The Washington PostDemocracy Dies in Darkness

Texas created a blueprint for abortion restrictions. Republican-controlled states may follow suit.

September 3, 2021 at 8:08 p.m. EDT
After Texas’s 6-week abortion ban went in to effect, other Republican-led states implemented similar laws to spur test cases for challenging Roe v. Wade. (Video: Blair Guild/The Washington Post)

Republican officials in more than a half-dozen states across the country moved this week to replicate Texas’s restrictive abortion ban after the Supreme Court declined to step in and stop the law from taking effect.

GOP officials in at least seven states, including Arkansas, Florida, South Carolina and South Dakota, have suggested they may review or amend their states’ laws to mirror Texas’s legislation, which effectively bans abortions after six weeks. Kentucky, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Ohio and more are expected to follow, after a year abortion activists have deemed “the worst legislative year ever for U.S. abortion rights.”