NEWS

ACLU files lawsuit to block abortion bill

Deborah Yetter

@d_yetter

The American Civil Liberties Union has filed a federal lawsuit aimed at blocking a new Kentucky abortion law that would require doctors providing abortions to first perform an ultrasound of the fetus and try to show and describe the image to the patient — even if she objects.

The measure, House Bill 2, was approved Saturday by the Kentucky General Assembly with an emergency clause that allowed Gov. Matt Bevin to sign it into law immediately.

The law "violates longstanding constitutional principles, including the right to privacy, the right to bodily integrity and First Amendment Freedoms," said William Sharp, legal director of the ACLU of Kentucky.

But Bevin, in an interview Monday with WHAS radio host Terry Meiners, dismissed the legal challenge.

“It’s a shocker that the ACLU is suing someone,” said Bevin, a Republican and abortion opponent. “We anticipated as much. That’s what they do. It’s what liberals always do when they don’t like something, they sue."

The lawsuit was filed Monday in U.S. District Court in Louisville on behalf of the state's sole abortion provider, EMW Women's Surgical Center in Louisville, and three physicians who provide abortions.

Two other clinics, EMW in Lexington and Planned Parenthood in Louisville, suspended providing abortions last year after the Bevin administration sued them, alleging they were operating without proper state licensure. Legal disputes are pending in those cases.

The ACLU's lawsuit asks the court to declare the new ultrasound law "unconstitutional and unenforceable."

It claims the bill was "rushed" through the legislature and "forces physicians to deliver a government-mandated, ideological message" to a patient "lying captive on the examination table." It also said the procedure is invasive because, prior to nine weeks into a pregnancy, the physician must use a probe inserted into the vagina to conduct a fetal ultrasound.

The ACLU said a similar law from North Carolina was struck down in 2014 by a federal appeals court.

Kentucky's new ultrasound law was one of two abortion bills passed in the first week of the legislature under new Republican control of the House. The Senate already had a GOP majority.

The other measure, Senate Bill 5, bans abortions after the 20th week of a pregnancy. It also has been signed into law by Bevin, who said in Monday's radio interview he strongly supports it as well.

“I personally believe that it’s inappropriate to kill human beings that are innocent,” Bevin said.

The ACLU said it is analyzing that law as well.

Both measures were among a handful of bills Republicans leaders identified as priorities and pushed through the legislature quickly despite objections from abortion rights supporters that the proposed laws were rushed, unfair to women and had not had thorough review.

Republicans and conservative Democrats in the legislature have been pushing for such legislation for years but had been stymied in the House, which until this year had been controlled by Democrats.

Both abortion bills were passed last week after impassioned and sometimes heated debate.

Supporters of the ultrasound law said it will ensure women have the information they need to provide informed consent for an abortion by getting the chance to see an image of the fetus and hearing a heartbeat.

But opponents say the ultrasound proposal adds another barrier to abortion for women as well as adding an invasive and unnecessary medical procedure.

“This is only meant to coerce and shame women,” said Tamarra Wieder of Planned Parenthood of Indiana and Kentucky.

The law permits the patient to avert her eyes or refuse to listen to the heartbeat if she chooses. It doesn't say whether the patient may refuse to listen to the physician's description of the ultrasound image.

Any physician or technician who fails to follow the ultrasound law could be fined up to $100,000 for the first violation and up to $250,000 for each subsequent offense.

Contact reporter Deborah Yetter at (502) 582-4228 or at dyetter@courier-journal.com. Reporter Phillip Bailey contributed to this story.