Veteran state senator Merv Riepe felt what he called “signer’s remorse” at the last minute. Although he was among the Republican lawmakers who had pushed for the law, he ultimately decided not to support it. And so he knocked her down. He had realized – he explained to the anger of his colleagues – that prohibiting abortion beyond six weeks of pregnancy was excessive, since during this time it is not easy for a woman to at least not know that she is pregnant.
The 80-year-old MP, a former manager of Ralston Hospital, first introduced a compromise amendment that would have placed the new ban at 12 weeks and would have added to the list of exceptions any fetal anomaly incompatible with life. His co-religionists in the House said no. He then warned them of the signals that voters from all over the country had been sending since the Supreme Court annulled this right in general in June.
To illustrate the counterproductive effect of a resounding rejection of abortion after this controversial ruling, Riepe used his case as an example. If in the primaries held shortly before the sentence, in May, he prevailed against three other contenders with 45% of the votes and an advantage of 27 points over the second, in the legislatures of November this difference was reduced to five points And his defense of the abortion veto had something to do with it, he admitted… As, in fact, happened in the United States as a whole, where analyzes of the electoral results highlighted the high price that the right he paid for his eagerness to restrict or veto a right defended by the majority of citizens (more than 60%, according to the latest polls).
“In an ideal world, all children would have the opportunity to live and thrive,” Riepe said before the plenary of the state Senate on Thursday. “Nevertheless – he pointed out – we must recognize that we do not live in a utopian society and we do face challenges that make it difficult to achieve this ideal”. Having said that, he abstained from the project of his party and caused it to decline. So, for now, abortion in the state will continue to be legal up to 20 weeks.
The same thing that happened in Nebraska also happened on Thursday, in essence, in South Carolina. Three Republican senators, after joining their only two Democratic colleagues in the 46-member chamber, ruled against a proposal by local Grand Old Party bosses to avoid a near-total abortion ban . Exceptions would have been limited to cases of rape or incest, fatal anomalies confirmed by two doctors and risk of death or serious illness for the pregnant woman.
The rebellion in the southern state took the form of a gender conflict. Especially when Republican Senator Sandy Senn accused her group leader, Shane Massey, of leading the state into “an abyss†on reproductive rights. And he added: “The only thing we can do when all of you men in the chamber continue to metaphorically slap women on the issue of abortion is to slap them back with our words.”
Currently, 14 states in the country have laws in force that prohibit or restrict to the maximum the free termination of pregnancy. The Supreme Court ruling that struck down the right spawned a series of state legislative projects. Many are pending judicial or political dispute. But the Republican party is increasingly exhausted from advancing its campaign on the issue. Now, the defeats conceded to Nebraska and South Carolina due to the insubordination of some of their own can be a lesson for them to study. There is a year and a half left for the final exam of this course. It will be November 5, 2024, the day of the presidential elections.
