Police line up beside the Indiana Statehouse as pro-life and pro-choice rallies held Saturday blend.
Indiana lawmakers are set to return to the Statehouse later this month to draft new abortion laws for the state. Until then, abortion currently remains legal in Indiana, with restrictions.
Thousands of Hoosiers across Indiana have already made their feelings known in the aftermath of the Supreme Court ruling last month overturning of Roe v. Wade, a landmark 1973 court ruling that had protected abortions rights at the federal level. Protests have been hosted across several days at the Indiana Statehouse in the last couple weeks from people on both sides of the issue — those asking Indiana to act and ban abortion and those who say the government should stay out of it and leave abortion legal.
A special session was called for Wednesday to take up Gov. Eric Holcomb’s requested taxpayer refund, but in light of high court’s decision, lawmakers are now planning to take up new regulations on abortion as well. Because of that, Republican lawmakers announced last week they would not start the session until July 25, to have more time to draft an abortion bill.
Current abortion laws
Right now, a pregnant person can have the abortion completed in the first 20 weeks of their pregnancy, with consent to their physician. However, if the pregnant person is experiencing issues with their pregnancy that are life-threatening, the physician can make the judgement to perform an abortion without consent. If the person is under the age of 18, they are required to submit a written consent form from their parents or legal guardian.
Additional restrictions were added Thursday to abortions in the second trimester. Following the Supreme Court ruling, Indiana Attorney Todd Rokita asked last week that federal judges in Indiana lift injunctions on three previously halted abortion restrictions that were passed into law by state lawmakers, but we halted in court.
On Thursday, U.S. District Judge Sarah Evans Barker lifted the injunction she placed in 2019 blocking House Enrolled Act 1211. The law bans dilation and evacuation abortions, which are procedures that are commonly used to terminate a pregnancy in the second trimester. The law prohibits doctors from performing dilation and evacuation abortions unless to prevent serious health risk or save the life of the mother. A doctor violating the law could face a felony charge, punishable by up to six years in prison.
Barker granted a request from the Indiana attorney general’s office to lift her order, writing that the Supreme Court’s decision last month overturning the landmark Roe v. Wade ruling removed the “linchpin holdings” for her analysis.
Barker, however, declined to lift her injunction against a 2017 Indiana law that would require parents to be notified if a court allows a girl younger than 18 to get abortion without parental consent. Barker cited procedural reasons, pointing out that the challenge of that law was pending with the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago.
In 2021, 8,414 abortions were completed in Indiana, and 7,949 of those individuals were Indiana residents, according to an annual report compiled by the Indiana Department of Health. In 2020, 7,756 abortions with 7,372 being Indiana residents. In Johnson County. there were 194 residents who received abortions in 2021, and 175 in 2020.
Most patients in the state went to Planned Parenthood of Indianapolis or The Women’s Med Center of Indianapolis. The centers saw 2,450 patients and 2,293 patients, respectively.
Some Hoosiers traveled out of state to have an abortion, according to the data from the Illinois Department of Public Health. A total of 1,878 Indiana residents received abortions in Illinois in 2020, 1,949 in 2019 and 1,279 in 2015.
Because of Ohio’s law triggering an abortion ban following the Supreme Court’s decision, more out-of-state pregnant people are visiting Indiana clinics. An Ohio 10-year-old who came to Indiana for an abortion caught the national media’s attention.
Kentucky also had a trigger law, but it is stayed in federal court, so it has not taken effect.
Local lawmakers react
In the lead-up to the July 25 special legislative session, most local lawmakers from Johnson County haven’t revealed what abortion regulations they would support.
All state lawmakers representing the county say they are anti-abortion and have issued statements of support for the overturn of Roe v. Wade.
Republican lawmakers hold supermajorities in both branches of the Statehouse and seem poised to restrict abortion in some way. Their options could range from a reduction of weeks to get an abortion to full ban. They could restrict surgical or medicinal abortion — or both.
John Jacob, R-Indianapolis, who represents a portion of northern Johnson County, has been vocal in his opposition to abortion of any kind. Passing a total abortion ban was his primary campaign goal when he first ran for office in 2020. During the 2022 legislative session, Jacob co-authored House Bill 1282, which sought to end all abortion in Indiana before Roe v. Wade was overturned. The bill died in committee during the session.
“My campaign promised to co-author that bill with his bill that defied Roe. We could’ve ended abortion immediately in Indiana. My position has not changed. Life begins at conception and biology upholds what the Bible says,” Jacob said last week. “Willful taking of any innocent human life is always murder. Abortion takes the life of a preborn child. We don’t regulate murder and wouldn’t call for regulation of murder.”
The new abortion law that lawmakers consider shouldn’t have exceptions for rape or incest, Jacob said.
“We do not punish another individual for the crime of another. If someone commits murder we don’t punish someone else for that crime. If someone rapes someone, you punish the man who commits the rape, not someone else,” Jacob said last week. “When it comes to abortion, we say we are going to punish the child for the crime of the father. We want to address the bigger issue. We are punishing the child, saying ‘your life is not worthy, you deserve the death penalty for the crime of your father.’ The man who committed the crime should be punished to the fullest extent.”
No other local lawmaker agreed to an interview with the Daily Journal and instead sent written statements or referred to previous statements.
Rep. Michelle Davis, R-Whiteland, said in a statement that while Indiana should be more restrictive on abortion, there should be more resources to help pregnant women.
“Indiana has a strong history of protecting life, and it’s critical we make sure our laws go further to protect unborn Hoosiers,” Davis said. “With this favorable ruling, I stand ready to further strengthen our pro-life laws while also expanding resources and services to help pregnant mothers and their newborn babies.”
In a statement issued following the high court’s decision, Senate President Pro Tem Rodric Bray, R-Martinsville, said exceptions for rape and incest, as well as whether it should be a total abortion ban or a ban after a certain number of weeks, would be “really important parts of the discussion” during debate on a new law.
When making decisions regarding abortion laws, it is important to gather everyone’s input, Bray said. He also said future policy will come from a “pro-life perspective.”
“We are having ongoing and important conversations as we work to craft a pro-life policy that will support mothers and babies in our state,” Bray said. “As we have said before, it is critical to let people on all sides be heard on this important issue, and we will provide ample time for that when we return for special session.”
Rep. John Young, R-Franklin said in an interview with the Daily Journal in May that he would be open considering exceptions to allow abortion in certain circumstances.
Planned Parenthood, OBGYNs fight on
On the other side, Planned Parenthood officials say they are standing beside people who afraid of the fallout from the decision.
“We know this is a difficult, confusing and scary time for many people across Indiana. Know that we are fighting with everything we’ve got to protect abortion access in Indiana so that we can continue to provide the full range of reproductive health care for patients,” said Nicole Erwin, spokesperson for Planned Parenthood of Great Northwest Hawai’i, Alaska, Indiana and Kentucky.
The nearest Planned Parenthood Johnson County residents can visit is the Southside Health Center, a 22-mile drive located at 935 E. Hanna Ave. in Indianapolis.
“Regardless of what happens during the special session, our doors remain open, and our team of supportive doctors, nurses and expert staff are here to help patients get the care they need and to help them understand what the Supreme Court’s decision means for their access to abortion care,” Erwin said.
Doctors and researchers are expressing concern that restricting access to abortion could lead to more pregnancy-related deaths, particularly among the most vulnerable who can’t travel out of state to end their pregnancies.
“We know that anywhere where abortion is severely restricted, limited or banned altogether, maternal mortality increases,” said Dr. Caitlin Bernard, an obstetrician and gynecologist and assistant professor at the Indiana University School of Medicine. “… We know, particularly in Indiana, we do not have the best health determinants. We have high rates of chronic medical conditions, substance use. Many people have pregnancy conditions that have occurred in other pregnancies that would make a future pregnancy risky.”
Medical professionals also worry that potential grey areas and vague wording of a new abortion law could create confusion among physicians and put patients’ lives in jeopardy.
“The language about, you can perform an abortion, but only to save the life of the mother – well, how close to death do they have to be?” Bernard said. “What about treatment of an ectopic pregnancy? What about what we call an inevitable abortion, where somebody is coming with an early-stage miscarriage? They’re bleeding. They may have an infection, but there’s still cardiac activity of the fetus on the ultrasound. What am I supposed to do at that point? How far does (the patient) have to get (to death) for me to be able to, within the legal limits, perform an abortion?
Health care providers are afraid of what would happen if they afoul of restrictions. For doing a job that was legal until a few weeks ago, they could face criminal prosecution, civil penalties or other sanctions.
“I can tell you, right now, all of the OBGYNs in Indiana are reaching out and asking, ‘What does this mean for me? What could I face? How am I supposed to practice in this environment, even for normal, non-abortion care?’” Bernard said.
Daily Journal Reporter Andy Bell-Baltaci, The Associated Press and Andy East of the Daily Journal’s sister paper, The (Columbus) Republic, contributed to this report.
