Juan Antonio Labreche / AP
Pro-abortion rights protestors Mike Butler, left, and Joel Gallegos, right, stand in front of abortion opponent Mary Rose on an Albuquerque, N.M., street Thursday, Nov. 14.
Daniel Arkin, Staff Writer, NBC News
New Mexico's largest city is poised to become another crucible in the nationwide battle over abortion rights as voters head to the polls Tuesday to vote on a measure that would outlaw most late-term abortion procedures.
The ballot initiative in Albuquerque — widely considered to be the first such municipal measure in the country — may mark a new front in the abortion wars, which have been historically fought at the federal and state levels.
The law would bar doctors within city limits from performing abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy — permitting only a small handful of exceptions provided for in most late-term abortion bans enacted in other pockets of the state in recent years.
Notably, the measure makes no exemptions for victims of rape or incest.
The prohibition could be lifted only to save a mother's life or if continuing her pregnancy runs the risk of "substantial and irreversible physical impairment of a major bodily function" for the mother.
The "Pain Capable Unborn Child Protection Ordinance," which requires a majority to pass, would have ramifications across the state. Two of the few facilities in the rural region that perform late-term abortions are in Albuquerque.
The existence of those facilities — the Southwestern Women's Options clinic and the University of New Mexico Center for Reproductive Health — has led abortion opponents to call the high-desert city "the late-term abortion capital of the country" and to eye it for the municipal prohibition, Elisa Martinez, executive director of the organization Protect ABQ Women and Children, told Reuters.
Julianna Koob, legislative advocate for Planned Parenthood of New Mexico, told Reuters that the clinics had been key resources for patients around the region.
"Because access has been so severely impacted in other cities, women do depend on the clinics here to pursue these safe medical procedures when they are facing some really heartbreaking decisions," Koob told the wire service.
The campaign drew activists and advocates from both sides of the divisive issue — as well as thousands of dollars in advertising, according to the Associated Press.
Public opinion polls from September showed that some 54 percent of city voters said they supported the measure. An immediate court challenge is widely expected should the ballot initiative pass Tuesday, according to Reuters.
Gary King, the city's Democratic attorney general, has characterized the proposed law as "unconstitutional and unenforceable."
The measure is modeled on bans enacted by 13 states premised on controversial medical research suggesting a fetus feels pain beginning at 20 weeks of gestation.
The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.
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