ATLANTA — More than 100 people filled the hallway outside an overflowing committee room at the state Capitol on Wednesday as lawmakers heard testimony on legislation that would ban all abortions in Georgia and allow prosecutors to charge women who receive the procedure with homicide.

Gillsville Republican state Rep. Emory Dunahoo, who sponsored House Bill 441, told members of the House Judiciary Non-Civil Committee that the bill expands on the 2019 legislation banning most abortions once a medical professional can detect fetal cardiac activity, typically around six weeks of pregnancy and before many know they are pregnant.

Dunahoo’s bill would grant rights to zygotes and embryos from the point of fertilization, a policy often referred to as “personhood.” It would also get rid of the exceptions for rape and incest in Georgia’s current abortion law.

“This bill simply ensures that those same laws protecting the lives of people after birth equally protect the lives of people before birth,” Dunahoo said.

But opponents said the law would exacerbate the state’s already high rate of maternal mortality, force victims of rape and incest to carry a pregnancy and give birth, and endanger in vitro fertilization, which is often used by people who have had difficulty conceiving children.

The committee did not vote on the measure on Wednesday.

The House hearing took place the day before the Senate is set to vote on House Bill 428, a bill backed by Republican House Speaker Jon Burns that would protect IVF in state law. That bill passed the House 172-0. All of the nearly two dozen cosponsors of HB 441, except for Dunahoo — who was excused from the chamber — voted in favor the IVF legislation.

The IVF process includes fertilizing an egg that can either be placed directly in the uterus or be frozen for future use. Oftentimes, unused embryos are discarded, given to other people seeking children or donated to science.

Health professionals argued that if HB 441 became law, it would push fertility specialists out of state for fear of being charged with homicide when embryos do not result in a live birth.

Dr. Karenne Fru, an Atlanta-based reproductive endocrinologist who founded a Sandy Springs fertility clinic, told lawmakers that HB 441 would jeopardize her life’s work of helping families have children.

“This whole conversation of, ‘We all know life begins at fertilization,’ is wrong — it is scientifically wrong,” Fru said. “I am doing God’s work. He said, ‘Go forth and procreate.’ I’m doing that. Please just let me continue to do that. I cannot go to jail because I want to help people become parents, and this bill criminalizes what I do.”

The committee heard testimony from a few dozen people, with most of those testifying speaking against the legislation. Most of those who spoke in support of HB 441, including the attorney who wrote the bill, traveled to Georgia from other states.

The bill also created the unlikely alliance of organizations such as Feminist Women’s Health Center, which provides abortions and opposes restrictions on the procedure, with organizations such as the Georgia Life Alliance, which lobbied in support of Georgia’s current abortion law but believes HB 441 goes too far.

The hall on the Capitol’s ground floor outside the committee room was packed with people on both sides of the issue, with each side cheering for the speakers they agreed with as they left the hearing room.

Those supporting the bill arrived by the busload and held signs with slogans such as “A person is a person, no matter how small” and “Abortion is murder.” Many could be heard singing songs outside the committee room, which had to be cleared for being overcrowded.

Opponents held signs that read “Support and compassion, not punishment. No to HB 441.”

While it’s unlikely the bill will get any traction this year, it remains in play next year when lawmakers will return for the second of the two-year legislative session.

_____

©2025 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Visit at ajc.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.