A Republican lawmaker introduced a bill in the Tennessee House to ban all abortions once a fetal heartbeat can be detected — which typically occurs in the early weeks of pregnancy.
The bill runs contrary to the Supreme Court's ruling in Roe v. Wade, which established a right to abortion until the point of fetal viability — or about 24 weeks after gestation.
Rep. Micah Van Huss, R-Johnson City, who filed "The Heartbeat Bill" Thursday, told 10News, “I want to protect life and I wasn’t not around for Roe V. Wade but I am now, so I aim to fix it because I want to protect life."
He added there would be an exemption from the bill for women whose lives could be at risk due to pregnancy. He also said it would be subjective to a woman's pregnancy and the term in which a heartbeat can be detected.
"If there's not a heartbeat detected then she can do what she wants but after the heartbeat is detected, it would be illegal to do that in Tennessee," Van Huss added.
Van Huss also said the law would not disregard women who have an unwanted pregnancy from being raped or victim of incest.
"None of us chose who our mothers and fathers were and I do not believe that the judgment of the sins for the mother and father should be carried out on the baby," Van Huss said.
The bill is one of several similar bills introduced in state legislatures across the country thus far this year that could pose a challenge to the 1973 landmark Supreme Court decision guaranteeing a woman's right to abortion just as newly elected President Donald Trump, an abortion opponent, has the opportunity fill the vacancy left by late Justice Antonin Scalia.
It was filed a day after Rep. Terri Lynn Weaver, R-Lancaster, filed a bill that would ban abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy.
"None of this is about protecting the health and safety of women," said Jeff Teague, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Middle & Eastern Tennessee.
"Given the results of the election and the promise of the president to appoint justices who are going to be hostile to Roe, I think it is part of nationwide strategy to do everything possible to get cases back before the Supreme Court to overturn that decision to make abortion illegal and ban it in this country."
Corinne Rovetti, the co-director at Knoxville Center for Reproductive Health believes HB-108 will not make it through committee.
"This bill would essentially make all abortion illegal because a heartbeat is detected between 5 and 6 weeks which is sometimes way before women are even aware they are pregnant," Rovetti said. "Tennessee is just falling in line with many other states that have introduced this bill that have all been struck down as unconstitutional."
Rovetti said women should always have the right to chose and Roe V. Wade gives women that right.
Van Huss agrees, it would be a difficult battle to overturn Roe V. Wade.
"I do realize it is a tough fight but guess what, in my opinion, it's a fight worth having," he said.