LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — Melanie Scheible has lived all of her life with legal abortion in the United States, thanks to the U.S. Supreme Court's 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade.
That all changed on a summer day three years ago today, when a different Supreme Court ruled 6-3 to overturn Roe v. Wade, sending the abortion issue to 50 state legislatures.
WATCH | Nevada's abortion rights stand firm three years after Supreme Court's Dobbs ruling
"I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that it was devastating," said Scheible in an interview Tuesday. "It is incredibly scary to live in a world where you know that the Supreme Court can and will simply reverse course and decide to no longer protect the rights of people who live and work in the United States on a whim."
The decision was hailed by pro-life groups that worked assiduously in the 50 years since Roe was decided to overturn the ruling. Although many presidents ran on a pro-life platform — and even appointed Supreme Court justices who shared that view — it wasn't until President Donald Trump's first term that justices finally addressed Roe.
LOOKING BACK | Nevada reacts to Supreme Court overturn of Roe v. Wade
In the three years that followed the court's decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, various states have imposed new laws on abortion rights, creating a nationwide patchwork of rules.
Here in Nevada, abortion rights are protected by a state statute that was subjected to a voter referendum in 1990; Nevadans voted 63.5% to 36.5% to uphold abortion in the state.
But that doesn't mean there aren't other laws that could be passed. In 1999, for example, the Legislature updated an old law regarding consent for abortions. In the most recent session, Gov. Joe Lombardo signed a bill that prohibits government from interfering with the right to contraception.
The governor, however, vetoed a bill that would have provided coverage for in vitro fertilization treatments, which can be very expensive. Lombardo cited the potential cost in his veto message.
"I think that it's hard to separate abortion from the rest of reproductive care, for me, at least," Scheible said. "I think that abortion is part of responsible and ethical reproductive care, because none of us know when a pregnancy is not going to be viable, when it's going to be medically impossible to carry a pregnancy to term, and when that happens, abortion is medically necessary."
Lombardo also rejected a bill that would have allowed pharmacies to omit a doctor's name on prescription pill bottles for common abortion drugs. He cited safety issues in his veto message.
Scheible said the IVF bill came "...on the heels of the attack in Palm Springs on that IVF clinic. ... And we know that providers are targeted. Medical professionals who provide abortion services ethically within their scope of practice are targeted."
Scheible and other Democrats say Lombardo — who promised on the campaign trail to govern through a 'pro-life lens' — has given in to pro-life pressure, including on the IVF bill.
Then again, Lombardo in 2023 signed Senate Bill 131, a measure that would protect abortion-providers from out-of-state investigations conducted by authorities in other states where abortion laws are more strict.
LOOKING BACK | Nevada grapples with abortion rights in post-Roe landscape
Although abortion is already protected by state law, Nevadans are in the process of amending the state constitution to further protect abortion rights. Question 6 passed in November by a margin of 64% to 36%, and if approved again in 2026, will become part of the state's governing document.
"I think we do still need that constitutional amendment," Scheible said. "I think we need to ensure that abortion is specifically named and reproductive care is specifically spelled out in our Constitution, to ensure that people have that protection at every single level."
Given that the percentages of the pro-choice vote in Nevada have remained virtually unchanged between votes in 1990 and in 2024, Scheible said it's fair to conclude Nevada is a pro-choice state.
But what about the nation? Would abortion rights be upheld in a national referendum?
"Personally, I think it would," she said. "I think that, for as much posturing and grandstanding as Republicans do on this issue, it also touches every single one of them, whether they themselves have had to have an abortion, whether they themselves have experienced a high risk or difficult pregnancy, or whether it was their wife or sister or daughter or somebody else in their circle."
For now, at least, Dobbs has left the decision on abortion regulation to the states. But Scheible says it may be possible to return to the days when the nation seemed to have settled on the consensus first staked out by the high court in Roe v. Wade.
"I hope we'll be able to return to a pre-Dobbs world. I believe that is still possible, in the United States today," she said. "I work alongside so many amazing leaders who fight for reproductive justice, who work towards equality in the United States. I do believe that it is possible, even without a federal constitutional convention to rewrite the Constitution or add an amendment. I still do."
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