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Iowa Republicans drop near-total abortion ban proposals
GOP lawmakers turn focus to pill restrictions
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DES MOINES — Legislation limiting access to medication abortions in Iowa will continue, but Republican-led attempts to advance near-total abortion bans in the state failed to survive the first deadline of the 2026 legislative session.
In early February, state lawmakers in both chambers rolled out and advanced similar bills requiring an in-person visit with a health care provider to receive the abortion pill in Iowa. This includes mifepristone, a medication used within the first 10 weeks of pregnancy that blocks a hormone called progesterone needed for a pregnancy to continue.
During the same week, some House Republican lawmakers released two bills.
One, proposed by state Rep. Zach Dieken, of Granville, would have considered abortions as homicide under Iowa state law and punish those who receive them. Another, put forward by Rep. John Dunwell, of Newton, would have essentially enacted a near-total abortion ban by making it a crime for doctors to perform the procedures or face the possibility of life in prison.
Both bills included exceptions, including in the case of miscarriages or to save the life of the mother.
But both efforts were quashed. A subcommittee scheduled on Tuesday for Dunwell’s bill was canceled days before the Legislature’s funnel deadline, which requires bills to pass out of a subcommittee and a committee in either the House or Senate to remain alive.
Instead, Republican lawmakers will focus their attention on legislation — Senate Study Bill 3115 and House Study Bill 704 — restricting medication abortion.
‘Informed consent’
Beyond this week’s funnel deadline, the medication abortion legislation could look different as House and Senate lawmakers work together on an amendment removing a section on “informed consent,” according to Republican state Sen. Jason Schultz, of Schleswig, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee.
He said he is working with House lawmakers to remove the bill’s requirements for physicians to inform patients of specific health and safety information about the pill, the risks related to specific abortion-inducing drugs, and the possibility of reversing a chemical abortion, noting it would put Iowa physicians in “moral and ethical conflicts.”
“Iowa licensed physicians and facilities are not the target of this bill,” Schultz said Thursday. “We are aiming directly at out-of-state, black market, mail-order abortion pills that kill babies without a physical consultation, an ultrasound, licensed prescription administration under supervision and backup medical care.”
As written now, both bills would require the person being prescribed the drug to sign a form confirming they have been informed of specific health and safety information about the pill; create a civil liability for physicians who do not follow specific guidelines before prescribing medication abortion; and create a private cause of action against anyone who violates the bill’s dispensing requirements for the person receiving the chemical abortion.
The House bill advanced out of full committee, while Schultz said his committee let the bill “die” on the Senate side.
Rep. Austin Harris, a Republican from Moulton and chair of the House Health and Human Services Committee, confirmed that discussions on the bill are taking place between the two chambers.
Supporters of the proposals argue they would help curb medication abortion rates, which have increased since the 2022 U.S. Supreme Court ruling overturning the right to an abortion. The ruling turned over the right to control abortion to the states, and Iowa in 2024 adopted a state law restricting most abortions once a fetus heartbeat can be detected, usually around six weeks.
Health care providers and reproductive rights advocates are concerned the pill legislation would further restrict access to abortions and reproductive health care in rural Iowa, take away agency from patients and force physicians to act against medical standards.
Dunwell, of Newton, said his bill, House File 2332, which would make it a crime for doctors to perform abortions, failed to garner enough support in the GOP caucus.
Instead, he said, Republicans will be devoting their attention to medication abortion legislation.
“We realized that the most important priority we knew we'd get across the line this year was going to be prohibiting the black market abortion pill, and so I just shifted my focus 100 percent there,” Dunwell said Thursday. “Didn't want to rile a bunch of people up on a bill that I knew didn't have a path forward.”
House Speaker Pat Grassley, R-New Hartford, also acknowledged the hurdles of advancing a near-total abortion ban this year and said anti-abortion groups want to continue forward with abortion pill restrictions for now.
“We're probably not in a position where we're going to be ready to move forward with that,” Grassley told reporters at the Capitol on Thursday. “We feel that we're in a much better position with support within the caucus for that (medication abortion bill) than we would be the other bill at this point in time.”
House Minority Leader Brian Meyer, of Des Moines, and Senate Minority Leader Janice Weiner, of Iowa City, told reporters Thursday they are “happy” to see the House bills criminalizing abortion not move ahead.
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