Idaho just became the first state to pass a law modeled after Texas’ draconian six-week abortion ban that financially incentivizes private citizens to enforce the law.
The Idaho House of Representatives passed S.B. 1309 on Monday evening in a 51 to 14 vote, just weeks after the Senate passed it. Republican Gov. Brad Little is expected to sign it into law, and it will likely go into effect sometime in April, months before a decision is expected in the U.S. Supreme Court case currently threatening the constitutional right to abortion.
The bill is modeled after Texas’ six-week abortion ban that went into effect in September. The Idaho bill is somewhat different because it limits who can sue and who can be sued, unlike Texas, which allows anyone in the state to sue a person or provider who helps a woman get an abortion after the six-week point. In Idaho, the bill can only be enforced by the patient and their family members including the father of the fetus. Additionally, the only people who can be sued under the Idaho bill are abortion providers. In the Texas law, anyone from an Uber driver to a friend of a patient is vulnerable to a civil lawsuit.
As is, abortion is out of reach for most people in Idaho: In 2017, 95% of Idaho counties had no abortion clinics, and 67% of Idaho women lived in those counties. The state currently has two “trigger bans” on the books awaiting a Supreme Court decision: a waiting period for when a patient can get an abortion and restrictions on...
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