“South Dakota moves to legalize killing abortion providers!” claims a recent, sensational headline from Mother Jones.

In the article, Kate Sheppard said, “If the bill passes, it could in theory allow a woman’s father, mother, son, daughter or husband to kill anyone who tried to provide that woman an abortion; even if she wanted one.”

The Iowa State Daily recently printed an editorial that asks us to put ourselves in the shoes of an abortion provider who provided an abortion to a woman whose father didn’t approve of such an act, and then asks us to “[i]magine South Dakota state law says it’s all right for him to walk into that small, lonely clinic, and kill you.” It then goes on that this law “endorses terrorism.”

This is a huge moral issue; or it would be if anything these two news providers said about the law is true.

Fortunately, the law in question won’t allow any of those things. The writer of the bill, Rep. Phil Jensen, said the bill’s purpose is “simply is to bring consistency to South Dakota statute as it relates to justifiable homicide.”

You see, South Dakota has it on the books that someone who causes the death of an unborn child, say, by pushing the mother down the stairs or putting abortifacient pills in her food, can be tried for murder. Or if someone killed a pregnant woman, they would be tried for two, not one, counts of murder. This isn’t anything new, as 38 states, including Iowa, have laws on the books that protect unborn children in this way.

South Dakota also has a justifiable homicide law. It allows the killing of a murderous assailant in self-defense. This, again, is not something new or novel. The bill in question only seeks to reconcile the two laws. It gives the ability of a mother of an unborn child to protect her child, and it is written for cases like this one outlined by Jensen:

“Say an ex-boyfriend who happens to be father of a baby doesn’t want to pay child support for the next 18 years, and he beats on his ex-girfriend’s abdomen in trying to abort her baby. If she did kill him, it would be justified. She is resisting an effort to murder her unborn child.”

That’s the “consistency” Jensen talks about.

The bill has absolutely nothing to do with abortions.

There will be no one who will escape murder charges if they kill an abortion provider. The law is pretty clear and unambiguous about that.

“This section does not apply to acts which cause the death of an unborn child if those acts were committed during any abortion, lawful or unlawful, to which the pregnant woman consented,” according to the law.

So, in fact, an angry father would not be justified in killing an abortion provider, even if the abortions provided are illegal. The law goes out of its way to protect abortion providers’ right to live, and yet it still gets attacked.

Now, it may be prudent to debate whether the law is necessary. In fact, it may be true that a South Dakota expectant mother’s ability to protect her unborn child is already thoroughly covered by law.

However, it can’t be said that this law endorses the murder of abortion providers or “terrorism.” That would be simply dishonest. I certainly hope that the mistake was just that: an incomplete body of evidence.