MECKLENBURG COUNTY, N.C. — In response to the North Carolina House of Representatives and Senate passing a bill that limits abortions to 12 weeks into a pregnancy, Gov. Roy Cooper is traveling the state to discuss women's reproductive health.
Cooper visited the Davidson Town Hall on Tuesday, among other places, to voice his displeasure about Senate Bill 20, which passed through both chambers of the North Carolina General Assembly last week.
“Let’s stop this disaster that’s about to happen in North Carolina,” Cooper said.
Mecklenburg County was specifically targeted by Cooper for this roundtable because he has called out two representatives, John Bradford (R-98) and Tricia Cotham (R-112), from the county who voted in favor of the bill despite saying they would not support further bans in the past.
“I tend to think there would be a person who would want to create a legacy of standing up for what is right," Cooper said.
Cotham recently switched from Democrat to Republican and voted in favor of this abortion ban. But Cooper pointed out on Tuesday she had previously voiced support for abortion rights before her party switch.
“She gave a very passionate speech on the House floor about how the government needs to stay out of women's health care decisions," Cooper said. "Nothing has changed since then, a party label shouldn’t change that fact."
Abortion advocates say they're fearful people won't have the same access to abortion that they had.
“I wouldn’t be able to travel, meet people, do things, had I not had that abortion, I just wasn’t ready at 20-something years old, I was absolutely not ready," Tina Marshall, founder of the Black Abortion Defense League, an abortion-rights-supporting group said.
The 46-page bill includes details about exceptions, administrative requirements for abortion providers, and funding for early childhood care, among other items.
The bill includes exceptions for rape, incest, life-limiting anomalies, and medical emergencies.
Additional administrative requirements in the bill would reduce access to abortions and may lead to an increased burden of providing abortion care.
Planned Parenthood released a statement saying it does not have any health centers in North Carolina that currently meet all of the requirements of the new license and added that many facilities will not be able to meet them in the near future either.
“The people who are most vulnerable are going to be most negatively impacted, people who are poorer, people of color," the chief medical officer of Planned Parenthood South Atlantic, Dr. Katherine Farris, said.
Meanwhile, supporters of the bill say it will protect unborn babies and their mothers.
Republican lawmakers have put nearly $180 million of funding into the bill. That includes money to expand access to child care, reduce infant and maternal mortality, additional money for foster care, kinship care, and children’s homes, money to help people without insurance pay for birth control, and additional money over the next two years for community college tuition grants.
Cooper has said he will veto the bill Saturday. Cooper needs one Republican to vote with Democrats to sustain his veto.