Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade leaves Indiana's abortion laws in question
CHICAGO (CBS) -- After the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, abortion will now quickly be outlawed in 13 states with so-called "trigger laws" that make abortion legal immediately, or within a matter of days or weeks.
In Kentucky, Louisiana, and South Dakota, that happens immediately.
As CBS 2's Chris Tye reports, even states without trigger laws could soon take action to more severely restrict abortion, or ban it altogether.
Indiana doesn't have a trigger law, so abortion currently is legal up to 22 weeks of pregnancy, but all signs point to that law changing quickly.
"Indiana is a complicated state," Indiana University law professor Jody Medeira said.
But it might become a less complicated and more conservative state quickly, if Medeira is correct.
"I believe the state of Indiana is now going to act very quickly to make abortion regulations in this state more stringent," she said.
Indiana could even go so far as to ban abortion altogether. Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb has called for a special session of the General Assembly in the first week of July. His expectations are unambiguous.
"I have been clear in stating I am pro-life. We have an opportunity to make progress in protecting the sanctity of life, and that's exactly what we will do," he wrote in a tweet.
Indiana – part rural, part urban – is a red state. So why didn't they have a trigger law?
Madeira said state legislators faced strong criticism from the business sector when the state previously pushed back on LGBTQ rights, and didn't want to lose business from companies not wanting to be viewed as supporting states with extreme abortion laws.
Now, an exodus of a different kind is likely to begin.
"There's going to unprecedented numbers of women going to Illinois, and other states where abortion rules are more liberal, to obtain safe procedures.
If states take even more extreme measures of criminalizing out-of-state medical procedures, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot said watch out.
"Then I'm going to use that same precedent to sue states like Indiana, like other states that are bringing illegal guns into my city and my state with reckless abandon and taking lives. So, careful what you wish for in these other states," she said.
It's unclear how far Indiana will go with all this; a full ban, a ban on certain medications or providers, or making it more difficult to use telehealth or making it tricker for clinics to operate.
We will learn more when the General Assembly meets July 6.
