Looking at impact of Oklahoma anti-abortion law on first anniversary
TULSA, Okla. (KTUL) — "We try to direct and inform people, we don’t advise them what to do, but we do inform them of their options," said Susan Braselton of Roefund.org.
That is one of the adjustments pro-choice advocates have had to make in the year since abortion was banned in Oklahoma, navigating a legal minefield.
What is the fine legal line they are walking ?
"We have consulted with our attorneys and we have been told that there’s a big difference between advise and inform," said Braselton.
For example, Susan says women can be informed that abortion is still legal in Kansas and informed that the Roe Fund has made funding available at certain clinics.
So if someone comes in and is directed to a clinic outside of Oklahoma, will there be funds for them to use?
"Yes, there will be funds that have been allotted to the clinic to use towards Oklahoma women, yes," said Braselton, which she confirms is legal.
Meanwhile, on the other side...
"I think we live in a land that’s soaked with the blood of innocent children and the injustice continues," said Alan Maricle.
Maricle is an abortion abolitionist and thinks the law wasn't changed enough.
"The fact that certain doctors or certain medical professionals who used to commit abortions in surgical facilities have been driven out of business or intimidated by the laws as they currently stand, yet mothers are immune from prosecution if they take a chemical weapon in the form of a pill to murder their baby that they got over Amazon. That’s the situation that we look at today," said Maricle.
He'd like to see abortion treated in the same legal light as murder.
"I believe that abortion is murder no matter how it’s carried out and so I think that abortion, since it’s murder, should be treated just like any other murder and should be investigated and prosecuted just like any other murder would be," he said.
Abortion in Oklahoma, a look from either side one year later.
"It’s illegal in Oklahoma but, that doesn’t mean that women are going to stop getting abortions in Oklahoma, they’ll just have to travel further," said Braselton.
"The act of abortion has not been criminalized, only certain perpetrators of the act of abortion have been kind of intimidated by certain laws," said Maricle.
