DYSTOPIAN

Oklahoma Republicans Want to Track Women Considering Abortions

New legislation would create a government-run database that gives women considering abortions a “unique identifying number.”

Oklahoma Republicans have introduced a bill to the state legislature to create a government-run database that tracks women considering abortions. Senate Bill 1167, known as EMMA—Every Mother Matters Act—would create a call center for pregnant women who want “pre-abortion” resources. The hotline, however, would only provide information about “support services, other than abortion,” like adoption, housing, and child care options. The “care agent” operating the hotline would ask to provide the caller a “unique identifying number” to be registered and tracked in a database run by the State Department of Health. An abortion provider must confirm with a woman that she has made this call before performing an abortion by verifying her number in the database. As outlined in EMMA, the number would not track the identity or include any personal information of the pregnant woman within the system. The bill mandates, however, that documentation of the call must be logged in her personal medical records at the abortion clinic for seven years. Gov. Kevin Stitt (R) has pledged in the past to sign any abortion restriction bill placed on his desk.