A bill that would have made South Carolina’s abortion ban the strictest nationwide proved to be too extreme for a panel packed with anti-abortion Republican legislators. The proposal failed on a 3-2 vote with four Republicans on the Senate subcommittee declining to vote.
Dubbed the Unborn Child Protection Act, the bill called for a ban on abortions from the moment a pregnancy is “clinically diagnosable,” elimination of exemptions for rape and incest and a prohibition of abortions in any circumstances except to save the life of the mother.
Three Democrats – Sens. Brad Hutto, D-Orangeburg; Ronnie Sabb, D-Greeleyville; and Deon Tedder, D-North Charleston – voted against the bill and proposed amendments.
“The vast, vast, vast majority of South Carolinians are against this,” Hutto said. “We already have one of the strictest bills in the country. To go any further, is just an outright attack on women and doctors.”
Republican Sens. Richard Cash of Anderson, the bill’s chief sponsor, and Tom Fernandez of Summerville voted for the bill. Four Republican senators — co-sponsor Billy Garrett of Greenwood, Tom Corbin of Greenville; Jeff Zell of Sumter and Matt Leber of Johns Island — declined to vote, allowing the Democratic senators to sink the bill.
Abortion rights groups were quick to praise what Planned Parenthood’s Vicki Ringer called the Senate’s “resounding defeat” of the bill.
“We can only hope that these heinous attacks on reproductive freedom will cease, and our legislators will head into next year’s legislative session prepared to address the pervasive health care crisis affecting our state,” Ringer said in a release. “For now, we celebrate, but tomorrow, the work continues.”
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