Women protest Ohio abortion bill in 'Handmaid's Tale' garb

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) - More than a dozen women have staged a protest against a proposed ban on Ohio's most common abortion procedure while dressed in character from the dystopian novel "The Handmaid's Tale."

The group attended a committee hearing Tuesday at the Statehouse while wearing red capes and white bonnets. The costumes resemble those worn in a new television series based on Margaret Atwood's 1985 novel in which women are forced to give birth.

They were fighting legislation criminalizing what anti-abortion activists call "dismemberment abortion." The medical term is dilation and evacuation.

The bill would prohibit doctors from using forceps or similar instruments on a live fetus to remove it from the womb in pieces. Seven states have such bans.

Similar costumed protests to anti-abortion bills have taken place elsewhere, including in Texas and Missouri.