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South Carolina GOP Lawmaker Voices Regret over “Fetal Heartbeat” Abortion Ban

HeadlineAug 26, 2022

In South Carolina, Republican state Representative Neal Collins recently said he is reconsidering his support of his state’s so-called fetal heartbeat bill after learning how the law imperiled the life of one of his constituents. Last week, Collins described how he learned from a doctor about a 19-year-old who was denied abortion care for her unviable fetus and sent home from a South Carolina hospital because the new law required her to wait until a heartbeat could no longer be detected in the fetus.

Rep. Neal Collins: “The doctor told me at that point there’s a 50% chance — well, first, she’s going to pass this fetus in the toilet. She’s going to have to deal with that on her own. There’s a 50% chance — greater than 50% chance that she’s going to lose her uterus. There’s a 10% chance that she will develop sepsis and herself die. That weighs on me. I voted for that bill. These are affecting people.”

Collins was among three South Carolina Republicans who abstained from a committee vote on a new bill that would ban nearly all abortions. That bill faces a debate by the full South Carolina House next Wednesday.

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