Anti-abortion group seeks to change state law by removing lifesaving exception from Wisconsin abortion law
An anti-abortion group would seek to remove an exception to Wisconsin's abortion law that permits the procedure to save the life of the pregnant person, if Roe v. Wade is overturned by the country's highest court.
Pro-Life Wisconsin legislative director Matt Sande told USA TODAY Network-Wisconsin Friday that his organization believes there are no situations where an abortion would be medically necessary to save the pregnant person's life.
Sande said that would not include operations like removing an ectopic pregnancy or removing a cancerous uterus, which they consider "moral even under Catholic teaching."
Sande said "many" Wisconsin lawmakers would support a total ban on abortion, and said the state would "have the power to completely ban abortion without exception" if a governor opposed to abortion is elected.
Democratic Gov. Tony Evers has vetoed legislation aimed at restricting abortion access. All four Republican gubernatorial candidates support significant abortion restrictions, without exceptions for cases of rape and incest.
Abortion is currently legal in Wisconsin, but an 1849 state law would ban most abortions in the state if Roe is overturned — an outcome that appears possible following a draft opinion from the United States Supreme Court that was leaked last week. The Wisconsin statute currently makes an exception if a doctor decides it "is necessary, or is advised by two other physicians as necessary, to save the life of the mother."
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Sande said he believes the exception could become a "massive statutory loophole" for doctors. Instead, his group wants doctors to be required to work equally to save the parent and baby in cases of medical emergency.
"If one or the other inadvertently dies, that's not an abortion, that's in God's hands," he said. They'd seek immunity for physicians in those cases, he said.
Doctors who care for people whose pregnancies are high-risk are already worried about the phrasing of the exception, saying such medical emergencies are rarely clear-cut scenarios and arguing they don't want to put patients at increased risk.
Sande said his organization has not been focused on interpreting or clarifying the existing language.
"We just want it gone," he said.
Many voters and organizations advocate against a total ban on abortions
Mike Murray, vice president of public affairs for Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin, called the comments "incredibly alarming and disturbing."
He said advocating for a total ban without exceptions is indicative of the direction some abortion opponents want to go, but that it doesn't represent the beliefs of the majority of Wisconsinites.
In an October poll conducted by the Marquette University Law School, 61% of Wisconsin voters said abortion should be legal in all or most cases. Eleven percent said it should be illegal in all cases.
"The fact that proponents of this agenda want to even remove an exception that would allow an abortion to be performed to specifically save the life of the mother indicates that the health, well-being and lives of women are not their priority," Murray said.
History shows that when abortions are banned, people die, he said. An October study out of the University of Colorado Boulder found that a nationwide abortion ban could lead to a 21% increase in the number of pregnancy-related deaths overall and a 33% increase in pregnancy-related deaths among Black Americans.
Not all anti-abortion groups in Wisconsin share Pro-Life Wisconsin's stance.
Wisconsin Right to Life lobbyist Gracie Skogman said her organization supports the exception and called the language in the statute "very good."
They also advocate for doctors to make equal attempts to save the life of the pregnant person and their baby in emergencies, something she said scientific and medical advancements since the 1970s should help with.
But "we are standing by and referencing that medical emergency language," Skogman said.
Contact reporter Madeline Heim at 920-996-7266 or mheim@gannett.com. Follow her on Twitter at @madeline_heim.
This article originally appeared on Appleton Post-Crescent: Pro-Life Wisconsin aims to cut lifesaving exception from abortion law
