The JLF’s Becki Gray was on Pete Kaliner’s show today talking about eleventh-hour legislation. She believes House Bill 297 will be signed into law. It is a bill to prevent the sale of baby parts, something that reportedly has never occurred to any extent in this state. Were that all, the bill would be merely hogwash for political posturing. But it also contains the following:

The Department’s use of State funds for initiatives and projects authorized under this section shall not include the allocation of funds to renew or extend existing contracts or enter into new contracts for the provision of family planning services, pregnancy prevention activities, or adolescent parenting programs with any provider that performs abortions.

Susan Fisher of the local delegation, according to Gray, was the bill’s worst enemy. Planned Parenthood figures strongly on the legislator’s resume and in her support base. She criticized earlier legislation that made abortion clinics abide by the same health codes as other clinics. It effectively shut down the only abortion clinic in Western North Carolina. At the time, Fisher complained the legislation disproportionately challenged rural women who would have to take time off work, arrange for daycare, and pay travel expenses whenever they wanted an abortion.