The new measure, signed into law by Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican, would ban abortions as early as six weeks, before many women realize they are pregnant. The law is set to take effect in July, but that may be held up by legal challenges. The American Civil Liberties Union has already said it plans to sue.
At the bill signing, DeWine said the measure would “protect those who cannot protect themselves,” but he also acknowledged its potential to be used as a tool in the fight against Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court ruling that legalized abortion before a fetus is viable outside the womb, usually about 24 weeks into a pregnancy.
“Taking this action really is the time-honored tradition, the constitutional tradition, of making a good-faith argument for modification, reversal of existing legal precedent,” DeWine said, according to Cleveland.com. “So this is exactly what this is, and the United States Supreme Court will ultimately make a decision.”
Ohio is the third state to enact a fetal heartbeat bill this year, joining Kentucky and Mississippi, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that supports abortion rights. Georgia is expected to become the fourth. Iowa and North Dakota have passed similar measures in recent years as well.
The laws are unlikely to go into effect anytime soon, and similarly restrictive bans are routinely struck down in court, but anti-abortion activists continue to bring such measures forward in order to lay the groundwork for a Supreme Court challenge.
In Ohio, conservatives had previously brought forward a fetal heartbeat bill, but they were newly energized by the appointments of Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court.
While the measure is the first major abortion restriction signed by DeWine, who took office in January, his support for the bill was hardly a surprise to abortion rights-supporters given his role as attorney general under former Gov. John Kasich, a fellow Republican.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.