South Carolina
State House conservatives suggest almost total abortion ban
COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — A House committee reviewing South Carolina’s abortion law suggested Tuesday the state ban almost all abortions other than when the life of the mother is at risk.
The state currently has a ban at roughly six weeks that includes exceptions for rape and incest. After the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, conservatives in the General Assembly started to look if they could join the growing number of states banning the procedure.
The 12-member special panel voted nine to three with all eight Republicans joining one of the House’s most conservative Democrats in approving the new bill.
“This is a huge opportunity for the state of South Carolina. For 50 years, we have been killing the unborn — the ones who don’t have a voice,” said Republican House Majority Leader
David Hiott.
Everyone emphasized the bill has a long way to go through the legislature. It moves on the House Judiciary Committee and then has to go through the whole process in the Senate. South Carolina’s General Assembly typically meets from January to May, but allowed the special session to consider abortion.
But the vote was a big step in a state that just 18 months ago had a similar debate over abortion that ended with a law requiring an ultrasound and banning the procedure if cardiac activity is detected, which typically happens six weeks after conception. The law includes rape and incest exceptions after some Republicans suggested they could not support it without them.
The exceptions were quietly placed in the bill last year without an on-the-record vote.
Bill writers said they have learned from flaws seen in abortion bans passed before the U.S. Supreme Court decision. The proposal specifies what emergencies would allow an abortion, such as an ectopic pregnancy, miscarriage or a ruptured womb. It protects in-vitro fertilizations and specifically allows contraception, said Rep. John McCravy, the Republican chairman of the House’s special abortion committee.
But it prevents in almost all cases killing a fetus while in the womb, requiring it to be separated from the mother. And McCravy said a bill banning abortion with exceptions for rape and incest is not truly protecting life.
“What will it do to turn one tragedy into two,” McCravy said.
Democrats on the panel asked their Republican colleagues if they thought through all the repercussions of a ban — women who might have to stop working to care for children or stop their education.
They said a state that did not expand Medicaid and trails behind a majority of other states in spending and quality of life for children needs to show it truly values life by helping parents and children.
“I do hope if you consider yourself champions of the unborn, if you will also consider making yourself champions of the born,” Democratic Rep. David Weeks said.
Even though almost all the lawmakers are the same as the 2021 debate, the circumstances around the abortion debate is much different after the June high court decision.
“I know my colleagues, and many truly care and worry about this issue which before now was merely an empty vote. Now it’s the real deal. I hope my fellow senators either vote for a more moderate state law or abstain,” Republican Sen. Sandy Senn told The Associated Press.
During the 2021 debate, Senn was the only Republican to vote against the six-week ban, but as other conservatives tried to remove rape and incest expectations, a few other Republicans suggested those exceptions were required for their support.
Senn said she is pro-life and not in favor of forced birth. She said instead of banning abortion, the state should let a woman “make her decision unrushed, and within the first trimester.”
“If given time to figure out her situation, most women who are able will make the right call,” she said.
Oregon
Judge acquits Patriot Prayer founder, 1 other, in riot trial
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — A judge in Oregon granted a motion Tuesday to acquit far-right Patriot Prayer founder Joey Gibson and associate Russell Schultz on felony riot charges.
Multnomah County Circuit Court Judge Benjamin Souede said no reasonable jury could find their behavior at a 2019 street confrontation “threatened an imminent breach of the peace,” Oregon Public Broadcasting reported.
“Oregon’s law clearly does not permit such an outcome,” Souede said, rebuking the district attorney’s office for pursuing a jury trial on the evidence presented.
Schultz, Gibson and their associate Mackenzie Lewis each faced a riot charge for their roles in political violence in May 2019 at the now-closed Northeast Portland bar Cider Riot.
Lewis’ attorney also sought a motion for acquittal, but Souede denied that effort.
After the prosecution rested, defense attorney Brian Schmonsees said the state had presented no evidence that Schultz had participated in any violent activity. Schmonsees argued the video evidence showed Schultz standing on the periphery as those with the far-right and anti-fascists exchanged fist jabs and threw things, and later video showed him telling people in his group that it was time to leave.
In videos presented by the prosecution, Gibson taunts anti-fascists on the bar patio and tells them to “do something.” After someone in the crowd spits on Gibson, he wipes the spit onto a bar patron.
“The record is overwhelming, and I suggest indisputable, that Mr. Gibson spoke obnoxiously to the crowd,” Souede said in his ruling. “He was provocative, he was taunting, he was acting like a troll.”
Souede said Gibson’s activity amounted to speech, and Oregon law prohibits taking speech into consideration when deciding riot charges. A charge of harassment, however, would have been likely to survive a motion for acquittal, Souede said.
“If this defendant could be convicted in this case, there would be no protection for protesters in Oregon on other occasions,” Souede said, before referencing 2020 racial justice protests in Portland.
In his denial of Lewis’ motion for acquittal, Souede pointed to video of Lewis shoving a person and throwing an empty can of mace at a crowd as reason for the trial to continue.
Three other brawl participants with the Patriot Prayer group, Chris Ponte, Ian Kramer and Matthew Cooper were indicted and previously pleaded guilty to riot charges.
Gibson founded the Vancouver, Washington, based Patriot Prayer in 2016. He has held rallies supporting former President Donald Trump and supported other demonstrations organized by the Proud Boys — a group that’s been designated as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.
