Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) is adding her name to the list of lawmakers who believe the Texas abortion law is doing more harm than good.
She said in a Thursday statement, “The Texas law is extreme and harmful. The Supreme Court recognized that there are ‘serious questions’ regarding the constitutionality of the Texas law, and it emphasized that its recent ruling does not address those question.”
Collins added, “I oppose the Court’s decision to allow the law to remain in effect for now while these underlying constitutional and procedural questions are litigated.”
Sen SUSAN COLLINS on SB 8: "The Texas law is extreme and harmful."
— Frank Thorp V (@frankthorp) September 2, 2021
"I oppose the Court's decision to allow the law to remain in effect for now while these underlying constitutional and procedural questions are litigated," she says.
Full stmt: pic.twitter.com/bOL6ctaGl3
The law, known as the “fetal heartbeat bill,” went into effect in Texas Wednesday. It bans all abortions after six weeks. The Supreme Court later refused to block the bill.
The decision garnered strong reactions from both President Joe Biden and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).
Biden called the decision “an unprecedented assault on a woman’s constitutional rights under Roe v. Wade, which has been the law of the land for almost fifty years.”
Pelosi labeled the law a “catastrophe,” adding, “The Supreme Court’s cowardly, dark-of-night decision to uphold a flagrantly unconstitutional assault on women’s rights and health is staggering. That this radically partisan Court chose to do so without a full briefing, oral arguments or providing a full, signed opinion is shameful.”
She also argued the law is a “cynical, backdoor attempt by partisan lawmakers to evade the Constitution and the law to destroy not only a woman’s right to health care but potentially any right or protection that partisan lawmakers target.”
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) reacted to the ruling on Twitter, as IJR reported.
“Republicans promised to overturn Roe v Wade, and they have,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “Democrats can either abolish the filibuster and expand the court, or do nothing as millions of peoples’ bodies, rights, and lives are sacrificed for far-right minority rule.”
The New York Times noted Georgia, Mississippi, Kentucky and Ohio have also passed “heartbeat laws.” Legal challenges have kept those laws from being implemented.
