PHOENIX — On Tuesday, a bill that would make it legal for the Department of Health Services to do spot-checks on abortion clinics was passed in the House.
Cathi Herrod of the Center for Arizona Policy, who lobbied for the bill and has played a large role in pushing conservative bills through the House and Senate, was in attendance, along with representatives from Planned Parenthood, for what is shaping up as a new battle less than a week after Gov. Brewer vetoed the last bill promoted by Center for Arizona Policy, SB1062, the so-called religious-freedom bill that critics said enabled discrimination against the LGBT community.
The abortion-clinic bill would allow for the Department of Health Services to randomly check abortion clinics without a warrant. In order to perform an inspection, there would have to be reasonable cause, as determined by the director of the department.
The Democrats pointed to the last time that a state law allowed unannounced checks, in 1999, when that law was overturned by the 9th Circuit Court. “We’re wasting money; we’re wasting time on an issue that was already decided,” said Rep. Stefanie Mach (D-Tucson). “This is something that we all need to accept, that it’s unconstitutional.”
However, the Republicans insisted that the bill would be constitutional because the last time it was overturned, it was because Arizona didn’t have certain abortion-clinic regulations at the time.
Democrats also drew comparisons to Gov. Brewer’s reason for vetoing SB1062, saying the bill is not an important priority of the state. Rep. Justin Olson (R-Mesa) disagreed.
“This question that this bill gets at is a very important priority of this state,” he said.
While Democrats acknowledged that women’s safety is important, they pointed out that the Department of Health Services can still check clinics now, if a warrant has been obtained first. They argued that the bill was unnecessary and would violate the rights of women.
“I will not stand for our constitutional rights to be violated,” Rep. Victoria Steele (D-Tucson) said. “This will cost taxpayers a lot of money. It’s unnecessary, it uses scare tactics, and again it’s an unconstitutional violation of a woman’s right to privacy.”
Rep. Chad Campbell (D-Phoenix) said he was concerned that the unannounced checks would invite potential abuses on a process in which women are facing an extremely difficult decision.
“To open the door for potential abuses for that process, for that experience to begin with in a way to harass or scare somebody that’s already going through what is probably the most significant and most difficult decision they’ve ever had to make in their life is horrifying to me,” Campbell said.
The Republicans disagreed.
“This bill will do nothing to harass patients,” said bill sponsor Rep. Debbie Lesko (R-Peoria) said, “The Department of Health Services is the one in charge, they’re the ones doing the inspections, or people they designate to do these unannounced inspections. They do it in every other health clinic, every other hospital in the state, there’s been no privacy leaked in those places.”
Lesko went on to argue that this bill should be a non-partisan issue about safety for women. “This is not a pro-life vs. pro-choice issue.” she said, “This is about the healthiness of a facility where a woman goes to get a procedure done. That is what this bill is about.”
The Republicans had the final say. The bill narrowly passed 34-22, with four people not voting.
—Story courtesy of the Arizona Sonora News Service—
This article appears in Feb 27 – Mar 5, 2014.
If the State legislature had to pay for their own attorneys most of the crap bills, such as this one, would never get introduced at all, let alone make it out of committee. This, too, will be shot down in court, but not until hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars have been wasted on attorneys’ fees. Keep this sort of nonsense in mind when it comes time to vote this November.
Why is Cathi Herrod Antipas joining the Taliban in the war on women? Do we need the 82nd ABN Div to protect women in AZ? After all we have thousands of troops in Afghanistan to protect women from radical Islamists!
Seems pretty straight forward. If you run a medical facility, you have to maintain a certain level of care and cleanliness or you get shut down by the State. The State has the right to inspect to ascertain that those standards are met. Abortion clinics are medical facilities with licensed practitioners. We know from the Dr Gosnell clinic in PA that when clinics are given the right to ignore the rules because abortion is ” special” , they become unsanitary death houses. So treat them like any other medical facility.
Why do the Repuglicans believe that it is their God-given right to interfere with womens health subjects? If they haven’t got anything else to do (other than trying to defund Obamacare) or any causes to champion (that are truely worth their effort), they should sit down, shut up, and stop trying to institute rules and regulations over things that are of no concern to them. Better yet, just resign and let the democratic process take care of anything they think is amiss.
Dan, can you be a voice for the voiceless. Pre-borns are in fact humans
…even the US supreme court has indicated this fact.
We need voices for the voiceless. Please, thank you, Good Luck.
More people die in hospitals than in Abortion Clinics, mostly through medical errors.
Why not amend the bill to make “spot checks” on all medical facilities, instead of singling out one particular sector?
But Wait.. Wait…. don’t tell me.. this was sponsored by the Far Right extremists who have brought nothing but devastation to Arizona’s economic climate for the past several years. So why not do it??
Because, the old farts who keep voting for these Radical Republican Morons who vote for stuff like this are eventually going to die off, and be replaced by a different constituency, leaving out future Arizonians with a Draconian Lawbook that will take years to undo.
Replace these Republicans, or Arizona will be known as the “Hermit Kingdom” of the United States, and a Pariah, just like North Korea.