William Napoli

William M. "Bill" Napoli (born June 17, 1948) is a former Republican state senator in the South Dakota State Legislature, representing the 35th State Senate district. He retired in 2008. On March 20, 2008, Napoli announced that he would not seek re-election and instead would retire from politics. In the Rapid City Journal, Napoli stated that he would run for governor "if his supporters ask him to". Comments on abortion Napoli entered the spotlight by virtue of several public statements he made regarding the legislation H.B. 1215, enacted in 2006, to limit abortion access in South Dakota to those cases in which the woman's life would be in danger, possibly anticipating or inviting a repudiation of Roe v. Wade by the Roberts Court. Among his statements were, "When I was growing up here in the wild west, if a young man got a girl pregnant out of wedlock, they got married, and the whole darned neighborhood was involved in that wedding. I mean, you just didn't allow that sort of thing to happen, you know? I mean, they wanted that child to be brought up in a home with two parents, you know, that whole story. And so I happen to believe that can happen again." Asked about a possible exception to that rule, Napoli replied, "A real-life description to me would be a rape victim, brutally raped, savaged. The girl was a virgin. She was religious. She planned on saving her virginity until she was married. She was brutalized and raped, sodomized as bad as you can possibly make it, and is impregnated. I mean, that girl could be so messed up, physically and psychologically, that carrying that child could very well threaten her life."