Stupifyingly Bad Legislation...
From NARAL Pro-Choice Missouri Executive Director, Pamela Sumners:
"Governor Blunt's special session awarded spoils to his right-wing cronies at the expense of Missouri women. Key provisions of the law passed in the special session this September include a "gag rule" on clergy, counselors, and others; a requirement that doctors performing abortions have clinical privileges at a hospital within 30 miles (almose one-third of Missouri women travel 50 miles, and on September 15, the clinic in Springfield stopped performing abortions as a result of this provision--they have since reopened following an injunction being placed on the law); punitive damages for assisting a minor in obtaining an abortion out of state without parental consent, with no exception for rape or incest; a provision subjecting anyone who "induces" an abortion between six months and 20 years in jail without specifying what "induces" means, or exempting pharmacists, or excluding certain classes of contraceptives. I could continue with the litany of legislative abuses just heaped on Missouri women, but you can see from these few features of the new law the urgency of standing up to anti-choice bullies now and in the future."
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