On Wednesday night, lawmakers in Wyoming overrode Republican Gov. Mark Gordon’s veto of a bill that requires pregnant women to undergo an ultrasound before being given the abortion pills mifepristone and misoprostol.

The Wyoming Senate voted 22-9 to override the governor’s veto following a 45-16 House vote on Tuesday. The Republican majority in both chambers of the legislature cited concerns for women’s physical safety in obtaining a medication abortion without determining the gestational age and location of the pregnancy via ultrasound. 

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Medication abortions account for nearly two-thirds of all abortions in the United States, and nearly all abortions in Wyoming involve abortion pills, according to the healthcare think tank KFF.

Anti-abortion advocates have pushed for greater regulation of mifepristone since the Food and Drug Administration removed in-person screening requirements in 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic

They argue that an ultrasound is the best method to not only determine how far into the pregnancy the patient is but also whether or not the pregnancy is implanted in the uterus.

Mifepristone does not work to terminate ectopic pregnancies or those outside of the uterus, most often in the fallopian tube. Ectopic pregnancies are life-threatening emergencies and are recognized by both sides of the abortion debate as medically necessary pregnancy terminations. 

When the FDA initially approved the brand name drug Mifeprex, made by Danco Laboratories, in 2000, patients seeking a medication abortion were required to obtain an ultrasound to determine the gestational age of the pregnancy. 

At that time, medication abortions were only permissible up to eight weeks gestation. In 2016, the FDA allowed medication abortions up to 10 weeks of pregnancy, which is the current standard.

In his veto of the bill on Tuesday, Gordon said, “Mandating this intimate, personally invasive, and often medically unnecessary procedure goes too far.” 

During the first trimester of pregnancy, healthcare providers typically perform a transvaginal ultrasound to determine the gestational age of a fetus. This requires the provider to insert an ultrasound probe a few inches into the patient’s vagina.

Under the new law, pregnant women seeking medication abortions must drive potentially long hours to get an ultrasound and have it documented in order to obtain abortion pills. 

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Patients would not be required to view the image of the fetus. The law also mandates a 48-hour waiting period following the ultrasound before obtaining the abortion pills. 

Pregnant women who do not get an ultrasound before obtaining abortion pills will not be penalized under the law. Medical providers who do not arrange for their patients to obtain an ultrasound will face up to $9,000 in fines and six months in jail.