Proposed life-saving exceptions opposed by anti-abortion lobbyists

through the state House on March 20.

A proposed amendment to Tennessee’s abortion ban is being advanced through the state legislature despite resistance from antiabortion lobbyists.

Currently, Tennessee’s abortion ban does not contain explicit exceptions, even for lifethreatening medical emergencies. Instead, it contains the concept of “affirmative defense,” which would place a legal burden on doctors to prove that the abortion care they provide is solely for emergencies where a patient’s life or major bodily functions would be endangered.

However, to be able to use affirmative defense, a doctor would have to first be charged for performing an abortion, which is considered a felony in Tennessee. This charge carries the risk of an individual losing their medical license, even if they are later found innocent.

In mid-February, Republican lawmakers introduced a bill that would remove affirmative defense entirely from the language of the ban and would instead clarify that it is not a crime to terminate a pregnancy to prevent or treat a medical emergency. The original bill received bipartisan support.

It is the provision that allows doctors to pre- vent a medical emergency that is particularly distasteful to some anti-abortion lobbyists. Will Brewer, a representative from the state’s foremost anti-abortion lobbying group Tennessee Right To Life, called preventative abortion care “quasi-elective abortions” during a meeting with lawmakers.

Noé Monárrez, a health educator and condom distribution coordinator for Planned Parenthood of Tennessee and North Mississippi, explained that they were particularly outraged by that term.

“‘Quasi-elective abortion’ feels like an attempt from abortion oppositionists to further demonize and stigmatize a very normal and old medical process,” Monárrez said.

After a tense meeting with the House Population Health Subcommittee, TN Right To Life issued a scathing press release about the bill.

“While well-intentioned, in reality this bill, if enacted, would offer cover to those who abort children in our state and would delete large sections of pro-life measures in Tennessee code,” the release said.

The organization also threatened to give poor ratings to the sponsors of the bill, amongst other political retribution. Due to this, the bill was drastically reworked before passing

The current version of the bill preserves the removal of affirmative decision and gives explicit protections on abortion care to treat ectopic pregnancies and miscarriages. However, language that would clearly allow doctors to terminate on the basis of lethal fetal anomalies and other medical emergencies has been deleted and replaced with “reasonable medical judgment.”

TN Right to Life has expressed support for this version of the bill.

Sam Traylor, president of the University of Tennessee’s College Republicans, clarified that while College Republicans supports the bill, he understands where lobbyists’ concerns are coming from.

“If a doctor is being told that they can practice ‘good judgment,’ this could potentially lead to corrupt doctors performing abortions,” Traylor said

“But overall, I think that doctors should be allowed to perform an abortion if it is for medical reasons to preserve the life of the mother.”

The bill is only one of several abortion-related legislation measures to have recently passed and the only one relaxing restrictions to have received Republican support. Democrat-led efforts to add protections to victims of incest and rape, exceptions for minors and to lower criminal abortion to a misdemeanor have all failed.