Little more than a week after Arkansas adopted the country’s most stringent abortion limits , banning the procedure at 12 weeks of pregnancy , the North Dakota Legislature on Friday passed a more restrictive bill that would ban most abortions as early as 6 weeks into pregnancy. 
 
 The Legislature, which is dominated by Republicans, also passed a second measure that would ban abortions sought because of a genetic abnormality or to select the sex of the child. 
 
 Both bills must be signed by Gov. Jack Dalrymple, a Republican, to become law. As of Friday afternoon, the governor had not said whether he would do so. 
 
 No other state has barred abortions because of evidence that a fetus has a genetic defect like Down syndrome, which rises in incidence with maternal age, leading many pregnant women to seek tests for the disorder. Pennsylvania, Oklahoma and Arizona have all banned abortions for the purpose of gender selection. 
 
 National abortion rights groups, including the Center for Reproductive Rights, Planned Parenthood and the American Civil Liberties Union, condemned the measures that passed the North Dakota Senate on Friday, after previous approval by the House. These groups warned that if adopted, both measures would be declared unconstitutional by federal courts. 
 
 Under Supreme Court rulings, women have a right to an abortion until the fetus is viable outside the womb, generally around 24 weeks into pregnancy. 
 
 “We urge the governor to veto all of these bills to ensure that this personal and private decision can be made by a woman and her family, not politicians sitting in the Capitol,” said Jennifer Dalven, the director of the A.C.L.U.’s Reproductive Freedom Project. 
 
 One of the newly passed North Dakota bills outlaws abortions when a fetal heartbeat is “detectable” using “standard medical practice.” Heartbeats are often detectable at about 6 weeks, using an intrusive transvaginal ultrasound, or at about 10 to 12 weeks when using abdominal ultrasounds. 
 
 The bill does not specify a time threshold or whether doctors with a patient in the initial weeks of pregnancy must use the transvaginal probe. A proposed law in Virginia last year that would have required use of the transvaginal ultrasound caused a national outcry, and the bill was ultimately shelved. Arkansas declared a 12-week limit specifically to avoid that controversy. 
 
 But some experts said that doctors in North Dakota, which has only one clinic performing abortions, in Fargo, could face prosecution if they did not use the vaginal ultrasound when necessary to detect a heartbeat. Doctors who knowingly perform abortions in violation of the measure, if it is adopted, could be charged with a felony that carries a five-year prison sentence; the patients would not face criminal charges. 
 
 The law makes exceptions for abortion to save the life of the mother or for other severe medical emergencies, but not in cases of rape or incest. 
 
 In 2011, according to state data, 1,247 abortions were performed in North Dakota. If the ban becomes law, more than 75 percent of the procedures could be outlawed, according to Elizabeth Nash, a state issues manager with the Guttmacher Institute in Washington, a research group that supports abortion rights. 
 
 The early abortion ban was sponsored by Representative Bette Grande, a Republican from Fargo. 
 
 “A heartbeat is accepted by everyone as a sign of life,” she said in a blog posting on Tuesday as she argued that it was time for the Supreme Court to revisit the definition of viability. ||||| Two bills that would increase restrictions on North Dakota’s abortion laws are headed to the governor’s desk after passage by the Senate on Friday. 
 
 If signed, the bills would create some of the toughest abortion laws in the nation. 
 
 House Bill 1305 would make it a Class A misdemeanor for a physician to willingly perform an abortion based specifically on gender or on genetic abnormalities. 
 
 House Bill 1456 requires a physician to determine whether there’s a detectable heartbeat prior to performing an abortion. A physician who willingly performs an abortion after the detection of a heartbeat could be subject to a Class C felony. 
 
 HB1456, if signed by Gov. Jack Dalrymple, would enact the earliest abortion restriction in the nation. Heartbeats have been detected as early as approximately six weeks after conception. 
 
 “The time has come to choose life,” said Sen. Spencer Berry, R-Fargo, who spoke briefly in favor of HB1456. No further debate followed before the Senate passed the bill 26-17. 
 
 Opponents of the bill in past hearings have pointed to federal law that protects abortions up to where an unborn child can survive outside the womb, approximately 24 weeks. 
 
 The potential six-week mark is even stricter than a bill passed by the Arkansas Legislature that enacts a near-ban after 12 weeks. A federal court earlier this month overturned an Idaho law banning abortions after 20 weeks. 
 
 Nearly all of Friday’s debate was centered on HB1305, which passed by a 28-15 vote minutes earlier. 
 
 The debate included emotional appeals and personal stories from senators, as well as a brief delay during floor votes on two divided portions of the bill when a Democratic member of the Senate left the chamber. 
 
 Sen. Connie Triplett, D-Grand Forks, was later excused, but her departure drew a rebuke from the majority leader and a warning for senators not to do that in the future. 
 
 Sen. Margaret Sitte, R-Bismarck, introduced HB1305, calling on her Senate colleagues to vote against what she called sex discrimination. 
 
 “This gender-cide has led to ... a well-documented gender gap,” Sitte said. 
 
 Sen. Carolyn Nelson, D-Fargo, disputed Sitte’s claim of gender-based abortions in North Dakota. She said the issue of such abortions stems from the Chinese law restricting couples living in urban areas to one child. 
 
 “We don’t live in China. We live in North Dakota. This is not a problem in North Dakota,” Nelson said. 
 
 According to records from the state’s only abortion facility, there have been no instances of an abortion being performed for gender reasons, she said. 
 
 Minority Leader Mac Schneider, D-Grand Forks, then asked to have HB1305 split into two parts for separate votes before voting on the final bill. The motion was approved. 
 
 The bill was divided, with one section removing the wording about genetic abnormalities. 
 
 Berry said allowing sex-selective abortions and those based on genetic abnormalities is a path down the “slippery slope of eugenics.” 
 
 “We get in a dangerous area for future precedent,” Berry said. 
 
 Triplett called the comparison to China “silly” and called the Legislature’s attempt to govern women’s bodies “an abomination.” 
 
 She said the Chinese law was passed to address a fear of rapidly rising population and a consequence was that couples would have sons overwhelmingly. When the law was enacted in the late 1970s, only men could own property, she said. 
 
 Sitte said abortion providers can claim that no abortions are being conducted based on gender “because they don’t have to give a reason.” 
 
 She said North Dakota was a leader in passing its anti-discrimination laws and HB1305 boils down to a question of discrimination. 
 
 “Is it right to discriminate against a human being?” Sitte said. 
 
 Before the first vote was taken, Triplett left the chamber. After brief discussion on Senate rules relating to absences and voting, Triplett was excused so the vote could proceed. The first part of the bill then passed by a 37-6 vote. 
 
 Sen. Terry Wanzek, R-Jamestown, spoke about the second section, which stripped the reference to genetic abnormalities from the bill. He noted that his sister was born with a genetic abnormality and said nothing about her makes her life less valuable. 
 
 “These are special people here for a special purpose,” Wanzek said. 
 
 The second part of the bill also passed, and the full HB1305 then passed by a 28-15 vote. 
 
 Before the Senate adjourned, Majority Leader Rich Wardner, R-Dickinson, told members that Senate rules require those who are on the floor and in attendance to vote. He said absences can be excused only by first checking with the leader of the senator’s party and that the absent senator must have a legitimate excuse. 
 
 Wardner told his colleagues that if any of them are thinking of leaving as Triplett did, they should “get it out of your mind.” If that happens, he said, the Senate will wait for them to return. ||||| A federal judge on Monday temporarily blocked North Dakota's new abortion law, the most restrictive in the country because it prohibits ending a pregnancy once a fetal heartbeat can be detected, which can be as early as six weeks after conception. 
 
 Banning abortions as early as six weeks, or before fetal viability between 24 and 26 weeks of gestation, would bar nearly 90 percent of the abortions performed at the Red River Women's Clinic, the state's only abortion clinic, said its director, Tammi Kromenaker. 
 
 U.S. District Court Judge Daniel Hovland, in granting a preliminary injunction in response to a lawsuit filed by the clinic, wrote that the new law "is clearly an invalid and unconstitutional law based on the United States Supreme Court precedent in Roe v. Wade from 1973." 
 
 The law was to go into effect August 1. 
 
 In its lawsuit, Red River Women's Clinic had claimed the measure violates the U.S. Constitution and places the health of women in danger. 
 
 "We are very pleased," said Kromenaker. "The U.S. Supreme Court has said time and time again that you cannot ban abortion prior to viability." 
 
 Were the law to go into effect, the clinic would be forced to close, she added. The closest alternative clinics are 250 miles away in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, and Sioux Falls, South Dakota. 
 
 The law, approved in March, is among a host of restrictions on abortion passed this year by Republican-led state legislatures across the United States. 
 
 North Dakota Governor Jack Dalrymple, a Republican in a state where the party also controls the legislature, said in March that it was not clear if the law would be constitutional but that money should be provided by the state to defend it. 
 
 A dozen states have approved bans on most abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy, but none have approved restrictions as strong as the ones enacted by North Dakota and Arkansas. 
 
 In March, Arkansas banned most abortions after 12 weeks of pregnancy. A federal judge blocked the law in May, at least temporarily. 
 
 (Reporting By Brendan O'Brien; Editing by Dina Kyriakidou and Philip Barbara)
– Abortion opponents in North Dakota have one-upped their peers in Arkansas. Less than two weeks after the latter state banned abortions after 12 weeks, North Dakota lawmakers approved a ban after six weeks, reports the Bismarck Tribune. They also voted to outlaw abortions when a genetic defect is discovered—Down syndrome, for example—or when parents don't like the sex of their fetus. Gov. Jack Dalrymple hasn't said whether he will sign the measures, but proponents have enough votes to override even if he vetoes them, reports AP. Which means it's a safe bet that the state will soon have the strictest abortion laws in the nation. Lawmakers picked six weeks because that's when a heartbeat can be detected by transvaginal ultrasound, the intrusive procedure that set off controversy in Virginia last year, reports the New York Times. Arkansas picked 12 weeks because a heartbeat can be detected with an abdominal ultrasound at that point. Assuming the North Dakota bills become law, expect legal challenges to follow. No other state, for example, has a law that outlaws abortions over a genetic defect. Of the 1,247 abortions performed in the state in 2011, 75% would be illegal under the new legislation, according to a research group that backs abortion rights. That could well mean that the state's only abortion clinic, in Fargo, would have to close its doors.