Georgia lawmakers want abortion rights question on November ballot
ATLANTA, Ga. (Atlanta News First) - Some Georgia lawmakers who the right to an abortion held a news conference Wednesday to try to draw attention to a long-shot resolution that would put abortion rights on the November ballot.
House Minority Leader James Beverly of Macon and state Rep. Kim Schofield of Atlanta, both Democrats, ed other lawmakers and activists to speak about House Resolution 836, known by its sponsors as the “Right to Reproductive Freedom” resolution.
The legislation would allow voters to decide if the right to an abortion should be enshrined in the Georgia Constitution.
“We should never, ever, ever be on the wrong side of history telling a woman when, where, and with whom to have a baby,” Beverly said.
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“Let’s put it on the ballot,” Schofield said. “Let us make the decisions.”
A woman named Nandi, who asked that her last name not be published, stood with the resolution’s sponsors at the State Capitol. She’s a mother of two who said she’s had three abortions in Georgia. She now works as a doula helping others who are seeking abortions.
“To be able to vote – which is insane that you have to vote on being able to care for your body – but to get on the ballot would mean so much to me and the clients that I because it means that we’d be able to get care without fear,” Nandi said.
The proposal is unlikely to gain any traction. Currently in Georgia, most abortions are banned after roughly the sixth week of pregnancy once fetal cardiac activity can be detected in the womb. Plus, it takes a two-thirds majority in both chambers to get a constitutional amendment question on a ballot, and Republicans control both the House and Senate in Georgia.
Sponsors of the resolution submitted it in January, and it still hasn’t had a hearing. Atlanta News First reached out to Republican insiders who said it would be highly unlikely for the measure to gain any traction with conservatives in charge of deciding which legislation gets a hearing.
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