Republican Gov. Rick Perry has called a second special session—beginning at 2 p.m. on July 1 —to again take up the abortion-restriction cause.
“I am calling the Legislature back into session because too much important work remains undone for the people of Texas,” Perry said in a statement. “Texans value life and want to protect women and the unborn.”
The special session also will consider transportation infrastructure funding and legislation relating to sentencing for a capital felonies committed by a 17-year-old offender.
The initial abortion legislation, Senate Bill 5, was defeated Tuesday night in a chaotic vote that followed a daylong filibuster by State Sen. Wendy Davis. Perry addressed the brouhaha in announcing the second special session: “We will not allow the breakdown of decorum and decency to prevent us from doing what the people of this state hired us to do.”
The bill would have drastically cut the number of surgical centers in Texas that could legally perform abortions.
According to this interactive map, six out of the seven Dallas-Fort Worth facilities that now perform abortions would not meet the bill’s regulatory standard of being an ambulatory surgical center. Only Southwestern Women’s Surgery Center in Dallas would qualify.
