LANSING, Mich. (Michigan News Source) – Governor Gretchen Whitmer signed an executive order on Wednesday which states she will refuse to extradite women who come to Michigan seeking what she referred to as “reproductive health care.”

In addition, her order seeks to protect abortion providers from prosecution.

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Whitmer’s executive order can be viewed here.

“I will stand up for all women, even if their local and statewide leaders refuse to,” Whitmer wrote in a press release. “Michigan must remain a place where a person’s basic rights are preserved. In this existential moment for fundamental rights, it is incumbent on every elected official who believes that health—not politics—should guide medical decisions to take bold action.”

Whitmer has repeatedly invoked the “health, not politics” line during her tenure. She kept abortion clinics open during the COVID-19 pandemic while she shut down businesses, limited services at bars and restaurants, closed schools, cut hairstylists and barbers out of their livelihoods, and created a list of products Michiganders could not buy, which included paint, lawn furniture, and garden seeds.

While Whitmer said she will not extradite women who seek an abortion, there is a law already on the books that prohibits women from being prosecuted for having an abortion. The Michigan Supreme Court made this ruling in 1963.

Currently, the courts are sorting out where Michigan’s 1931 abortion ban stands in following the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling returning abortion rights to the states. A temporary injunction issued by Judge Elizabeth Gleicher in May is keeping abortion legal in Michigan for now.

David Kallman, attorney with the Great Lakes Justice Center, called Whitmer’s executive order “meaningless.”

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“Whitmer is creating a fake strawman argument,” Kallman said. “In the real world this won’t happen, so what’s the point of the executive order? This is purely to look good to her political base.”

Meanwhile, voters may get a say on abortion rights if signature petitions are approved. Volunteers with Reproductive Freedom for All turned in signatures on Monday which would place a measure on November’s ballot which would enshrine abortion in the state’s constitution if approved by voters.