A few years ago the bills were considered politically toxic. And extreme proposal by a fringe element of the Antiabortion Movement over 60000000 innocent babies have illegally made it up there. This is a crime against humanity in a city get. This but this year they swept through republican controlled state houses and were signed into law. The laws are being challenged in court and none are yet in a fax and on judge has blocked ohios and so called needle heartbeat law this bill is not about pro life. This bill is about control. For the 1st time this state will make georgia women criminals criminals for seeking basic reproductive care ok. These laws are part of a strategy to challenge roe v wade the Supreme Court decision that made abortion legal across the country almost 50 years ago do you think a majority of people in georgia wanted this bill to pass the heartbeat no absolutely not was this law written to challenge roe yes of course it was faultlines travels to. Alabama and georgia 2 of the states on the front lines of this battle. Or served for next saturday the 7th at 7 45 in the morning to ask whats at stake when access to abortion is under threat and how far can these laws go. Because you think. That people on the i mean this bill would create a new pathway to criminalize black and brown women which youve already seen the disappoint shit facts in the criminal Justice System these are the latest attempts not merely to overturn roe v wade and the right to choose abortion they are about spam wishing in the law the fact that none have a 2nd class its. Alabama has become ground 0 for the countrys it illogical battle over abortion. And the fight over what should prevail the rights of women or the unborn. Baby already have a part. In may the state passed the most restrictive abortion law in the country banning it in nearly all cases including rape and incest. Its the latest chapter in the Antiabortion Movements decades Long Campaign to end abortion i just found this on the fair with. One of the bike dolls. They have now yeah theyll try to like tell you thats what your papers. For years theyve chipped away at Abortion Access by pushing for laws that make operating clinics difficult if not impossible. And theyve succeeded. 50 clinics closed in the American South between 20112017. Under the new legislation doctors who perform abortions could face up to 99 years in prison. Who is pain is the main Abortion Provider here and has been a doctor for 50 years. Has your clinic ever experienced any kind of threats or as anything ever happened yeah weve had you know the arson far it was total destruction of 97. 00 and their way had the all weather shot out once and then we had to get out it drove his car into the way or. The new laws could have far reaching implications not only for abortion clinics but for anyone who becomes pregnant. Theyre part of a fetal Personhood Movement which seeks to give fertilized eggs embryos and fetuses the same legal rights as people who are far. Far far as you are saying. That will allow our own what were trying to follow scientists are 1st for the city of roses savage to salt the seed as earlier you were you know or certainly. You know the 1973 Supreme Court ruling roe v wade said that states cant restrict a womans right to an abortion until the fetus becomes viable and can survive outside the uterus according to the ruling that can start at 24 weeks but the Supreme Court sidestepped the question of personhood and refused to quote resolve the difficult question of when life begins and thats where Eric Johnston a lawyer who drafted alabamas bill saw an opening that of medical science can prove that the unborn child is a person that gets the rights of the constitution and i think that higher purpose in our. All in alabama is to approach it that way you know they didnt have the sonograms and the ultrasounds in the fetal for god or for that we have now. Its women like nora a 20 year old student who would be directly impacted by this law. Im getting an abortion. And im choosing to the surgical procedure. Because. Shes 5 weeks pregnant. But as i have seen author sound like the size of a pea. And i brain is there a heartbeat like its not anything thats actually living god these are they throw back. Right. Most people saying this stuff its man and so they dont understand the responsibility and pressure that puts on women to say that anything thats inside you is now like your responsibility and you have to give birth to it and might carry that for the rest of your life. And its also saying a fetus isnt only equal to a woman but its like more important than a womans personhood because like i mean i dont get to choose that. What would it mean for you if you didnt have the option to have an abortion right now and id probably drop out of school and like probably move back home in love with my mom and id be like a nightmare situation yeah i dont know what i would do probably try some at home would be really dangerous oh no sir you know i was told. This is my risk personally. If these abortion bans go into effect it would mean going back to a time before bush and was legal nationwide. Dr payne whos 80 remembers that time well because there were a lot of illegal abortions. A lot of a lose their uterus lose their o. Reproductive ability and thats the way it was back there thats what. Well it wont ever go back to that because theyre not going to outlaw abortion. But opposed through world is what johnston was imagining when he wrote alabamas bill in the summer of 20 teen as President Trump was gearing up to nominate conservative judge Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. Were you thinking this is our moment not necessarily i was thinking that the circumstances are about as favorable as they may ever be there are several factors that are brought us through that probably the biggest ones will be to new justices on the Supreme Court we think that they are likely to reverse roe if given the opportunity and thats right 2019 all of a sudden like a year or shed year for these kinds of laws in a row there were 2 competing concepts one was the privacy rights of the individual rights of the woman the other was the rights of the unborn child and the u. S. Supreme court said well since the unborn child is not a person then the woman within her rights of privacy has a right to have an abortion. And that the unborn child is a person then that trumps the rights of the woman because she is the rights of 2 individuals. That its a fiction. The fact is that as long as that life is inside of another human being there is no way to treat it as a matter of laws if its separate without taking away the personhood of the pregnant woman what has been called the fetal Personhood Movement is an attempt by political activists to establish as a matter of law separate rights for fertilized eggs embryos and fetuses so that police and prosecutors and legislators husbands and other outsiders can control the people who get pregnant women. If alabama provided Fertile Ground for shaping the countrys most extreme antiabortion law georgia has become the center of the resistance. In may. Lawmakers here passed a socalled heartbeat bill effectively banning abortion and around 6 weeks. Any bill that outlaw or restrict a womans right to access abortion care is a bill that is calling for the policies of forced birthing for women. And we do not need your condescending bills that challenge our bodily autonomy one of the most fervent opponents was state representative granita shannon as soon as this bill was introduced i immediately called it what it is which is the forced birthing bill for the women of georgia and i promised myself that if this bill hit the floor i would speak so long that i would force the speaker of the house to physically remove me and other Health Professionals and let my words or going to be mounted on their own herman x. That they be honest way around in the context of this she descended on the grounds that black women would be hit hardest by the ban wire is protected and in terms of number fashion of literacy Maternal Mortality tracks women dying due to complications related to pregnancy up to a year after giving birth and if you look at countries that have outlawed abortion immediately you see a spike sometimes up to 50 percent of more women dying in Maternal Mortality and black women are already 3. 00 to 4. 00 times more likely to die than their white counterparts. And it is the reason why black and brown women have come out so fiercely against this bill. The bills main sponsor was georgia representative and sets where the issue before this house is the question of when should human life be protected by the law were trying to give recognition to disenfranchise groups that had not gotten full and appropriate recognition in the past i think where the groups thats been ignored now for decades has been the unborn. The bill passed by a narrow margin and was signed into law by. The states republican governor brian camp. He and other georgia officials are now being sued in an effort to stop the long. Kemps office declined repeated requests for an interview or have gov you know whatever was the 1st lady so we did the lead plaintiff in the lawsuit is sister song a social justice collective focused on Reproductive Health led by women of color. Monica simpson is their executive director shes also a soul singer. The lawsuit argues that black low income and rural women would be disproportionately impacted by the abortion ban and points out the black women in particular face some of the highest pregnancy related deaths in the country. The legacy of forced reproduction under slavery still looms large. Were talking about being able to make decisions for ourselves make you physicians for our bodies. Because what i refuse to do is to go back to a day where our states are controlling our bodies that sounds like a very scary time to my ancestors lived through that allowed need to be here today and im not going back. Since black people arrived in this country we have effectively had white men telling us what to do with our bodies in slave time and we were forced bred to create more slaves we were raped by slave masters so this is par for the course and we see the same thing by a party that is majority white men again now trying to tell black and brown women especially what is best for their bodies. This is like you decide this is a double it goes a Digital Divide people with a liberal they will build it speak with us but when you say that there are some that i have a right to see that right thats right abortion rates have been falling for more than a decade across racial groups and income levels. I think that if you believe that you gave the labor to the people. Who are men of color and those living in poverty are more likely than their white counterparts to have abortions thats because theyre less likely to have access to quality contraception and health care. Things are there when you come here and you hear people like him. Saying that theyll take care of your baby and then however you want to do with. The Antiabortion Movement has used these statistics to claim that women of color are being targeted for abortion its not worth it to the father. Oh. Oh. I have not seen any of these prolife people and a black lab matter rally ive not seen them at the Maternal Health conference but were talking about beating the best outcomes for folks who are pregnant and i have not seen them talking about Economic Justice or Environmental Justice theyre not talking about any of that theyre talking about fetuses. To divide everything you need if you will just in. Just listing it and if you only care about a fetus that you dont care about the world at that fetus would have to live in or if you dont care about the life of the person thats carrying that fetus then youre not about life oh oh by the way im going to do that here. For the woman you know. People who do not understand or subscribe to this commitment to reproductive justice are trying anything they can to deny. Yes the ability to have what we need its not just as narrow as have a baby or dont have a baby. Have an abortion at one point in their lives might be the very thing that helps them to grow their families later. Look at you our news come in and want to do some big. This is absolutely a civil rights issue. But reproductive justice advocates so we talked to said they feel that black women and women of color are some of the most negatively impacted by your bill they say that this is an example of white men telling black women what they can do with their bodies its a false premise i. Reject that sort of. Thats your answer to them its a false promise you know we as a legislature responding to a very Diverse Group its amazing the people who they think theyre speaking for that support or bill. These lawmakers say that they are protecting life so what is your response then whose life whose life are you concerned that you dont have to dehumanised the pregnant person in order to assign humanity to the cells that are growing inside of her. If these fetal personhood laws are allowed to move forward theres concern it could open a pandoras box from not 3 weeks pregnant a pregnant woman would legally be considered to people and states would have more power to charge pregnant women for behavior that otherwise wouldnt be considered criminal her. Own fault. And its your right and its. Own portion advocates worry that this bill could end up criminalizing women that have miscarriages or abortions is that a legitimate concern that theres 0 legal basis for the. Are women going to be criminalized for trying to end pregnancies themselves. You know the woman is not criminal its got a civil exemption for her. Hes a lawyer on the border there are a whole bunch of other laws in alabama there are murder statute there manslaughter statute there chemical in danger of a child statute there child abuse laws theres an innumerable practically a list of laws that could be used to arrest a pregnant woman all based on the theory of separate rights for fetuses so excluding a rest from a single statute the abortion statute really Means Nothing especially in a state where women are already being arrested hundreds of them in relationship to their pregnancy. But from alabama suffered a miscarriage after big shot about shes being charged with bad slaughter for the death of her unborn child since 1973 more than 1200. 00 women have been arrested or detained in connection with their pregnancies according to data from the National Advocates for pregnant women and pro publica sent to prison for half of these cases were in alabama women who have had a home birth with a midwife and women who have delayed having says arion surgery women who had stillbirths miscarriages or given birth to babies they couldnt guarantee would survive have been arrested for manslaughter and 1st degree murder and 2nd degree murder if you travel while pregnant it could be considered kidnapping none of these are hypotheticals these things are already happening. Here do you think. That if a fish you get your key dare of it says who lives in alabama is one of these women. She suffered from severe epilepsy since she was a teen. As i go electricity store your brain is getting 100000 years and. Years ago she became pregnant and then miscarried she says her doctor told her that antiseizure medications could raise the risks of birth defects. When katie became pregnant again she stopped taking her medication. Instead she relied on marijuana to help regulate her seizures thinking it posed the least risk to her unborn son time whether he is looking for here you know you know after she gave birth and 2014 katie and her baby were both drug tested. It was about a week after i and. I had. Been home i remember one morning i got a phone call from play station asked me if i was home. And they come in immediately after that its like barged in neatly put in handcuffs. Too big to take showed up with a bulletproof vest and like you know it was going to walk in on me like a muslim in a certain place is in my own house you know my you know yall are taking my wife away after she just gave birth you know i. Am telling you how does you know im sorry i love you but i cant i cant fight them you know how to die just to keep me. You know how long i was going to be in nearing exactly what they were going to charge me with. And. I was really scared that i wouldnt be able to see my family again. Because they were they were talking about put me in prison for what like 15 to 20 years 10 years of her. What exactly were you charged with. Chemical indulging that they were child a law intended for people that were like cooking meth around their children you know which of course is bad you know but he tried to do what she thought was. Good for our son and what im going to get is going to stave us said if i had a seizure i give a High Percentage of both of us dying but it is higher for him to. Get hurt. Then me. In 2006 alabama passed its chemical endangerment of a child wrong. The architects of the law intended for it to protect children from homes where drugs were being made. The prosecutors and judges effectively turned it into a futile personhood law. Individual prosecutors thought im going to use that law as a mechanism for responding to pregnant women who use drugs. The state Supreme Court a ballot bama whose chief justice is deeply antiabortion ruled that the law could apply to the unborn in the womb and once that law was upheld hundreds of women have since then been arrested based on the fact that they used any amount of any controlled substance and including ones that their physicians have legitimately appropriately prescribed to them. Katie spent 8 days in jail her family says the case cost them more than 10000. 00 other than her having epilepsy she had a healthy pregnancy she had never been arrested she had never been in trouble. I think that were the lucky ones. Because. We was able to get katies case dismissed with a lot of work and a lot of people on her side. What are you most concerned about in this Political Landscape im concerned that its going to get worse nit picking and looking at the mother trying to see if she did something wrong. If someone has a stillbirth for them to start looking to see what the mother did wrong and i think that a lot of innocent women are gonna get arrested before things change. If the concept of fetal personhood takes hold whats at stake for women goes far beyond abortion. With 2 Supreme Court justices appointed by donald trump its a new era. And the future of reproductive rights is now in the hands of the most conservative court in decades. The nomination and appointment of kavanaghs deeply disturbing and not only because of the risk that roe v wade would be overturned and abortion might be criminalized but the much larger implications of all that which is that women will go to jail. Trying to imagine for a way around what it would be like to be pregnant and have an abortion and i dont think i can. I dont think. I dont think well ever know. These are laws that are really about a much larger agenda and it is an example of massaging me that itself can justify incredible cruelty to the people who get pregnant. Mass protests forcing the. Governments but are we seeing the truth this time. We follow journalists on the frontline to speak to. Free press committed to reporting the facts Police Officers pointing guns at journalists to say stop the hong kong sacked and friction the truth is it anyway on aljazeera what we were. Doing a bit. Out when we are. Now an investigation into the real powers that control the World Health Organization their obligation to their shareholders completely overwhelms any consideration of Public Health can they be trusted with building a healthier future if their loyalty becomes questionable using the people that are about to be h one n one push is it getting much difficult like you are now a w h o has this chaz who says dont hear us trust that you trust on aljazeera. This is aljazeera. Very one im come all sons of maria and this is the news hour from aljazeera more damning of revelations against donald trump by a top diplomat and the 1st public hearing of the impeachment quire against the us president to withhold that systems for no good reason other than help with the Political Campaign made no sense it was it was counterproductive to all of what we had been trying to