In the last two weeks Democrats in New York and Virginia have advanced efforts to expand legal abortion, succeeding in the former case and failing in the latter. Both can be understood as responses by Democratic states to shore up legal abortion in the face of a shifting Supreme Court.
In New York, Governor Andrew Cuomo signed into law a bill that would allow third-trimester abortions in the event of “absence of fetal viability” or a threat to the health of the mother. It also dropped the requirement that only doctors perform abortions, and removed possible criminal penalties for non-abortion violence against the unborn. For example, if an abusive partner pushed a pregnant woman down the stairs, causing the death of the child, that can only be prosecuted as a homicide if the baby is after 24 weeks.
