(Washington) The Supreme Court of the US state of Iowa decided Friday to allow a law to go into effect that would ban most abortions as early as six weeks of pregnancy, before most women know they are pregnant.
This is a victory for Republican elected officials, and Iowa thus joins the states having strongly restricted, or even banned, abortion after the annulment in 2022 by the Supreme Court of the United States of the federal guarantee of abortion .
Democratic President Joe Biden has denounced an “extreme and dangerous abortion ban” that “puts women’s health and lives at risk.”
“This should never happen in America,” he added, vowing to continue calling on Congress to restore federal abortion protections.
The issue of abortion is one of the key themes of the campaign for the presidential election in November, which will pit Republican Donald Trump against Mr. Biden.
In a ruling, the Iowa Supreme Court overturned a court’s temporary injunction blocking the law, which was passed last summer. The legislation bans most abortions once a heartbeat is detected, usually around six weeks into a pregnancy.
Chief Justice Susan Christensen expressed strong opposition to the decision in a dissenting argument.
“The majority on our court deprives Iowa women of their bodily autonomy by holding that there is no fundamental right to terminate a pregnancy under our state constitution. I cannot accept this decision,” she wrote.
“The majority’s rigid approach relies heavily on the history and traditions of the male-dominated 1800s and ignores how far women’s rights have come since the Civil War,” she said.
The Republican governor of Iowa, Kim Reynolds, welcomed the decision.
“There is no right more sacred than life, and nothing deserves our firmest defense more than the innocent unborn,” she said.