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SD public defense duties shift from counties to state; SCOTUS appears skeptical of restricting government communications with social media companies; Trump lawyers say he can't make bond; new scholarships aim to connect class of 2024 to high-demand jobs.

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The SCOTUS weighs government influence on social media, and who groups like the NRA can do business with. Biden signs an executive order to advance women's health research and the White House tells Israel it's responsible for the Gaza humanitarian crisis.

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Midwest regenerative farmers are rethinking chicken production, Medicare Advantage is squeezing the finances of rural hospitals and California's extreme swing from floods to drought has some thinking it's time to turn rural farm parcels into floodplains.

Missouri Senate May Send Personhood Bill to Voters

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Monday, May 9, 2016   

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. - Missouri voters may be asked to change the state constitution to say life begins at conception.

The House voted in favor of House Resolution 98 last week and now, it's the Senate's turn to debate it.

The bill recognizes an unborn child as a person with a "right to life which cannot be deprived by state or private action without due process and equal protection of law."

It also says fertilized eggs "have a natural right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."

But Sarah Rossi, director of advocacy and policy for ACLU Missouri, warns the bill takes away a woman's rights.

"It attempts to ban all types of abortion services in the state of Missouri through the Missouri State Constitution," says Rossi. "It would also ban quite a few forms of birth control, and also put in-vitro fertilization and other fertility procedures at risk."

Ash Grove Representative Mike Moon sponsored the bill that would ask voters to decide if embryos at every stage of biological development should be given the right to life.

The Republican-dominated House approved it on Thursday and sent it to the Senate, where there are only eight Democrats among the 34 senators.

M'Evie Mead, director of policy and organizing with Planned Parenthood Advocates in Missouri, thinks if the bill passes, it will be found unconstitutional, which means an expensive court battle for the state.

She contends lawmakers have plenty of other priorities to focus on.

"The Senate absolutely should not spend the very last week of Missouri's legislative session with so many pressing things that need to be tended to - expanding Medicaid, helping with education, looking at our state's infrastructure."

Similar measures have been challenged in other states, and Rossi is convinced that would also be the fate of HR 98.

"For us, it's a constitutional issue, but at a deeper level, it's a health and welfare issue," says Rossi. "It's a emotional and mental health issue, and while I don't disregard the moral and religious views of the proponents of these bills, our state's constitution and our state statutes are not the place for the religious and moral judgments of other people."

The ACLU and Planned Parenthood say the legislation collides head-on with Roe v. Wade, the 43-year-old U.S. Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion.



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