Missouri's House passed a strict abortion bill that would ban abortions after eight weeks into a pregnancy.
The Missouri Stands with the Unborn Act passed Friday, one day after it passed in the Senate. The bill would make it a felony for a doctor to perform an abortion after eight weeks except in cases of medical emergencies. It doesn't include exceptions for rape or incest.
The bill now heads to Gov. Mike Parson, who's indicated he'll sign it.
That means Missouri could soon join a number of states that have recently passed strict abortion bills. Alabama's governor signed a controversial bill Wednesday that bans abortion at any stage of pregnancy unless the mother's life is at risk or the fetus has a "lethal anomaly." And last week Georgia's governor signed a a bill that effectively bans abortions after a fetal heartbeat is detected, which is usually about six weeks into pregnancy.
A lot of these bills are a direct challenge to Roe v. Wade, a Supreme Court decision that established the right to abortion nationwide. It's highly likely lawsuits will be filed in each state and that the laws will be blocked by the lower courts.
That was the case in Iowa earlier this year. Planned Parenthood and the ACLU of Iowa filed a lawsuit against the state's so-called "fetal heartbeat" law signed in 2018. In January, a judge ruled the law unconstitutional.
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