
Goes back to Livewire's point that there's an ulterior motive. I don't deny that, and I don't like it. It's ridiculous. That's clearly their intention. But, on the surface I think it's a safe idea, which is why I said if another party came up with it that the not-so-hidden agenda aspect would be removed.
 
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How come?

For the simple reason that it's a lot easier for anti-abortion advocates to harass and picket a hospital than an abortion provider. Hospitals are far more susceptible to outside pressure, but also pressure from within. They're made up of board members, doctors, patients, and donors, all of whom exert tremendous influence on what services hospitals are willing to provide. Then there are those hospitals who are religiously affiliated and won't allow anything involving abortion to take place in their facility, even when pregnant women need medical care that could save their lives. And other hospitals are publicly supported institutions that are subject to local or regional government pressures for grants or reimbursements, meaning if the government doesn't approve of abortions, in order to protect their funding, the hospital will not offer the service. And because the hospitals refuse to permit abortions to take place within their walls, abortion doctors are not given admitting privileges.

I think it should be the same all around. Surgery is surgery.

Dentistry is also surgery, but dentists also do not have admitting privileges in a hospital. Again, the only reason abortion providers are being singled out is because of an aversion to abortions in general. Is it fair? No. And that's why the law is being challenged.

Goes back to Livewire's point that there's an ulterior motive. I don't deny that, and I don't like it. It's ridiculous. That's clearly their intention. But, on the surface I think it's a safe idea, which is why I said if another party came up with it that the not-so-hidden agenda aspect would be removed.

Anything a human can conceive of or create can be perverted into a means to do harm. In the wrong hands, those safe ideas can be, and are, used to disadvantage people, in this case women.
 
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Meaning, if the Democrats proposed it it'd be a wonderfully thoughtful idea.


On the first part of that, I'd think that would be wanted by any government of any political stripe since higher birth rates means more tax-paying citizens.

Second half, of course, that's not desirable at all


Some may close down in the short term, yes. That's unfortunate. But wouldn't others open up later who meet the criteria? It's not like all clinics go away forever.

It's like saying we can't enforce new food standard guidelines because that may cause some current producers to close up shop. Adapt and get better.

You misunderstand. Yes, having Doctors with high-level admittance privileges would probably be good, they'd be highly trained and skilled, not to mention expensive. But having them in scenario is like having calling a SWAT team in to capture the kid who stole your bike. Unnecessary.

And it's hard to open new clinics when most of the federal dollars don't make their way to the clinics because they provide abortions. Something WI, MI, VA, OK, ND, etc, have already tried to do. ;(
 

TRIFORCE89

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You misunderstand. Yes, having Doctors with high-level admittance privileges would probably be good, they'd be highly trained and skilled, not to mention expensive. But having them in scenario is like having calling a SWAT team in to capture the kid who stole your bike. Unnecessary.
That created a hilarious mental image

And it's hard to open new clinics when most of the federal dollars don't make their way to the clinics because they provide abortions. Something WI, MI, VA, OK, ND, etc, have already tried to do. ;(
Ah, that's the probably the bigger issue then. That needs to change
 

FreakyLocz14

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Plain and simple, the goal of laws such as these is to shut down abortion providers, effectively making the state abortion-free./QUOTE]

The same logic could be applied to Democrat's calls for gun control.

But the fact is that there are NO abortion-free states. Legal abortions take place in all 50 states, including the most conservative states.
 
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I am not a fan of this. Abortion is not exactly a nice thing, but still should remain safe and legal, all these laws will do is lead to desperate women seeking out unsafe abortions. If people want something bad enough, they will find some way to get it, even if that means taking risks and going to unsafe measures to get it. Banning abortion will never really work, it's better in my opinion to have it be safe and legal than to try and ban it and have people get hurt when they try to go the illegal route.
 
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The same logic could be applied to Democrat's calls for gun control.

Let's not get started on the gun control issue.


But the fact is that there are NO abortion-free states. Legal abortions take place in all 50 states, including the most conservative states.

North Dakota has only one abortion provider in the entire state. That means only women in that state with the means to travel have access to a safe abortion services provider. One, in an entire state. That state, effectively, is officially abortion-free as a result. The consequence of this is that women who cannot make the trip to that abortion provider must rely on other means to get an abortion, some of which are decidedly not safe, and could potentially be fatal to both the mother and the foetus. So while you are technically correct, practically you are not. Unless the situation in these low abortion provider states is rectified, shares in companies that make coat hangers will skyrocket.
 

FreakyLocz14

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North Dakota has only one abortion provider in the entire state. That means only women in that state with the means to travel have access to a safe abortion services provider. One, in an entire state. That state, effectively, is officially abortion-free as a result. The consequence of this is that women who cannot make the trip to that abortion provider must rely on other means to get an abortion, some of which are decidedly not safe, and could potentially be fatal to both the mother and the foetus. So while you are technically correct, practically you are not. Unless the situation in these low abortion provider states is rectified, shares in companies that make coat hangers will skyrocket.

But abortion is still legal in North Dakota, and there is still a legal abortion provider there. Nothing in North Dakota law requires there to only be one abortion provider. That's just a coincidence. Liberals want abortion to be legal, but they don't really want it to be safe or rare, since they oppose laws that would make it more safe and more rare.

Really, what's wrong with letting a woman see her baby before she decides to murder it? Even your computer asks your if you're sure before you delete and important file.
 
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