Thread by @asanderford

Big day.

The folks handling Capitol Security and the redcoats are taking the step today of separating the supporters and opponents of Legislative Bill 626, a proposal to ban abortions in the state after an ultrasound detects embryonic cardiac activity.

There are already some folks here standing in the Rotunda who say they are against LB 626.

The #NEleg is arguing another bill right now. But LB 626 is next.

State Sen. Megan Hunt: When a woman who needs an abortion gets an abortion, it is not our place to judge. Restricting health care is a guaranteed way to increase unplanned pregnancies and increase abortions. “I think we are interested in forcing women to be pregnant.”

Hunt: Our shared quality of life is better for women’s ability to participate in the workforce the ways that we do. “Women are frustrated, because we are fighting for the rights that we have already won.” I will lead the fight against this ban for the rest of my time in my term.

Hunt: We will support one another no matter what the government tries to do to us. We are organized. (She withdrew her motions to let Sen. Merv Riepe discuss his amendment pushing for a 12-week ban instead of LB 626.)

Riepe is discussing his 12-week ban alternative. Riepe: Exceptions for life of mother already in statute for 20-week ban stay. Says his amendment will not criminalize doctors and medical providers. “Abortion has become more than a medical procedure and more than two pills.”

Riepe: “I stand against elective abortions and abortions of convenience.” But, he said, we do not live in a utopian society. In the real world, some flexibility is needed. Six weeks was expressed as a near total ban that does not leave people time to make decisions, and I agree.

Riepe is sharing an email: Said a Millard constituent said more women will chose life if given more time.

Riepe is explaining why he thinks LB 626 might be a bridge too far. Riepe: “My experience is change is best when made incrementally.” “The six-week ban appears to be a winner-take-all position.” With the six-week ban the pushback will be substantial.

State Sen. Danielle Conrad: “Abortion bans hurt women.” I appreciate Senator Riepe’s effort to bring forward a path for a more humane approach. It is an issue that causes my constituents a great deal of consternation. I don’t know that I could support any restrictions.

Conrad: Moving from 20-week ban to 6-week is extreme. Unclear about civil and criminal penalties. “I believe that senator Riepe’s amendment is a better step forward than the bill before us.” Would allow women time to make an informed decision.

Conrad: Look at sister state after sister state. Worse for Women’s health, for rape victims, young women. “This is a more humane and practical approach for Nebraska.” Every pregnancy is different. We should not propose an extreme ban.

Hunt: “Legitimate countries would not force birth.” I appreciate Senator Riepe’s openness to listening to health care providers and for taking a more measured approach to LB 626.

Riepe: The opposition response to this could end up being a referendum well-funded by interests from out of state. Says Kansas could happen here. (Kansas voters defended abortion rights in the state constitution.)

Riepe: Says a South Carolina case found that women must be given a reasonable amount of time to make a decision. Texas is in the throes of a similar legal challenge. Will require years of litigation.

State Sen. Carol Blood: I appreciate Senator Riepe’s attempt to hear Nebraskans. “There’s nothing friendly about threatening a physician’s license.”

Blood: If our own Attorney General cannot decipher this bill, what makes you think it will withstand scrutiny.

Blood: “You are literally playing doctor.” I do not fault you for embracing this cause. I fault you for bringing forward bills that are poorly written and you won’t let be amended. “The vast majority of Nebraskans that I meet are happy with the law the way it is right now.”

State Sen. John Cavanaugh: This bill has an emergency clause and would go into effect immediately. I asked how they’ll inform doctors of their obligations under this bill. They’ll mail a letter after it goes into effect.

Cavanaugh: The letter more or less says LB 626 prohibits abortion without meeting these requirements. Department recommends they read the bill.

Cavanaugh: “Doctors are not equipped to interpret the law. That’s the big problem with this.” Says he is still deciding what he thinks of Riepe’s amendment on a 12-week ban.

State Sen. Tom Briese of Albion: “This bill is really simple for me. It’s about protecting innocent life.” Briese: This gives the medical community wide latitude. LB 626 is a reasonable place to land.

State Sen. Joni Albrecht: This is the first time I’ve seen the (Riepe) amendment. I do not believe it is in good faith. This bill protects women and doctors. “Are we really willing to let that many babies die because we can’t come to an agreement?”

State Sen. George Dungan: The Attorney General’s opinion raises questions about mandatory reporting requirements. Survivors of sexual assault need to be given time.

Dungan: What’s unclear is if anybody would still be able to anonymously report sex assault or whether what the doctors write down might remain anonymous.

Dungan: You have doctors in other states pausing medical care because they are unsure about the law.

State Sen. Ben Hansen is reading from chief medical officer opinion saying that the definition provides a “wide, safe harbor … for how a medical emergency should be read.”

Hansen (still reading): It is necessary only that a reasonable physician would’ve made a similar decision.

Hansen (still reading): The threat to human life need not be immediate.

Albrecht: There are no criminal or civil penalties in LB 626. The bill is clear.

Riepe amendment would allow abortion up to 12 weeks. Appreciate him having this conversation. LB 626 is carefully crafted to meet concerns last session and save “many lives.”

She wanted total ban

Sen. Rick Holdcroft: Reading emails from supporters saying to reject all attempts to water down LB 626. Holdcroft says this is about “protecting babies with a beating heart.” (Scientists say embryonic cardiac activity occurs before the heart is fully formed.)

Albrecht: A 12-week ban would protect 300 babies from being aborted, citing HHS statistics from Nebraska. The cardiac activity bill would protect 1,700 more, she says.

State Sen. Dave Murman: “This bill is pro-women.” Murman: LB 626 is not racist. A disproportionate number of abortions are done on people of color. Is a person with a beating heart inside another person with a beating heart a person? “I think it is.”

Albrecht: I know this is a difficult conversation with many different viewpoints, but I know we believe that every woman and every child deserves love.

State Sen. Jane Raybould: This bill, LB 626, is extreme. She is arguing that the bill puts a lot of power over doctors’ licenses in the hands of bureaucrats at Nebraska DHHS. Raybould: Doctors know they put their license and practice at risk by performing an illegal abortion.

State Sen. Terrell McKinney: I rose opposed to LB 626. “It’s not my place to make health care decisions for anybody else.” I thought it was interesting they pulled the people of color card.

McKinney: If people were really pro-life, my district wouldn’t have as much poverty and we would not have a death penalty. I think we should respect women and let them do what they want with their bodies.

State Sen. Machaela Cavanaugh is asking Riepe about what his amendment does. Cavanaugh: “You’ve given me something to ponder.”

State Sen. John Lowe: He is reading poetry and or writings about the value of a child and of motherhood.

Lowe appears to be reading from some sort of anti-abortion written from the perspective of the baby.

Now State Sen. Steve Halloran is reading something similar to Lowe about the lost potential of thousands of lives lost to abortion. Halloran: Who might have been a surgeon? What if your parents would have chosen to abort you?

Albrecht: We do not want to be an abortion destination.

State Sen. Mike Jacobson: This is a compromise, and I’m tired of the opponents of LB 626 moving the goalposts. “This is not health care.”

Jacobson: You never know the potential of a child. We lost a child. We are adoptive parents. I believe we were put on this to do this.

State Sen. Wendy DeBoer: I cannot support this bill. “Government should not be involved in these decisions.”

Riepe: The 12-week ban is a restriction. It will restrict abortions. The Dobbs decision nearly cost me my election. The message to me is clear, how critical abortion will be on the minds of voters in 2024, especially women.

Riepe: We must understand the importance of this nonpartisan issue, reproductive rights, in 2024. It will be a top issue for many voters.

Albrecht is talking about the exceptions in LB 626.

Albrecht is echoing the Attorney General’s opinion that minors who are sexually assaulted are required to be reported.

State Sen. Julie Slama is arguing that the 12-week amendment would kill the bill. “We value life.”

Slama is talking about Colorado allowing late-term abortions. She says she wants to know how far opponents would go if left to their own devices. She credited DeBoer for saying 20 weeks. (Opponents of LB 626 have argued that no state allows abortions past the point of viability.)

State Sen. Brian Hardin: Women and babies should be supported. Human life should be protected.

Hardin: “Nebraska is a pro-life state, and this is what Nebraskans want.” This would protect 1,800 lives.

State Sen. Jana Hughes: DHHS says there were only five physicians who performed all the abortions in Nebraska. Most were performed by two doctors.

Hughes: LB 626 gives physicians more leeway than most other conservative states. I agree that we ought to provide more support to mothers. I will vote for 12-week or “heartbeat.”

Slama: AG says we would not be criminalizing doctors. We would not. The bill also does not change mandatory reporting requirements. Nor would doctors risk committing new crimes.

Slama: “This is the most doctor-friendly pro-life bill in the country right now.”

Albrecht: “LB 626 is an opportunity for a generational win.” Arguing that heartbeat (cardiac activity) is a universal sign of life. Let’s stay in the lane of what we are talking about here. Mothers will be protected. Babies will be protected. Doctors will be protected.

Albrecht: How can we possibly look at 200k babies and think it’s okay? “It is our duty to stand up and fight for life.” I couldn’t be prouder of the people standing up, whether you’re for an amendment or LB 626.

State Sen. Brad von Gillern: Arguing that opponents are being disingenuous about how this bill works and who will or will not be put in jeopardy. Doctors will be able to figure this out. (Doctors are split on LB 626, but the majority who have testified are against LB 626.)

von Gillern: Every argument that they had prior to LB 626 have been answered by the authors of 626. I know it’s uncomfortable that we are pulling you back to the bill. But these concerns have been addressed.

von Gillern: I encourage pro-choice physicians to correct the record.

State Sen. Rita Sanders: If life begins at conception, these babies en utero are alive. We know they can feel pain as early as 12 weeks. This is one of the reasons we should support LB 626. We have heard a claim that there is not a real heartbeat at 6 weeks. It beats.

(Many doctors draw a distinction between cardiac activity and a heartbeat of a fully formed heart.)

State Sen. Mike McDonnell: I told people when I ran that I was pro-life. Through this process I’ve had people reach out opposed to LB 626. And some supportive. Sen. Albrecht has answered their questions to me. (McDonnell is the lone Democrat supporting LB 626 so far.)

Slama defended McDonnell as a great legislator to work with. Says his yes means yes and his no means no.

State Sen. Kathleen Kauth: The abortions LB 626 means to prevent are elective abortions. She says abortion-rights advocates have moved beyond “safe, legal and rare” to “shout your abortions.”

Took a break from debate to check on the crowd out in the Rotunda. A lot of abortion-rights advocates around the Rotunda. A line of abortion ban supporters in line upstairs trying to get in to watch debate.

Slama is arguing that she, one of the two conservative lawyers in the Legislature, agrees with AG that LB 626 does not tie actions under the bill to the criminal penalty those opposed to the bill cite.

State Sen. Loren Lippincott: There is a profit motive in abortion and abortion providing.

Lippincott says he supports LB 626 with no amendments.

State Sen. Steve Erdman: Says Riepe was opposed by 53% of the people in his district. He won by 4.5%. I appreciate that Sen. Riepe was re-elected. He’s asking about fetal anomaly exceptions decided by a doctor.

Erdman is saying Tim Tebow’s mom might not have given birth to a child if his mom had listened to doctors.

State Sen. Barry DeKay: We should be protecting the unborn. Their value depends on whether someone wants them or not.

A quick look at the view toward the back of the legislative chamber.

Slama is arguing again that LB 626 creates no new crimes unless they are acting far outside of the scope of the bill and their practice.

State Sen. Lou Ann Linehan: I appreciate Sen. Riepe, but I am not going to support his amendment. I support the bill.

Sen. Riepe just called the question on his amendment and got called up front to speak with Lt. Joe Kelly. Kelly rules that there hasn’t been full and fair debate. (Looked like they might not have had enough people to beat the filibuster.)

State Sen. Myron Dorn: We need to listen to the people and we need to be respectful to the people who agree and disagree with us.

State Sen. Rob Clements: An unborn child is someone who is already a human life. Current Nebraska law already recognizes the unborn as a person when a pregnant woman is attacked.

(Need to clarify: People supportive of Riepe’s amendment are trying to find a way to let Riepe vote for his amendment before a cloture vote happens, not the other way around.)

Conrad: Those that support LB 626 are filibustering the Riepe amendment so it does not come to a vote.

Conrad: “Have the courage to take a vote on Senator Riepe’s amendment.”

Slama says the quiet part out loud, that the cloture vote on LB 626 will come first, which will render the vote on Riepe’s amendment effectively moot, if it doesn’t get adopted, as expected. Senators could then vote quickly to advance LB 626 as written.

Riepe, in a brief interview just now, said he had not yet decided and would not yet declare whether he would be a vote for cloture if the Legislature requires a cloture vote on LB 626 before he gets a vote on his amendment.

Riepe: “I make the analogy of driving a car. Sometimes you don’t know if you’re going to turn left until you get to the point where you need to make a turn.”

Taking a little break to pre-write. Be back soon.

They’re about to vote on cloture.

LB 626, the abortion ban pegged to when an ultrasound detects embryonic cardiac activity, fails a pivotal cloture vote with 32 votes. State Sen. Merv Riepe of Ralston voted present not voting, as did Sen. Justin Wayne of Omaha. The bill fails.

Albrecht declined to comment. Kauth said she was “very disappointed.” Conrad said the debate focused on the right things, especially how extreme LB 626 is.

The crowd of abortion-rights advocates cheered outside.

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