Arizona Governor Vetoes Partial-Birth Abortion Ban

Yesterday, in the midst of the marriage amendment debate, Governor Napolitano vetoed the partial-birth abortion ban for the second time this session. Partial-birth abortion is the gruesome procedure in which the baby's entire body is delivered, except for the head, and then the baby is killed by being stabbed in the neck with scissors and having its brain vacuumed out.

In her first veto letter, the Governor stated two concerns with the bill and that she "stand[s] ready to work on these issues in a bipartisan manner." Senator Linda Gray took the Governor at her word and introduced a bill that addressed the Governor's two concerns - giving doctors a chance to have the state medical board determine whether the partial-birth abortion was necessary to save the life of the mother and limiting the penalty to not more than two years in prison. Yet despite these changes and continuing bipartisan support in both Legislative chambers, the Governor vetoed the bill, thereby preventing Arizona from having a clear law preventing this horrific practice that literally takes the life of a preborn child.

In this second veto letter, the Governor falsely claimed the new ban would introduce "more criminal penalties...into the relationship between a woman and her physician." The state ban tracked identically the federal criminal penalties. A state ban on partial-birth is needed because the federal law only applies in limited scenarios with limited enforcement options.

Banning partial-birth abortion is widely supported beyond traditional pro-life groups, and the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that bans on this horrific procedure are constitutional. Governor Napolitano remains unwilling to consider the view held by the overwhelming majority of Arizonans that the partial-birth abortion procedure is appalling.