npr:

A vote on what would be the country’s most restrictive abortion ban was postponed in the Alabama Senate on Thursday, after chaos erupted over the stripping of an amendment to allow exceptions in the case of rape or incest.

Shouting broke out on the Senate floor when the rape and incest exemption was removed without a roll call vote. Troy Public Radio’s Kyle Gassiott reports from Montgomery: “Democrats loudly challenged Republicans, saying blocking the amendment violates Senate rules. … These exceptions were added by the Senate judiciary committee over the objections of the bill’s sponsor, who proposed it with the eventual goal of challenging Roe V. Wade in the U.S. Supreme Court.”

Democrats and some Republicans objected to the amendment being tabled so hastily.

“You’ve got 27 men over on the other side ready to tell women what they can do with their bodies,” Democratic Sen. Bobby Singleton said, according to The Associated Press. “You don’t have to procedurally just try to railroad us.”

Republican Sen. Cam Ward agreed that there was no need to hurry. “If we’re going to debate this issue in a serious manner that it should be debated, I will stand here and ask all of you to go bring your lunch, and your dinner, and your breakfast in,” he said. “I am not going to move until we get a fair procedure in this process.”

Democrats want a roll call vote so there is a record of the Republican lawmakers who support a bill without exceptions for women who were raped.

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