EXCLUSIVE — A South Dakota state legislator is taking aim at a key argument in favor of legal abortion by combatting misinterpretation and confusion of the state’s restrictions on abortion .
Republican state Rep. Taylor Rehfeldt, who holds a doctorate in nursing and practiced as a nurse anesthetist until she took office in 2021, introduced the “Med Ed Bill” on Wednesday morning to authorize spending for the state Department of Health to make training materials clarifying how the state’s near-total abortion ban ought to be interpreted in cases in which a mother’s life is at risk during pregnancy.
“The abortion topic has really just become this political warzone,” Rehfeldt told the Washington Examiner in an exclusive interview. “What we’re doing in South Dakota [is] putting women and babies first. We’re making sure that, if there is confusion for providers, that we’re stepping up to the plate where other people are not providing clarification.”
Legal abortion advocates argue that states such as South Dakota, which only allows abortion if the mother’s life is at risk, are a danger to women’s health because physicians and healthcare providers must often interpret vague legislation, potentially facing severe criminal penalties if they perform an abortion that does not meet the legal standard.