Texas House overwhelmingly passes bill to clarify medical exception to state abortion ban
Senate Bill 31 standardizes the medical exception in the state's three separate abortion bans, including one from 1857, and requires doctors to receive training on what is permissible under the law. It also clarifies that doctors may treat a life-threatening condition before a patient faces imminent death or harm, codifying the Texas Supreme Court's 2024 ruling in a lawsuit brought by 20 Texas women and two OB-GYNs.
The proposal does not expand or change which Texans qualify for a legal abortion. Current law bans the procedure from fertilization, with no exceptions for rape, incest or fetal anomalies.
Addressing his colleagues, Republican state Rep. Charlie Geren said SB 31 will ensure doctors know when they can intervene in near-death situations.
"We know women have died after care was delayed or denied,' said Geren, who authored SB 31's House companion. "We know women have left Texas for lifesaving care. We know women have been horribly injured because doctors have refused to provide abortions that could save their bodies. Doctors and hospitals need the clarity that SB 31 can provide."
Since September 2021, when the Legislature passed Senate Bill 8, at least three women have died after doctors denied abortion care during medical crises and the rate of sepsis nearly doubled among pregnant Texans, according to ProPublica. Around three abortions per month have taken place under the life-of-the-mother exception, or 135 in total, according to data from the state Health and Human Services Commission.
Doctors also testified in regulatory hearings that they were afraid they would face lawsuits or criminal prosecution for intervening to save a woman's life.
The preliminary 129-6 House vote moves SB 31 one crucial step forward to reaching the governor's desk after it passed unanimously in the state Senate. Ten House members abstained. The bill will go to a final vote Thursday and would take effect immediately once signed by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott.
Several of the chamber's hardline Republicans questioned Geren about whether the bill would allow doctors to terminate pregnancies unnecessarily, with Rep. Briscoe Cain, R-Deer Park, asking whether more babies would die as a result of the bill.
Rep. Tom Oliverson, an anesthesiologist and conservative Republican from Cypress, responded to those concerns by saying that when a previable pregnancy threatens a mother's life, the baby will die regardless.
"The question is whether the mother survives the pregnancy," Oliverson said on the House floor. "We're not talking about circumstances where the baby could be delivered and could survive."
SB 31's initial language drew significant pushback from abortion rights activists, who said it could bolster the state's argument that an abortion ban originating in 1857 is enforceable.
In response, the bill's author, Republican state Sen. Bryan Hughes of Mineola, changed the proposal to clarify it neither rejects nor affirms the enforceability of the pre-Roe law. The bill now also states that pregnant Texans cannot be prosecuted for receiving an abortion.
SB 31 will tweak Hughes' Senate Bill 8, the 2021 law that authorizes private citizens to sue people who terminate a pregnancy after around six weeks. It also changes some language in House Bill 1280, a 2021 law that set out criminal penalties of up to 99 years in prison, loss of a medical license and significant fines for physicians found to have illegally terminated a pregnancy.
According to Geren, SB 31 will address a mismatch between the intent and the effect of those abortion bans.
"This bill clarifies the legislative intent that everyone thought we had when we passed the law several years ago," he said.
This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Bill to 'clarify' Texas abortion ban set to reach Gov. Greg Abbott
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