COLUMBIA, S.C. (WBTW) — Governor Henry McMaster and other officials appealed an injunction Friday on South Carolina’s abortion ban.
“We have appealed the federal court’s preliminary injunction against the Fetal Heartbeat Bill. No fight is more worthy of our time and energy than the fight to protect life in South Carolina,” McMaster said.
South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson, South Carolina House of Representatives Speaker James Lucas, and 13th Circuit Solicitor William Walter Wilkins, III., are also named in the appeal.
Read the appeal below.
Gov. Henry McMaster signed the bill into law less than an hour after it was sent to him, but the national reproductive health services organization sued even before the governor put ink to paper.
The temporary restraining order was needed in part because more than 75 women are scheduled to have abortions in the state over the next three days, and most of them would be banned under the new law, Planned Parenthood and The Center for Reproductive Rights said in court papers.
The ” South Carolina Fetal Heartbeat and Protection from Abortion Act ” is similar to abortion restriction laws that a dozen states have previously passed. All were stopped from taking effect and currently are tied up in court. Federal law, which takes precedence over state law, currently allows abortion.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
