The Iowa House passed a resolution seeking to amend the Iowa Constitution to state there is no right to an abortion in the state of Iowa on Wednesday night, a Republican priority the party had fallen short of achieving in the previous legislative sessions. The measure passed in the House on a 55-45 vote nearly along party lines, with only three Republican representatives voting against.

The amendment, if ultimately adopted and ratified, would pave the way for further abortion restrictions to be put into place as well as make abortion access uncertain should Roe v. Wade, the U.S. Supreme Court case enshrining abortion rights, ever be successfully challenged.

Republicans made the amendment a legislative priority following a 2018 Iowa Supreme Court case which rejected a rule that would have required a 72-hour waiting period for women to receive an abortion, finding that the Iowa Constitution afforded women a “fundamental right” to abortion.

At the time, the Des Moines Register and other media outlets reported many legal professionals and activists considering the ruling to be the “death knell for abortion limits” in Iowa. Over the past two years, Republican legislators and conservative, anti-abortion organizations such as Iowans for Life have fought to amend the Iowa Constitution to explicitly state that no such fundamental right exists.

“We are very pleased it’s moving forward in the House,” said Maggie DeWitte, executive director of Iowans for Life. “We are in strong support of the amendment, and we believe that we need to restore our state constitution to what it was before the judicial overreach of our Iowa Supreme Court in 2018.”

The measure passed the Republican-controlled Iowa Senate in 2020 but was not brought up for a vote in the House, where Republicans held a majority slim enough to warrant concern it would fail. Having passed the House this session, the bill will again move to a vote by the Senate, which Republicans hold by an even greater majority than last year, where it is all but certain to pass.

“We are very confident. We have a lot of great conservative, pro-life Senators, and given the fact that it passed in the Senate last session, we are very confident they’ll move forward with the Senate verison and pass that as well,” DeWitte said.

Pro-choice activists sharply criticized the bill, calling into question both the substance and the timing.

In a statement, NARAL Pro-Choice America national communications director Kristin Ford accused Gov. Kim Reynolds and fellow Republicans of seeking to criminalize abortion and control pregnant women, calling into question the timing of this measure both during a pandemic and following a fraught election and insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

“NARAL and our more than 25,000 members in Iowa will not stop until every effort to roll back reproductive freedom in the state is stopped,” Ford said.

If the bill passes the Iowa Senate, it will then be presented before the legislature for adoption at the next general assembly in 2023 and then to the public for ratification at the following general election.