Abortion notification requirement proposed

Health care facilities that perform abortions would be required to post signs and online messages notifying women of their rights under a bill heard by the Judiciary Committee March 18.

LB187, introduced by Papillion Sen. Bill Kintner, would require any health care facility that performs abortions—other than those necessary to prevent the death of the woman—to post a sign stating that a woman seeking an abortion cannot be coerced or forced into having an abortion.

The bill also would require the state Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) to develop and maintain a web page containing ultrasound images of unborn children, a list of facilities providing a free ultrasound and information on abortion alternatives. Facilities with websites would be required to place a link to the DHHS page on their home page.

The bill would impose a $500 fine for each day the sign is not posted.

Kintner said the bill, especially its provisions for online access to information, would be a way to bring Nebraska’s informed consent statutes “into the 21st century.” Research confirms, he said, that a substantial number of women feel forced by boyfriends, spouses, parents and others to have abortions.

Information provided by online and posted messages would reiterate to women that decisions about abortion are exclusively theirs and that legal protection from coercion is available, he said.

“No woman in Nebraska should ever regret not having enough information about abortion,” Kintner said. “I want to give that woman one more chance to say yes to life.”

Maris Bentley of Nebraskans United for Life testified in support of the bill, saying that women are coerced into abortion far more regularly than is reported. It is critical that pregnant women be provided as much information about abortion as possible, she said.

“It won’t keep coercion and forced abortions from happening, but it will help,” Bentley said.

Greg Schleppenbach of the Nebraska Catholic Conference agreed, citing a study reporting that 64 percent of women felt pressured to have an abortion. The bill would provide women relevant information that would help them make a decision that is “freely made and fully informed,” he said in his testimony supporting the bill.

“No woman should be coerced or pressured to have an abortion,” Schleppenbach said.

DeLoris Tonack of the American Association of University Women testified in opposition to the bill. She said signs and websites displaying narrowly defined abortion language would infringe on individuals’ right to make decisions for themselves and would lead to the publication of additional state-mandated messages.

“This bill is not about information,” Tonack said. “It is about coercion—it is the coercion.”

Scout Richters of American Civil Liberties Union Nebraska also spoke in opposition to the bill. The measure would require an exclusively pro-life message be displayed, she said, which would violate the First Amendment rights of clinics.

“This bill is not about safety, it is about harassing providers and shaming women,” Richters said.

The committee took no immediate action on the bill.