Along with pledging to have a third vote in Colorado and a second vote in Mississippi, Personhood USA is trying to put the extreme anti-choice measure on the ballot in Alabama, Arkansas, California, Florida, Nevada, Ohio and Oregon. Now, you can add Oklahoma to that growing list of states targeted by Personhood USA.
In an interview with OneNewsNow, the news site of the American Family Association, which bankrolled Personhood Mississippi, the head of Personhood USA’s Oklahoma state chapter announced that they will begin collecting signatures to place a personhood amendment on the state ballot:
A campaign is under way in Oklahoma to give voters a chance to decide on a personhood amendment, and a co-founder of the initiative is hoping that lessons learned from other states' failures will help the effort succeed in The Sooner State.
The proposal has been submitted to Secretary of State Glenn Coffee (R), and once the green flag is waved, proponents will have 90 days to obtain at least 150,000 valid voter signatures. But Dan Skerbitz, co-founder of Personhood Oklahoma, the state affiliate of Personhood USA, hopes to gather at least 200,000. He says the initiative has already had a good response.
"The personhood message resonates with pro-life people because it offers the real solution to the whole issue and answers the debate that was left open when Roe v. Wade was passed," he explains.
In an interview with the Tulsa World, Skerbitz reiterated that the law would include no exceptions for rape and refused to answer a question about whether personhood laws would ban the treatment of life-threatening pregnancies and ban abortion even when the life of the mother is at risk:
It does not make exceptions for rape or incest, he said.
"It is our position that the child is to be a protected person, regardless of the fact that the child's father was a criminal," said Skerbitz, 44. "We believe criminals should be punished and not innocent children."
Skerbitz was vague when asked if it would allow for termination of a pregnancy when the mother's life or health is at risk.
"We would hope that science and medicine would do its best to save both," Skerbitz said.
Personhood USA is by no means grieving over their lopsided defeat in Mississippi.
On Monday, Keith Mason of Personhood USA appeared on Janet Parshall’s show In The Market where Mason claimed that the failed personhood effort in Mississippi was a “rwake up call” to the anti-choice movement and brought “revival” to the state. Parshall said that the campaign “may have put on the garment of politics but it was quintessential spiritual warfare”:
