CHEYENNE — Two Wyoming Freedom Caucus bills that would place heavy restrictions on abortion access passed easily through a House of Representatives committee Friday morning, with no questions …
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CHEYENNE — Two Wyoming Freedom Caucus bills that would place heavy restrictions on abortion access passed easily through a House of Representatives committee Friday morning, with no questions asked by committee members on expert testimony.
The committee chairperson decides how to regulate the procedures of the meeting.
House Labor, Health and Social Services Committee Chairwoman Rachel Rodriguez-Williams, R-Cody, did allow committee members to question a state agency providing testimony but did not allow the panel to ask questions during public testimony on the bills related to abortion access.
Partway through public comment Wednesday, Rep.Mike Yin, D-Jackson, asked Rodriguez-Williams if committee members would be allowed to ask questions on testimony. Rodriguez-Williams said no, due to the high volume of public comment.
More than a dozen people showed up to testify on the controversial legislation.
Yin told the Wyoming Tribune Eagle after the meeting it appeared to him these bills were being rushed.
“It’s important to be able to have committee members understand from the experts what the policy effects are, and that’s impossible to do if we cannot ask questions of them,” Yin said in a text message to the WTE. “But their purpose is to ram through these bills as fast as possible.”
Cheyenne resident Wendy Volk approached the WTE after Friday’s meeting with the same concern.
With a few medical experts among those testifying on the bills restricting abortion access, Volk found it concerning there was little discussion with the committee.
“It made me very uncomfortable that, on the three abortion bills, there was no opportunity for the committee to talk to the doctors or the experts in the room,” Volk said. “In all transparency, these three bills were really rushed.”
This is a diversion from the committee’s practices last year. Volk and Yin said lawmakers had the opportunity to ask questions during public testimony on similar legislation during the 2024 budget session.
Three bills were passed by members of the House Labor Committee that would restrict reproductive health care in Wyoming. Health care experts argued these bills would disproportionately burden rural women in accessing reproductive health care services.
House Bill 64, sponsored by Freedom Caucus member and House Speaker Rep. Chip Neiman, R-Hulett, passed the committee on Wednesday, with a 7-1 vote. The bill requires pregnant women to get an ultrasound no more than 48 hours before taking an abortion pill.
Anyone who violates this bill would be charged as a felon, with up to a $20,000 fine, up to five years imprisonment or both.
The committee’s sole Democrat, Yin, voted against all three pieces of legislation.
Two more bills were passed by the committee Friday morning, both of which also appear to severely restrict abortion access in Wyoming, which is currently legal. HB 42, “Regulation of surgical abortions,” requires Wyoming’s only abortion clinic to be licensed as an ambulatory surgical center.
“As long as abortion remains legal in Wyoming, we have the responsibility for the safety of women,” said Rep. Martha Lawley, R-Worland, the bill’s sponsor. “HB 42 provides common-sense regulations for surgical abortion to protect the health and safety of women who choose to get surgical abortion.”
‘Put us out of business’
Wellspring Health Access in Casper is the only surgical abortion center in Wyoming. This nonprofit organization provides a multitude of reproductive care services, including pelvic exams, Pap smears, emergency birth control, cancer screenings, STD testing and treatment, and treatment for urinary tract infections.
“We feel that this is specifically targeted to put us out of business,” said Executive Director Katherine Knutter.
Knutter told the committee Wednesday, when discussion began on the bill before continuing Friday, that the American Medical Association, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and many other reputable medical establishments have strongly opposed similar measures in past years.
HB 42 would restrict these health care services “with punitive detrimental measures,” Knutter said. In order “to comply with this trap bill,” the abortion clinic would have to undergo extensive construction, she said.
The bill also requires all of the clinic’s physicians to receive hospital admitting privileges, which is a “major barrier,” Knutter said. Not only is this access blocked for political reasons, but abortion clinic physicians don’t admit enough patients to the hospital on an annual basis.
“Because abortion is very, very safe,” Knutter said.
Dr. Rene Hinkle, an OB-GYN at the Cheyenne Women’s Clinic, told the committee abortions are 11 times safer than a pregnancy. The bill is also unnecessary, she said, since there are plenty of operations, such as vasectomies, that are performed in a doctor’s office.
“This is definitely a directed bill,” Hinkle said. “If you really are concerned about the safety of the citizens of Wyoming, you would include all of those (operations), because those have a higher complication rate than do abortions.”
She pointed to another component of the bill, which requires the abortion facility to be located within a 10-mile radius of a hospital, whereas other surgical centers in Wyoming are required to be within a 50-mile radius.
“The fact that this was 10 is obviously just a target on the Wellspring clinic,” Hinkle said.
Volk said she’s never seen the Wyoming Legislature attack a business the way this bill does.
“To drive them out of business in Wyoming, that is not pro-business,” said Volk, who also stated she’s a Republican and a local business leader. “That is not pro-freedom.”
Yin said he voted against the legislation because it seemed to target one specific Wyoming business.
“I think we all know that this is a bill that only targets one institution in the entire state, which is unfortunate that we’re passing bills that only target one exact place,” Yin said. “I don’t like doing that.”
The bill passed on a vote of 6-1. Rep. Clarence Styvar, R-Cheyenne, was excused from the meeting.
Abortion pills