By Julia Harte
(Reuters) -The South Carolina Senate on Thursday approved a bill tightening an abortion ban that is blocked by the state's highest court, following two days of fierce debate between anti-abortion Republicans and more moderate lawmakers from both parties.
The bill the Senate approved would cut exceptions for rape and incest to the first trimester of pregnancy, not 20 weeks as the existing law provides. Like the existing ban, the bill would also permit abortions if the fetus receives a fatal diagnosis, but it would require diagnoses from two doctors, not one, as the blocked law requires.
The current ban on abortions after six weeks with exceptions for cases in which the life of the mother was at risk would remain.
The South Carolina House earlier approved a near-total ban on abortions but Republican backers of the bill relaxed it after it became clear they lacked the Senate votes for a broad ban.
"We ladies are about to suffer a setback at the hands of a lot of white males," said State Senator Sandy Senn, one of several Republican lawmakers who fought the near-total abortion ban that the Senate began considering on Wednesday morning.
"But we're going to live to fight another day," she added.
The state's Supreme Court blocked the existing state abortion ban in August following a challenge by abortion providers, saying it could conflict with the state's constitution.
Senn expressed skepticism that the state Supreme Court would allow South Carolina's existing abortion ban to stand.
But Republican State Senate Majority Leader Shane Massey, who introduced the additional restrictions that were approved on Thursday, said he was confident the court would deem it constitutional.
South Carolina is one of about 25 U.S. states that are expected to try to restrict abortions or have already done so following the U.S. Supreme Court's June 24 decision to overturn its landmark 1973 ruling Roe v. Wade, which guaranteed a national right to abortion.
Abortion rights have emerged as a flashpoint in November U.S. midterm elections. Nearly 60% of voters in the conservative state of Kansas rejected a ballot initiative in August to remove abortion protections from the state's constitution, raising Democrats' hopes that anti-abortion efforts could draw voters to their party.
Several of South Carolina's Republican state senators, including all three Republican women in the chamber, urged their fellow GOP lawmakers to consider public opinion about abortion while debating the bill.
Democratic State Senator Dick Harpootlian also suggested that voters would retaliate against Republicans for passing the abortion bill.
"I'm going to defer to you, women of South Carolina, and say there's an election coming up in November," Harpootlian said in Thursday's debate.