'Heartbeat Bill' Outlawing Abortion To Be Reintroduced In PA

HARRISBURG, PA — While the roaring conflagration over abortion that has dominated American politics for years came to a fever pitch during the midterm elections, the sweeping Democratic victory in Pennsylvania was but an ellipsis.

And while Republicans may be counting their losses and reevaluating how certain strategies, like the degree to which they lean on MAGA wing candidates and tout election denying claims, serve them, they're doubling down on their core issues. Such is the case in the newly formed Pennsylvania General Assembly, where deeply conservative stalwart State Rep. Stephanie Borowicz has announced plans to reintroduce her "Heartbeat Bill" legislation.

"My legislation will require all physicians, before proceeding with an abortion, to determine whether the baby has a heartbeat," Borowicz wrote. "If the baby has a heartbeat, then the abortion cannot be performed."

The bill is a companion to the long-standing legislation introduced by Republican gubernatorial candidate State Sen. Doug Mastriano. If it's language matches that bill, it would outlaw abortions in all cases, including rape and incest.

However, Democratic Attorney General Josh Shapiro won that election handily, and he's has vowed to veto any bill that infringes on abortion rights in Pennsylvania. Democrats also took away the Republican majority in the House for the first time in 12 years. Both could be read as a referendum on a woman's right to choose in the Keystone State.

For Republicans, in the very least, the bill is a signal not only that they don't intend on backing down on abortion, but that their stance may remain hardline. Borowicz said earlier in the year that"God and guns got us here, and God and guns will keep us here." Mastriano once said in defense of his bill that women should be charged with murder for abortion.

"Is that a human being? Is that a little boy or girl? If it is, it deserves equal protection under the law," Mastriano told WITF in previously unpublished comments, first reported in October by NBC News.

When asked if he was saying the mother should be charged with murder, he reportedly replied "Yes, I am."

Borowicz says her bill shifts the focus from the law to "protecting the baby."

"This will eliminate the need (for) gestational age in legislation and will honor the science which shows that more than 90 percent of all pregnancies are viable in which a heartbeat is detected," she wrote.

Abortion rights were long considered settled law, and even as other conservative states pushed at-the-time unconstitutional fetal heartbeat laws and others restricting abortion access, many legal scholars doubted a right that generations of women and men had counted on was in serious jeopardy.

That was all shattered when the U.S. Supreme Court handed down a monumental reversal of Roe v. Wade earlier this summer, ending federal protections for abortion.

Borowicz named a wide array of state legislators that had previously signed on as consponsors, including State Reps. Struzzi, Schmitt, Hamm, Cook, Knowles, Fee, Metcalfe, Greiner, Owlett, Rothman, Topper, Jones, Smith, Hickernell, Kauffman, Diamond, Bernstine, Dunbar, Pickett, Moul, B. Miller, Rapp, Gleim, Ryan, Rowe, Cox, Zimmerman, Maloney, Keefer, Mercuri, Wheeland, Gillen, Hershey, Kerwin, Schemel, Pennycuick, Jozwiak, Roae, Armanini, Helm, Fritz, Davanzo, Marshall, Flood, Gregory, Irvin, Oberlander, Bonner, Warner, Lewis, DelRosso, Sankey, Mustello, Wentling, Lewis, Sonney, Rigby, Saylor, Causer, E. Nelson, Rossi, Klunk, Stambaugh, and Kail.