ST. LOUIS — The architect of Missouri's abortion ban appeared on "The Record" Sunday to discuss several abortion related topics.
State Senator Mary Elizabeth Coleman (R-Arnold), is a GOP primary candidate for Congress in the state's Third Congressional District. During the interview, Coleman talks about the ballot drive to overturn the abortion ban in the state's constitution, the GOP effort to make that harder to do, and the recent Alabama Supreme Court ruling on IVF which found frozen embryos the same as children in the womb.
5 On Your Side's Political Editor Mark Maxwell asked Coleman how a court might consider the following portions of Missouri's abortion ban, and whether that interpretation could potentially imperil access to in vitro fertilization treatments.
Because much of the live interview focuses on technical portions of the law, 5 On Your Side has included relevant excerpts, along with links to the legislative text, as a reader's guide to provide clarity around the conversation.
Missouri’s abortion law starts out saying, “Almighty God is the author of life...”
The abortion law, in Chapter 188 of Missouri's Title XII Public Health and Welfare statute, provides two separate definitions of abortion. One definition focuses on the embryo or fetus; the other focuses on the pregnancy "of the mother."
2) "The intentional termination of the pregnancy of a mother by using or prescribing any instrument, device, medicine, drug, or other means or substance with an intention other than to increase the probability of a live birth or to remove a dead unborn child."
In later portions of the same statute, the law expands on the definition of an unborn child. At other times, it switches back and forth between making references to abortions "of an unborn child," or abortions "induced upon a woman."
In some places, the ban says “no abortion shall be performed or induced upon a woman...”
In other portions, the ban says, “Any person who knowingly performs or induces an abortion of an unborn child in violation of the provisions of this section is guilty of a class D felony...”
Missouri's abortion ban defines an "Unborn child" as “the offspring of human beings from the moment of conception until birth and at every stage of its biological development, including the human conceptus, zygote, morula, blastocyst, embryo, and fetus."
It also says “Any person who knowingly performs or induces an abortion of an unborn child in violation of this subsection shall be guilty of a class B felony...”
The law says “...the life of each human being begins at conception and that unborn children have protectable interests in life, health, and well-being.”
A portion of the abortion ban which was updated in 2017 says doctors and hospitals can lose their license if they perform an abortion "of an unborn child."
Below is a transcript that illuminates Coleman's position on abortion, the broader debate about the ongoing efforts to regulate or protect the procedure, and how a court's interpretation of the law might impact the legal liabilities of fertility doctors who provide IVF treatments. The conversation is chronological with headers that label the following topic. Additional information about Missouri's laws is in Italics.
Trump in Missouri
Mark Maxwell: How do you describe President Trump's claim to the Republican base in Missouri, claiming all of the delegates at stake in Missouri? What is that thing?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: Sure. So I think you just saw a dominating win by President Trump. And what you see is really resonating with the base. Missourians are pretty frustrated. They are ready to fire Joe Biden. And when they look at somebody who under his leadership, we had a strong economy, we had a secure border, and people are just fed up. And I think that there's a lot of people who just love President Trump.
Mark Maxwell: When you rank...
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: And the numbers really bear it out. I mean, it's not just a dominant success, meaning every single congressional and county, but the percentages are astounding. There wasn't even a second option with most of those caucuses, right?
Mark Maxwell: And Nikki Haley, they didn't really put up much of a campaign or a fight in Missouri. But still, the numbers in Missouri were deeper red than they were for Trump in most other states, if not all so far.
Abortion in Missouri
Mark Maxwell: When you consider the impact of President Trump's term in office, where would you rank his influence on reshaping the Supreme Court and their ultimate decision to overturn Roe v Wade? Where does that fit into the Trump legacy?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: For somebody who, like me, has been a pro-life activist my entire life, It's got to be at the very top of the list. This is really the culmination of a 30-year fight to try to reshape the judiciary, to have people who are not legislating from the bench, people who are trying to interpret our founding documents the way that they were written. This idea that there's somehow a living Constitution is garbage. Our Constitution should be read under the four corners as it was written, and as it's amended under the process that's put in place. And so Trump has an incredible legacy, but it's not just for overturning Roe, which is a generational win, but it's for strong Second Amendment support in the New York case, it's about ending the deep state and pushing back against this bureaucracy that's going to expand past what the legislative intent of law was federally. So it's a huge part of his appeal and his victory.
Mark Maxwell: I often wonder if we'll ever change the U.S. Constitution through that process again. But that's a question for another day. We'll get to the Missouri part of that in a minute.
Many in our audience may know that you were integral, key in helping to write Missouri's abortion ban, often considered one of the most stringent in the nation.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: That's right.
Mark Maxwell: Would you like to see Missouri's abortion ban become the model nationwide? Would you vote for a federal law of the same kind?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: So listen, I would do anything and everything I can to protect the life of the unborn, and I'm certainly happy to advance that. We do not have the support nationally right now to implement the kind of protections that we have for women and children in the state of Missouri.
Mark Maxwell: But you're running for Congress to have a voice in that.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: Absolutely. But when you look at the landscape, there isn't a majority of voices across the country to enact that kind of legislation.
Mark Maxwell: 72% of Republicans and 84% of voters nationwide supported giving a rape victim legal access to an abortion in a recent poll conducted just last year by Marist. Where do you think that number sits in Missouri?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: I don't know. What I know is that women who have been violated in that way deserve every protection of the law, and people who commit those horrendous crimes should be put in jail for... I mean, just throw away the key. We have got to do a better job protecting women from the violence of rape. When we have people who are wanting to use rape victims as a talking point to legalize up-to-birth abortion, abortion on demand, paid for by taxpayers for any reason, I find that really reprehensible, because we should be focusing on punishing the criminals who are hurting women.
Mark Maxwell: They're not the vast majority of abortion cases, but they are some of the cases. So they're important to mention.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: Well, and we should listen to the voices of the women who have conceived through rape. Friends like my... People like my friend Rebecca Kessinger, who says she should have a voice to be talking about this issue. And she talks about how her life has value. She was conceived through rape. And so again, this is really horrible to be using as a talking point for the left, a small portion of abortions to legalize up-to-birth abortion on demand, paid for by the taxpayers. That's the radical position.
Changing Missouri's Constitution
Mark Maxwell: I was asking about the percentage of support because, as you know, the Missouri Senate right now is talking about changing the threshold of public support that would be necessary to change the Constitution.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: That's right.
Mark Maxwell: So that's why I was asking that question in numbers.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: Well, what I would say about that is that people who are talking about the initiative petition reform, which is a terrible acronym, I think that it makes it really confusing. Initiative petition reform sounds like a problem you're having with your internet service provider or your computer.
Mark Maxwell: Yeah, not the catchiest buzzword. Maybe get President Trump on it. He can brand it differently.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: I'm sure he'll have some kind of better branding. But people who are concerned about out-of-state influences coming in, spending their money to be able to change our founding documents. And that isn't just about abortion. I know the left is galvanized right now by abortion. They're wanting these really radical, up 'til birth, taxpayer-funded abortions. But protecting our Constitution goes far beyond that. We're talking about making sure that out-of-state influences can't come in, change the minimum wage, they can't change, you know, whether it's sportsbook and betting... I think a lot of people are in support of that. But those things don't need to be in our founding documents. We have bingo right now in our Constitution, because it is almost as easy to change the Constitution as it is to write a state statute.
Mark Maxwell: We could talk in circles about that, and whether or not the legislature could take a more active role, and there wouldn't be this push from industry to do it. I don't know the answer to that. But let me ask you about a few things that were successfully changed through that initiative petition process. Hancock Amendment. Good or bad?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: I think that's great.
Mark Maxwell: All right. You've got the Missouri Plan. Good or bad?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: Well, I think that we have judges in the Supreme Court right now who are continuing to push back against the legislative process. I'm a practicing lawyer. I'm a constitutional lawyer defending the rights of the unborn. But that's at the federal level, so I'm not a fan of the Missouri Plan, but...
Mark Maxwell: Really? Ok. It's widely seen as a success. I'm surprised to hear that.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: Yeah, no. Well, what we have right now is... So there was a legislative effort for, gosh, over 20 years to try to defund Planned Parenthood. And the courts continue to rule against the legislative process. And I think that's inappropriate. And as long as we don't have something more like the federal plan, like where you have people who are nominated by the governor, approved by the Senate, I think that moving towards a more federal system makes a lot of sense for Missouri, whether it's the Missouri Plan or protecting the Constitution through initiative petition reform.
Mark Maxwell: I raise those examples because they are examples of the public support coming in and saying, 'let's change the Constitution to make this good government reform. Let's do this thing. Let the will of the people be the law of the land.' And so it was. Those were examples there.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: So the will of the people is the law of the land when you go through the legislative process, too. You have a chance to throw out your elected leaders if they're not doing what you want on a regular basis. And changing our founding documents should be harder to do than just changing state statute.
Mark Maxwell: But I guess then why now? Why now when there is this big push to...?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: Well, I've been working on it since I've been in the state House, and I think that people have been working on it for a long time.
IVF in Missouri
Mark Maxwell: Would you vote to protect in vitro fertilization or IVF in federal law?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: So right now, well, in federal law, those are states issues that have been typically funded. Those have not been done at the federal level. And in Missouri, we have some of the most permissive IVF and surrogacy laws in the country. And so there isn't really a need to do anything legislative there.
Mark Maxwell: I'm not so sure. Do you think, for example, a Missouri court might reasonably reach the same conclusion that the Supreme Court did in Atlanta about IVF?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: I don't think so.
Mark Maxwell: I said... I meant to say Alabama. Pardon me.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: No, I don't think so. And you know that because back in 1986 is when Missouri put into -- by Democrats in the state House -- into our founding documents, that we believe that life begins at conception. And since that time, we have had IVF used by families to be able to build their families and parents since that time. Louisiana actually was one of the first places that put in IVF laws back in 1987. And so if the courts were going to find a problem with the statutes and the things that have been legal, they would have done so at some point in the last almost 35 years.
Mark Maxwell: How could they when the new Missouri abortion ban that took effect in 2021 was written in 2019? The courts haven't litigated that that new law yet.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: They have litigated it. In fact, they litigate it. And what's interesting is that.
Mark Maxwell: Around IVF?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: No, but somebody would have filed a piece of lawsuits that happened. So that law, the Missouri Stands for the Unborn Act, that I'm the architect of, was put in place in 2019, and we would have seen litigation be filed since then. And it's important to note, I think, too, that the Alabama case that you're talking about, if you read it, was actually brought by parents who had been working, I mean, really had given their treasure and their pain and their longing for a child to fertility doctors who really violated that trust by not having basic protections put in place. So I think people were shocked by the result of that case. But the people that were bringing it forward were the families who are trying to continue to add children into their families. And that kind of has gotten glossed over. And so if Missouri was going to do something, they would have needed to already address it.
Anti-abortion laws in Missouri
Mark Maxwell: I want to get specific on the law, though, because the portion of the law that you sponsored and helped to craft, it defines an abortion as the act of, basically "acting with intent to destroy either the life of an embryo, or fetus...
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: It doesn't say the life of an embryo.
Mark Maxwell: I'm quoting directly. "...or fetus in his or her mother's womb." Do you read that as embryo in mother's womb? Or...
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: So you have left out, as often the mainstream media does, important pieces in the definition. So a viable pregnancy is required to be able to have a termination of a pregnancy. And so one of the things that we talk about -- and actually we just had a hearing on this last week in the Health and Welfare Committee in the state Senate -- is when you have abortion defined positively as ending the life of a viable pregnancy, you don't have to go back in and do all of these negative definitions. And so you're kind of pulling a piece of that. An embryo in that section is talking about a viable pregnancy, which is a part that you didn't read in the legislation.
Mark Maxwell: I want to be clear, I did read and research all that, and I did see some portions of the law that refer to a viable pregnancy in the mother's womb.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: That's under the very definition of abortion under section 210.065. So you're going to have to read all of it together. I know it's tempting to kind of pick the pieces out to kind of try to get fearmongering or try to make points.
Mark Maxwell: I want to get clarity.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: But I want to make it really clear that IVF is legal in the state of Missouri. Surrogacy laws are legal in the state of Missouri, and there is no need to address those issues. And really, you know that because there has been no litigation on that since that point. And the Dobbs decision came out over a year and a half ago. So if that were a concern, it would have been addressed.
Mark Maxwell: Just to be clear, it defines... that law defines an unborn child as... And it goes on to use the term embryo. So it defines an embryo as an unborn child.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: As a viable pregnancy. So yes, as an embryo as part of a viable pregnancy.
Mark Maxwell: So you're taking different portions of that law and piecing them together.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: No. The opposite. I'm asking you to not do that.
Mark Maxwell: Okay, I guess it stands to a judge is basically the question. I think that people can read it, reasonable people can read it and have these questions, which is why I wanted to bring them to you.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: So I think often if you have people who are trying to make a political point by reading statutes in a piecemeal position, that they can get to that point. What's important to me is that people understand that in the state of Missouri currently, contraception, the morning after pill, miscarriage care and treating for an ectopic pregnancy, IVF, surrogacy, those are all perfectly legal. And there has been no litigation or lawsuits, to my knowledge, that have been filed since the Dobbs decision came out and the law went into effect, to challenge those things. And interestingly, in Missouri, we ended abortion before the Dobbs decision came out. The last provider of an abortion Planned Parenthood facility in Saint Louis left almost a full year before they stopped doing abortions, almost a full year before the Dobbs decision came out, because of how strong that law was to protect the unborn.
Mark Maxwell: Just for any of our viewers who haven't seen, we did quote a fertility doctor as soon as the Alabama case came out and said it was his view, and it's the view of many different fertility doctors in the state, that Missouri law does protect their access to practice in the manner that they do.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: So when you got pro-life activists who wrote the law saying that and providers saying that. This is my point about why people don't trust the mainstream media is because it starts to sow concern where there isn't a concern under the law. And the reason is because obviously there's a national uproar right now over the Alabama decision, and it becomes kind of a talking point. And so I just push back whenever that happens, because I think it's important for your viewers to know that it's perfectly legal.
Mark Maxwell: I think I understand what you're saying, and I want to be clear to our viewers as well. When people look at this big national [Dobbs case], they compare the written English language of the Alabama law to the Missouri law, they look at the court opinion and they see similarities. I think it raises fair questions there, which is why I wanted to see if you can clarify them. Let me button it up this way.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: Sure. Hopefully that clarified then.
Missouri's abortion law does provide definitions of abortion. The word "viable" is not included anywhere in the state's legal definition of abortion. Separately, the same law offers different definitions for "unborn child," "viability," "viable," "viable pregnancy," or "viable intrauterine pregnancy."
Section 210.065 of Missouri's Revised Statutes was repealed in 1985. While some portions of Chapter 210 under Missouri's Title XII Public Health and Welfare laws refer to child protection, child abuse, and foster care, the terms 'abortion,' 'viable,' and 'embryo' do not appear anywhere in that chapter of the statute. The only portion of Missouri law we could find that includes the term "viable unborn child" together is in the headline title of section 188.030 that prohibits the "abortion of [a] viable unborn child," and in the physician reporting requirements under that same section.
Protecting IVF
Mark Maxwell: Well, this this question will clarify it. If someone was to come to you, one of your colleagues in the Senate, and said, 'Hey, I think this language could make it crystal clear that IVF is protected in Missouri and could improve upon any confusion that may exist in the current statute.' Would you support that?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: Here's what I would say is you have to look very carefully at what's written. What Alabama has recently passed is actually to try to... The legislature is trying to address the concerns of parents in light of the Supreme Court ruling. But if you look at the language that they have recently passed and I think the governor may sign, there's real concerns because they've gotten rid of all negligence suits for fertility doctors who are not following the law. And we don't want families who are hurt to not have a cause of action. So the way that you word these things is exceptionally important.
Mark Maxwell: Okay.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: And because it's broadly legal right now, I wouldn't want to enact something that might actually make it harder for a family who would receive malpractice in their medical practice to be able to be made whole. So does that make sense?
Mark Maxwell: We'd have to see the language. Is what you're saying? To make any changes?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: Because right now it's broadly legal, and I wouldn't want to accidentally have something done that would take away the ability for a family who is harmed to be made whole.
Mark Maxwell: So there's no immediate threat to IVF in Missouri as you see it, and until the courts would come and try to throw that into question...
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: That's right.
Mark Maxwell: That would be the catalyst? I think I understand you.
Parson commutes a prison sentence
Mark Maxwell: I want to try to get your input on something else that just happened, a big news item just this week.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: Sure.
Mark Maxwell: Missouri Governor Mike Parson commuted the sentence of Chiefs coach Andy Reid's son, Britt Reid.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: Yeah.
Mark Maxwell: He had pleaded guilty to driving under the influence when he hurt a 5-year-old girl. He had served just about roughly half of his prison sentence. And you had said, 'This is not justice,' in a post online. Why not?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: A little girl has been harmed for the rest of her life, and the man who was convicted of that crime was sentenced by a judge and found guilty by a jury of his peers. And to have that commuted, I think is really inappropriate.
Mark Maxwell: Is it the optics of the powerful and well connected?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: It's not... It's not because he's who he is. It's because of what he did that I find it horrific.
Mark Maxwell: What would be your message to Governor Parson at this point?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: Well, I'm not sure that there's anything that can be done because he's commuted the sentence already. But I just think it's important that when people are looking at the, at this case in particular, that it's really a tragic case that should not have happened.
Initiative petition reform
Mark Maxwell: Before we let you go, because I know you're going back to Jefferson City for the duration of this session. That is still yet to play out. The House has passed one IP reform bill. The Senate has passed a different one. Can the Freedom Caucus sort of get its act together to let these two things become one? Or how does the where do we go from here?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: So the legislative process can be a little bit like making sausage, I hear, when you're trying to explain it to people. But basically what's happened is that each of those bills has made it to about step nine of 20. One has gone through one chamber, the other has gone through the other chamber, and then we're going to be picking up those other bills and considering them. What I would guess happens is that the House will pick up the state Senate's version, they'll make some modifications to it, they'll send it over to us and hopefully we'll go ahead and truly agree and finally pass this.
Mark Maxwell: The Senate bill adds another barrier that says you have to get not just a majority of the voters in the state, but also a majority of the congressional districts there, too. When the Missouri Independent did the math on that, they said about 23% of voters in the state of Missouri could kill a constitutional amendment. Why do that? Why add that extra barrier?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: So right now, in order to even get something on the ballot, you have to have signatures in six of the eight congressional districts. And that's because we want to make sure that voters across the state are represented. And we don't have just the people who live in the 70... My math, I'm a lawyer, not a mathematician. What's this, 27 minus whatever it is?
Mark Maxwell: If I knew, I'm not sure where you're going. I'm sorry.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: So about 70% of the people live in our urban areas, and I don't think it makes sense for people only in those urban centers to be able to change the Constitution, and neither do most Missourians. And that's why we require signature gathering and six of the eight congressional districts. I think it's important that we also have a majority of the congressional districts vote in favor of an idea before we change our Constitution.
Mark Maxwell: But you don't only need 67% support to change the US Constitution. This would take it up to 76...
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: But that's not true. You have to have every you.
Mark Maxwell: I know, there's a lot of steps.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: Yeah, that's not true. So you have to have actually each state independently ratify it. They have their own process. And if it was just by population, your analogy is actually kind of a perfect one because federally, if that were the case, you would only have to have a couple states change it because the population is in just a couple of the states. We have a country that's represented equally in our state Senate, and we have, I'm sorry, our federal Senate, and we have our states represented equally in changing the Constitution, where each state, a majority of the states have to. My threshold is actually easier. I'm saying not 67% like you have to have federally, just 51%. We have eight congressional seats right now, so five of eight. But if that ever changes, our population grows and we get nine, then you'd have to have six of nine, right? So you have to have a majority or five of nine I'm sorry. You have to have a majority of the constitutional districts.
Mark Maxwell: I guess just to to boil it all down to the bottom, you're going to confront critics on along the campaign trail who say you're trying to make it harder to change the Constitution right at the very time abortion advocates are trying to change the Constitution. They're going to make the claim that, 'See, they're afraid of public opinion. They're afraid of losing the hearts and minds.'
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: What I would say is that we have had example after example, whether it is Medicaid expansion, raising the minimum wage, legalizing marijuana, where you've had out-of-state money come in and put it on the ballot and change that, and you have more of those types of things, whether it's about, it's infringing the Second Amendment rights, increasing the minimum wage, again, making it harder for small businesses to be able to operate. There's a variety of issues that are going to be on the ballot and continue to be done, not through state statute, which everybody is fine with. And we're not changing in any way at all, but through our Constitution. And I don't think minimum wage or really, you know, bingo belongs in our state constitution. And I don't think most Missourians do either.
Mark Maxwell: Right. Okay. Last question. Do you hope to see that question about making it harder to change the Constitution on the ballot in August?
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: I don't know. I think that that governor is going to have to decide to do that. I think probably I'd want to have it on the ballot in November, because Trump will be at the top of the ballot. Missouri loves Trump, and it'll increase voter turnout. But whenever he puts it on the ballot, this isn't just about abortion. By the way, I hope your listeners decline to sign that signature collection process to put the abortion initiative onto the ballot. I think that that's a terrible, terrible proposed amendment that goes beyond Roe. It's not about going back to Roe. It's about taxpayer funded abortions up until the time of birth. But this is not the only reason why we should be changing the initiative petition process.
Mark Maxwell: Just to be clear, the constitutional language in the amendment would allow states, the state of Missouri, to continue to restrict abortion, not up until the point of birth.
Mary Elizabeth Coleman: No, because of the way that it's drafted. It has mental health explanation, ex example... Of mental exemptions as well. And the way that that has been interpreted in other states where it's been put like Michigan has been allowed up until birth for any reason. You just have a medical professional. You don't even have to, according to the way that it's written, have a doctor who says that. It could be just somebody who works in a medical clinic. So it is really very, very extreme, no matter what they say.