1). “Abortion, Every Day (5.6.24): Indiana anti-choice group wants abortion reports to be public”, May 06, 2024, Jessica Valenti, Abortion, Every Day, at < https://jessica.substack.com/
2). “More than 380,000 Missourians sign initiative petition to put abortion on the ballot: Missourians for Constitutional Freedom said they collected signatures from each of Missouri’s 114 counties and eight congressional districts”, May 3, 2024, Anna Spoerre, Missouri Independent, at < https://missouriindependent.
3). “If the GOP Can't Keep Voters from Putting Abortion on the Ballot, They Will Try To Trick Voters. They Will Cheat. The 'Decline to Sign' movement is gaining traction in GOP-dominated states”, May 06, 2024, Jess Piper, The View from Rural Missouri by Jess Piper, at < https://jesspiper.substack.
4). “Whitmer: Want to protect Michigan abortion rights? Reelect Joe Biden. | Opinion”, May 6, 2024, Gretchen Whitmer, Detroit Free Press, at < https://www.freep.com/story/
5). “Texas man wants court order to investigate woman’s out-of-state abortion”, May 5, 2024, Alessandra Freitas & Tierney Sneed, CNN, at < https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2024/
6). “Trump's anti-abortion stance helped him win in 2016. Will it hurt him in 2024?”, Apr 18, 2024, Consider This from NPR, Text and 10 minute audio available, at < https://www.npr.org/2024/04/
7). “Will SCOTUS Allow Pregnant Women to Die? Survivors Share ‘Dobbs’-Related Near-Death Experiences with the Court”, Apr 18, 2024, Carrie N. Baker, Ms Magazine, at < https://msmagazine.com/2024/
~~ recommended by dmorista ~~
Introduction by dmorista: Jessica Valenti posted this most recent roundup and update about abortion and reproductive healthcare issues in Item 1),. “Abortion, Every Day (5.6.24): ….”. She looks at a variety of issues. One of the important new developments is reported on in Item 2)., “More than 380,000 Missourians sign ….”, and in Item 3)., “If the GOP Can't Keep Voters From ….”. The State of Missouri, under near fascist control by Rethugs stonewalled and did everything it could to prevent the State Abortion Rights Constitutional Amendment initiative from appearing on the Nov 4, 2024 ballot. They used a "Decline to Sign" tactic (it didn't work) and claimed that criminals would get access to people's private personal information if they signed (that didn't work either). The necessary number of signatures was 170,000 and the campaign collected 380,000, or more than double that. And the initiative movement had a relatively short period to collect those signatures because of the Rethug stonewalling and attacks. The next tactic the Forced-Birth movement and their allies among the Rethugs can use is to try to change the regulations for ballot initiatives. That would require a yes vote by a majority of the State's voters, on a state constitutional amendment that would require petitions pass with a majority in 5 of Missouri's 8 Congressional Districts (the majority of the Congressional Districts are under strict Gerrymandered and Voter Suppressed control by the Rethugs), in an upcoming August election.
Item 4)., “Whitmer: Want to protect Michigan ….”, is an editorial comment written by the Governor of Michigan Gretchen Whitmer. And let's remember that Whitmer, and the two other courageous women who are the Michigan Secreatry of State and the State Attorney General, all lived through a period when armed fascist creeps, toting AR-15s, lurked in their backyards throughtout several nights. Whitmer was also the target of a plot to kidnap her, subject her to a fascist Kangaroo Court, and execute her, she is a tough determined politician. She writes that:
“ …. If Donald Trump wins again, I can’t prevent all the protections we fought so hard for in Michigan from being erased. ….
“But Donald Trump and the right-wing groups who support him want to hit the ground running with policies that would put Michigan’s protections in jeopardy. They want to allow the government to invade women’s privacy and monitor their pregnancies, restrict access to IVF and contraception, and outlaw the distribution of abortion pills. And their North Star, a national abortion ban, could effectively cancel out Michigan’s constitutional protections. ….
“Regardless of how he tries to dance around it leading up to Election Day, we know exactly where Donald Trump stands on abortion. It’s playing out all across the country.
“We know where President Biden stands, too: with women, guided by a firm belief that politicians shouldn’t get to make these personal, private decisions. And if we want Michigan’s protections to stay in place, we need Joe Biden back in the White House.”
At the other end of the Abortion and Reproductive Healthcare spectrum is a Texas right-winger named Collin Davis. Item 5)., “Texas man wants court order ….”, reports on his filing a lawsuit to try to investigate and punish a former girlfriend who had the temerity to go to Colorado to obtain an abortion of what Davis thinks was his “unborn child”. Davis is using the Texas SB 8 Bounty Hunter and Vigilante law and has hired Johnathan “Mitchell (who) helped craft SB 8, also known as the Texas Heartbeat Act,” This case brings up yet another wrinkle, can a woman be prosecuted or suffer civil legal attacks for obtaining a legal abortion in another state. Apparently she returned to Texas where she still resides.
In Item 6)., “Trump's anti-abortion stance helped him win ….” an NPR program discusses the differences between 2016 when Trump mobilized the Evangelical Forced-Birth adherents in his Presidential Election Campaign as opposed to the situation for the 2024 election where his support for Forced-Birth laws and his nominating of the 3 extremist Supreme Court Justices allowed the far-right to overturn Roe v. Wade, is a political liability with many voters.
Finally there is Item 7)., “Will SCOTUS Allow Pregnant Women to Die? ….”. This is a fairly long article that includes short summaries of what happened to several women who had nightmarish pregnancies because of Forced-Birth laws in Tennessee, Idaho, and Texas. The testimony took place a couple of weeks ago, after this particular article was published. The article discusses the only documented death of a pregnant woman who died because she was denied a medically necessary abortion occurred in Lulling, Texas. The article also points out that the maternal death rate in the U.S. is 10 times higher than that in other developed countries. In fact the maternal death rate in the U.S. is 14 times higher than that in New Zealand, 7.9 times higher than that of the Netherlands, 5 times higher than that of Australia, and 2.8 times higher than that of Canada. And these shocking and appalling figures only go to 2020 and we can be certain that the situation has gotten much worse now that millions of poor and working class women live in Forced-Birth states with harsh legal regimes. And in fact the State of Texas and the State of Idaho have already taken measures to hide the inevitable increase in Maternal Mortality that will inevitably accompany their harsh Forced-Birth regimes and we can be sure other Forced-Birth Red States will do the same in the months to come. A bar chart, a graph and a table, here below, demonstrate these appalling statistics.
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Abortion, Every Day (5.6.24)
Click to skip ahead: In Attacks on Privacy, anti-choice groups are pushing for publicly available abortion reports. In the States, news from Ohio, Idaho, Arizona, Florida and more. In Ballot Measure Updates, good news out of Missouri. In the Nation, Dems want to protect contraception. Trump is trying to back off of his TIME magazine abortion comments in 2024. And in Media Muck-Ups, another publication falls for Republican rhetoric.
Attacks on Privacy
The anti-abortion movement has become increasingly obsessed with abortion reports and data collection—from fabricated statistics on abortion ‘complications’ to invasive patient questionnaires that are reported to the state. Most recently, I’ve been tracking conservative efforts to make abortion patients’ data publicly available in spite of confidentiality laws.
Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita has been leading the charge, lobbying the state to treat “terminated pregnancy reports (TPRs)” the same way they would a birth or death certificate. Rokita says he needs the reports made public so that he knows exactly who to prosecute. Seriously.
Essentially, Rokita counts on “third parties,” aka anti-choice groups, scouring publicly available abortion data to tip him off on potential (bullshit) reasons to investigate providers and clinics. So it’s no surprise that an Indiana anti-abortion group, in support of Rokita, is now suing the state for the right to access abortion reports.
Voices for Life’s suit argues that Indiana’s “refusal to provide access to TPRs deprives private citizens of their role in petitioning the Attorney General to investigate cases that suggest a termination of pregnancy was unlawful.”
They’re obsessed with getting in women’s business and pretending it’s for our own good. (See: snitch culture.)
Melanie Garcia Lyon, head of Voices for Life, tells the Indiana Capital Chronicle that since the group started reviewing abortion reports in 2022, their “enforcement team” has submitted over 700 complaints about supposed illegal actions. Generally, these are medical licensing complaints and claims that doctors didn’t file the abortion reports on time. This has nothing to do with patient safety.
Meanwhile, Republicans in New Hampshire are pushing for legislation to require abortion reports in the state. The law would require doctors to report on everything from how and when an abortion was performed, to supposed abortion ‘complications’—something we know the GOP is eager to drum up stats on.
Remember, in the end this is all about shame and punishment: scaring women out of getting care (because they don’t want their information reported to the state), and targeting anyone who helps patients.
Related: I’ll have a big story this week on anti-abortion attacks on privacy, so make sure to keep an eye out!
Abortion, Every Day connects the dots so you don’t have to. Help me keep the newsletter going and growing by signing up for a paid subscription:
In the States
Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs signed legislation to repeal the state’s 1864 abortion ban on Thursday, putting an end to a law that was created before women had the right to vote. The ban sparked outrage across the country, leaving the GOP terrified of what voters’ anger would mean for 2024. (That’s why a handful of state Republicans voted with Democrats to repeal the ban.)
Former Arizona Rep. Athena Salman—who proposed a repeal of the ban back in 2019—was at the signing ceremony, barely able to speak because of how emotional she was. “Future generations will not have to live under the restrictions and the interference that we have had to experience,” she said. The state will now revert back to its existing 15-week ban.
When Ohio voted to protect abortion in the state constitution, people’s rights weren’t restored overnight. Activists in the state have had to challenge each and every restriction in the courts in order to fully restore abortion rights, and Republicans are fighting them every step of the way.
Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost wants the state to keep it’s 24-hour waiting period, for example, arguing that Ohioans didn’t vote to eliminate the restriction when they supported Issue 1. His office argues that the amendment was supposed to ‘restore Roe’, a time “that allowed and upheld Ohio’s waiting period, in person, and informed consent provisions.”
The lawyer representing abortion clinics in the state, Jessie Hill, says that voters know exactly what they supported: “The attorney general is acting as though the amendment doesn't say what it says and the people of Ohio didn't pass the law they passed.”
This is a good reminder for why ‘restore Roe’ is a troubling framework: people were still being denied abortions under Roe! We need to push for something much, much better.
In the wake of Florida’s 6-week abortion ban, the number of people going to Virginia for care has taken a huge jump. Axios reports that while only 3% of patients at the Virginia League for Planned Parenthood were from out-of-state in 2022, by last month it was 20%. Last week, when Florida enacted its ban, that number jumped to 30%.
Abortion rights activists are also preparing for North Carolina to see huge jump in patients—both those from Florida and those who would have gone to Florida for care. The Associated Press reports that even before Florida’s 6-week ban, 32% of patients going to North Carolina Planned Parenthood clinics were from out-of-state. The downside for patients traveling to North Carolina, though, is that while the law allows for abortions up until 12 weeks, patients need to have two in-person visits 72 hours apart before being able to obtain care. That’s a huge hurdle for those who need to take off of work, get child care, or pay for hotel rooms.
Idaho Attorney General Raúl Labrador has written an op-ed for the Idaho Statesman, insisting that the state’s abortion ban doesn’t endanger women’s health or lives. Fresh from complaining about the female Supreme Court justices and claiming that doctors lied about having to airlift abortion patients out of state, Labrador writes that the Biden Administration is “peddl[ing] fear [and] spreading blatant misinformation” about Idaho’s law:
“Under Idaho law, women facing life-threatening conditions should be treated and provided whatever care or procedures they need to save their lives. That’s what the law requires, and the Idaho Supreme Court has been very clear about this.”
First of all, nearly a quarter of Idaho OBGYNs didn’t leave the state because of misinformation. They left because they can’t give patients the standard of care. And what Idaho Supreme Court actually said about women with life-threatening pregnancies is that doctors “must remove that unborn child in a manner that provides the best opportunity for survival (e.g., vaginal delivery or cesarean delivery)” as opposed to a standard abortion procedure. Doctors need to do this even if if they believe the fetus won’t be viable—unless it would pose a “greater risk of the death of the pregnant woman.”
Is that a state that sounds like it cares about women’s health and lives?
In a far less infuriating op-ed, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer has written for Detroit Free Press, urging people who care about abortion rights to vote for President Joe Biden. “If Donald Trump wins again, I can’t prevent all the protections we fought so hard for in Michigan from being erased,” she writes.
Quick hits:
New York Attorney General Letitia James is suing crisis pregnancy center powerhouse Heartbeat International, along with eleven specific clinics, for lying to women about abortion ‘reversal’;
Two Arizona Democrats have been brought up on ethics complaints after shouting “shame” at the Republicans who blocked a vote on the 1864 abortion ban;
And Vanderbilt University in Tennessee has a vending machine with emergency contraception thanks to a collaboration between the student government and Planned Parenthood.
Ballot Measure Updates
Congratulations to Missouri abortion rights activists, who collected an incredible 380,000 signatures to get abortion on the ballot. That’s more than twice the number they needed! What’s particularly impressive is that because Republican leaders continually held up the signature-gathering process with anti-democratic attacks, petitioners had only three months to work. (For a refresher on those GOP attacks, click here.)
It wasn’t just conservative politicians trying to keep voters from having a say: anti-abortion groups launched a text message campaign lying to voters, warning them that petitioners were trying to steal their personal information.
Speaking of efforts to mislead voters, check out this quote from Stephanie Bell, an anti-abortion activist with Missouri Stands With Women: “Out-of-state Big Abortion supporters think the fight is over…they could not be more wrong.” This is language I’ve flagged before. Anti-choice groups need to use terms like “Big Abortion” because they don’t want voters to know that their actual political enemy isn’t some nefarious “abortion industry,” but women, themselves.
Florida anti-abortion groups have a new campaign they’re calling “Almost Aborted,” which is…quite a name. POLITICO reports that anti-abortion groups are targeting specific neighborhoods with materials featuring parents who considered abortion before deciding against it. (Deciding being the key word here!) As I’ve reported before, anti-abortion organizations are super-eager to find a way to replicate Democrats’ success with using personal stories to win over voters.
Finally, the Associated Press looks at Minnesota Democrats’ efforts to protect abortion and LGBTQ rights in the state constitution via an Equal Rights Amendment. The proposed amendment would prohibit discrimination of a person “making and effectuating decisions about all matters relating to one’s own pregnancy or decision whether to become or remain pregnant.”
In the Nation
Senate Democrats have introduced legislation to guarantee people can get their birth control at pharmacies without delays or interference from extremist pharmacists.
Led by Sens. Patty Murray and Cory Booker, the Access to Birth Control Act would establish civil penalties for pharmacies that that refuse to fill birth control prescriptions, misinform customers about contraception availability, breach confidentiality, or otherwise intimidate, threaten or harass patients seeking birth control.
“This bill is simple and especially important in light of increased threats to contraceptive access from Republican anti-abortion extremists,” Sen. Murray said.
Since we’re talking so much about privacy these days, it’s worth checking out this PBS NewHour segment about the Biden administration’s expansion of HIPAA rules to protect abortion patients. Carmel Shachar, head of Harvard University’s Health Law and Policy Clinic, talks about the increase of abortion reporting and abortion ‘complication’ reporting throughout the country.
Quick hits:
Salon on how self-managing an abortion is safer than ever;
A call for civil disobedience from Carrie Baker at Ms. magazine;
And a look at patient navigators, abortion fund volunteers and the other reproductive rights and justice activists making sure that patients in red states can get the abortions they need.
2024
Donald Trump is backing off of his comments on abortion in TIME magazine, where he made clear that he’d be fine with states monitoring women’s pregnancies and arresting them for having abortions. On Truth Social, Trump wrote, “this was made up by Democrats and the Fake News Media.” (He also took his expected victory lap, taking credit for both anti-abortion and pro-choice wins, just like I predicted.)
But as the disgraced former president tries to distance himself from anti-abortion policies, he’s ramping up dangerous anti-abortion rhetoric. In that Truth Social post, for example, Trump wrote that some states permit “execution after birth.” He repeated that lie in a Wisconsin speech last week, saying that Democrats allow “execution after birth,” a phrase he repeated at least three times. Also last week, Trump said in an interview with FOX-2 Detroit that in pro-choice states “they can kill the baby…they can kill the baby after the baby is born.”
Let’s be clear about two things: 1) This kind of language is going to get someone killed. (In fact, it already has.) 2) What Trump is actually referring to—the “execution” he’s talking about—is the painful decision some parents make to withdraw care from severely ill premature infants who they don’t want to torture with painful and pointless medical interventions. That’s who he’s saying are murderers. Democrats would do well to point that truth out.
Meanwhile, U.S. South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, a potential VP pick for Trump, has suddenly backed off his support for a federal abortion ban. (At least, he’s backing off publicly.) In an interview with MSNBC, Scott repeated some Trump-esque talking points about abortion being left up to the states. He declined to say whether he still supported a national ban, something he’s been unequivocal about in the past. Whether it’s because of Republicans’ broader fear of abortion rights or his desire to look good to Trump, Scott now joins all of the other politicians who refuse to give Americans a straight answer.
Biden’s reelection campaign released a new ad aimed at Latino men that features a Marine Corp veteran talking about his daughters and saying Trump is “not tough” for his attacks on women’s freedom. (It’s an interesting tactic you’ll hear more from me on soon.)
Finally, second gentleman Douglas Emhoff is holding a panel conversation tomorrow about the role men can play to protect abortion rights, and Kylie Cheung at Jezebel says maybe he should start with Joe Biden. Whew.
Media Muck-Ups
CBS News fell into a Republican trap, reporting that Florida has issued guidelines to “clarify” the state’s abortion ban and “safeguard against any immediate harm that could come to pregnant women due to disinformation.” That’s just not true.
As I reported last week, the guidelines from Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA) not only require doctors to send the state detailed abortion reports, but also dictate how doctors should end pregnancies—with language that could even force physicians to give women c-sections rather than abortions.
Abortion, Every Day has tracked similar moves in multiple state: Republicans claiming that they’re “clarifying” abortion bans to make it easier for doctors to help women, when the truth is that they’re just further codifying their extremism.
I am BEGGING mainstream publications to stop taking Republicans' word for it when it comes to abortion. Stop repeating their talking points. Stop doing their work for them.
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More than 380,000 Missourians sign initiative petition to put abortion on the ballot
Missourians for Constitutional Freedom said they collected signatures from each of Missouri’s 114 counties and eight congressional districts
By: Anna Spoerre - May 3, 2024 10:18 am
Attendees cheer during a Missourians for Constitutional Freedom rally after the campaign turned in more than 380,000 signatures for its initiative petition to enshrine abortion rights in Missouri’s constitution Friday morning (Annelise Hanshaw/Missouri Independent).
A campaign to enshrine abortion rights in Missouri’s constitution said Friday that it collected more than 380,000 signatures in just three months, more than twice the likely total needed to qualify for this year’s statewide ballot.
The coalition, called Missourians for Constitutional Freedom, is hoping to put on the November ballot a measure that would legalize abortion up to the point of fetal viability. Since June 2022, nearly every abortion has been illegal in the state with the exception of medical emergencies.
In order to put a citizen-led constitutional amendment before voters, the campaign had to collect signatures from 8% of voters in six of Missouri’s eight congressional districts. That total equates to more than 171,000 signatures.
The campaign on Friday morning announced they officially turned in 380,159 signatures to the Missouri Secretary of State’s office. A breakdown of how many signatures came from each district, which will ultimately determine if they met the threshold needed to qualify, was not provided. But the coalition said they collected signatures from each of Missouri’s counties and congressional districts.
“Hundreds of thousands of Missourians are now having conversations about abortion and reproductive freedom; some are sharing their own abortion stories for the very first time; and all are ready to do whatever it takes to win at the ballot box this year,” Mallory Schwarz, executive director of Abortion Action Missouri and spokesperson for Missourians for Constitutional Freedom, said in a statement. “Together, we are going to end Missouri’s abortion ban.”
The effort kicked off 90 days ago, requiring a massive undertaking to reach the May 5 signature deadline. The coalition is led by Abortion Action Missouri, the ACLU of Missouri and Planned Parenthood affiliates in Kansas City and St. Louis.
Like abortion campaigns that have played out in other states, Missouri’s coalition has been able to raise more than $5 million dollars in donations, including from the Sixteen Thirty Fund, a liberal dark money organization based in Washington, D.C., that gave $1 million. Separately, more than 3,200 individual Missourians contributed $1.8 million in the first three months of the year, according to a campaign finance report published last month.
This year, more than 1,800 volunteers from around Missouri helped collect signatures, according to a news release from the coalition. In the three weekends leading up to the deadline, the coalition said volunteers collected 18,000 signatures and knocked on 40,000 doors.
Dr. Iman Alsaden, chief medical officer for Planned Parenthood Great Plains and advisor to Missourians for Constitutional Freedom, said they became an abortion provider in part to sit with patients and help counter any narrative that they are bad people for having an abortion. But the overturning of Roe v. Wade in 2022 made the job much more difficult.
“Medical decision-making is clouded by unclear and harsh laws that make providers feel scared to do the right thing,” Alsaden said.
The initial attempt to place abortion on the ballot began in March 2023. Legal fights over the ballot language and internal disagreements on whether to include a viability ban stalled signature gathering attempts until January. Viability is often considered to be around 24 weeks of pregnancy.
The initiative petition language the coalition settled on would allow the legislature to “regulate the provision of abortion after fetal viability provided that under no circumstance shall the government deny, interfere with, delay or otherwise restrict an abortion that in the good faith judgment of a treating health care professional is needed to protect the life or physical or mental health of the pregnant person.”
Also among those gathered in front of Missouri’s Capitol to celebrate Friday was Sam Hawickhorst, who in 2015, at 22 years old, had an abortion in Missouri.
“It felt like everyone I reached out to for support made my pregnancy about themselves while I, the pregnant person, was an afterthought,” she told a crowd of about 200 people. “I felt like a burden. But despite these initial hurdles, I knew I had to look out for myself because no one else was.”
After reaching out to a friend who had recently had an abortion, Hawickhorst went to Planned Parenthood where she was prescribed abortion pills. During the multiple appointments and the transvaginal exam then required by state law, Hawickhorst said she felt as if the government was “ensuring cruelty every step of the way” in order for her to have an abortion.
“Abortion is healthcare. Abortion is normal. And those who have had and will have abortions deserve dignity and respect,” she said. “This amendment, this movement, is about who makes personal decisions for yourself and your family.”
Around the same time the abortion campaign was announced, a separate coalition organized to oppose them. That group, called Missouri Stands with Women, spent the past few months leading a “decline to sign” campaign, urging people not to sign the initiative petition. So far, they’ve been vastly out-fundraised by Missourians for Constitutional Freedom.
“Out-of-state Big Abortion supporters think the fight is over,” Stephanie Bell, with Missouri Stands With Women, said in a statement Friday. “They could not be more wrong when it comes to standing up for life in Missouri.”
The abortion petition is among five citizen-led ballot measure campaigns expected to turn truckloads of signatures over to the Secretary of State’s office before 5 p.m. Sunday.
On Thursday, Winning for Missouri Education, which is a coalition of Missouri professional sports franchises, submitted more than 340,000 signatures in the hopes of putting the legalization of sports gambling on the ballot.
A day earlier, more than 210,000 signatures were delivered for a campaign hoping to ask Missouri voters to mandate paid sick leave and raise the state’s minimum wage to $13.75 beginning in January 2025 and $15 in 2026.
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If the GOP Can't Keep Voters from Putting Abortion on the Ballot, They Will Try To Trick Voters. They Will Cheat.
I went to Arkansas this weekend to speak to the Crawford County Democrats in Van Buren. This town is very close to my hometown, and I was able to proclaim myself a proud Ozark Hillbilly in front of a crowd and not one person batted an eye.
I am a hillbilly in the most literal sense…it was my high school mascot. True story.
The event to raise money for local Crawford County candidates was held inside an auction house right off the highway. It was a BBQ supper, with a silent auction, and a Bluegrass band. The event also had petitions at the ready for several amendments, including the abortion petition.
As I pulled into the parking lot, I noticed a minivan and a woman stopping each person going down the drive. She was standing next to her van, while a man sat in the driver’s seat. She had what looked like paper tickets in her hand — I assumed she was checking in guests for the event. As I stopped, she smiled and asked if I wanted information on the petition to put abortion on the ballot in Arkansas?
I returned her smile and said, “sure.” She handed me a piece of cardstock with a QR code. I was really excited to scan it, because I thought Arkansas may have a way to electronically sign the petition, and I could share it with my Arkansas friends…
Oof. I was way off.
Another folder in the Google drive was something called “Decline to Sign.” This graphic included bulleted points. Among them:
*No licensing for healthcare professionals at abortion medical facilities.
*No ultrasound required before an abortion to determine fetal age and location.
*Would make it harder to combat sex trafficking and child abuse.
*No health and safety standards imposed on abortion clinics.
Wow. That was a lot of weird and incorrect information. I would think a doctor would know the location of a fetus, and forcing a person who has been sex trafficked into delivering a pregnancy is just about the most disgusting and cruel act I can imagine. The rest of the points are at least stretching the truth if not flat out lies.
Was the woman standing in that parking lot just some solitary extremist trying to dissuade voters from signing a petition? Some woman who got a crazy idea, created a Google drive, printed up cardstock with a QR code, and decided to lie to folks on their way to sign a petition in a small town in Arkansas?
No. “Decline to Sign” is a coordinated movement and we saw it in Missouri as well. It is well-funded and not at all grassroots. They have signs, sites, and lawmakers who are bought and paid for to do their dirty work.
I noticed “Decline to Sign” popping up on social media from Missouri GOP State Senators and Representatives. The messaging was exactly the same. Some Reps even started tweeting out videos of themselves, sitting on the same couch in front of the same bookcase, reading a script about “out of state” folks coming to Missouri to gather signatures and steal identities or allow abortions up to birth. It was creepy because it was so scripted and the deliveries were so automated. The politicians also had those dead eyes you need to straight up lie to someone.
I’m not exaggerating when I tell you it is Orwellian. Nearly the exact same words were seeping from the dry mouths of several extremist Missouri lawmakers.
There were nearly a dozen who were recruited for the videos, but here are just three examples: Senator Mary Elizabeth Coleman, Representative Doug Richey and Representative Justin Sparks.
Each one took their time to stare into the camera and lie about the abortion petition. The videos gave me chills and let me know we are up against a machine that wants to take away bodily autonomy from everyone, and keep us from fighting back with ballot measures to return bodily autonomy.
We still have obstacles to returning bodily autonomy to Missourians, though. The GOP is planning to take away one person, one vote and strip us of the ability to pass Constitutional amendments. They are planning to take away a simple majority vote to pass amendments. That will be a disaster for Missourians and I’ll write more on it in another post.
Right now, I celebrate. If you want to understand the rage folks feel about an abortion ban, look no further than Missouri. We won’t be stopped. This is a movement of determined people from both sides of the aisle with righteous anger.
Seven states have put the abortion question on the ballot and seven states have proven that voters believe women and girls should have the right to make decisions about their own bodies.
The vast majority of the country believes abortion should be legal. The GOP represents a vocal minority who will lie and cheat to keep over 1/2 of the population without fundamental rights.
They won’t win.
~Jess
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Whitmer: Want to protect Michigan abortion rights? Reelect Joe Biden. | Opinion
TIME: “Do you think states should monitor women's pregnancies so they can know if they've gotten an abortion after the ban?
Donald Trump: "I think they might do that.”
I read these chilling words from Donald Trump’s TIME interview just before a meeting with women and doctors in Flint. We had stepped into a bookstore together for a conversation we thought would be focused on abortion bans across the country. Florida’s six-week ban, which means abortions are banned before many women even know they are pregnant, would go into effect that same day. But as Stephanie, Harsna, Jessica and I took our seats, we found ourselves unpacking the reality that Donald Trump was, according to his interview, leaving the door open for states to track women’s periods and pregnancies, and prosecute women who have an abortion.
The women around the table told me how much it meant to them that here in Michigan, reproductive freedom is protected. But, I have to be honest, the thing going through my mind was: If Donald Trump wins again, I can’t prevent all the protections we fought so hard for in Michigan from being erased.
Let me explain.
Michiganders wasted no time after Roe fell: We amended our constitution to guarantee the right to abortion. I worked with the state legislature to remove medically unnecessary, politically motivated restrictions on abortion from state law. And since then, I’ve directed my administration to explore every option to protect access to surrogacy and IVF so Michiganders can grow their families. I am relieved and proud that Michigan was able to put in place strong protections to keep reproductive decisions in the hands of women and the people they trust. Progress like this in a purple state is unprecedented.
But Donald Trump and the right-wing groups who support him want to hit the ground running with policies that would put Michigan’s protections in jeopardy. They want to allow the government to invade women’s privacy and monitor their pregnancies, restrict access to IVF and contraception, and outlaw the distribution of abortion pills. And their North Star, a national abortion ban, could effectively cancel out Michigan’s constitutional protections.
Donald Trump is hearing the outcry from voters from Florida to Alabama to Arizona and Michigan loud and clear. That’s why he’s trying to hide his anti-abortion record and plans. He’s betting voters will buy what he’s selling without looking too closely.
But I know voters — especially Michigan voters — are smart. They are women like Stephanie, Harsna and Jessica. And what they’ll see as they go vote is alarming.
They’ll see that Donald Trump is the reason women are having to wait until they go into sepsis for lifesaving abortion care. He’s the reason states have enacted policies that threaten medical providers with jail time. He’s the reason that in Florida, abortion is not only banned before many women even know they are pregnant, but survivors of rape can only get an abortion if they can provide documentation to prove it. He’s the reason women in Arizona woke up to the news this spring that they were living under an abortion ban from 1864.
They see what Donald Trump is really for. But, I know they won’t let him get away with it.
Regardless of how he tries to dance around it leading up to Election Day, we know exactly where Donald Trump stands on abortion. It’s playing out all across the country.
We know where President Biden stands, too: with women, guided by a firm belief that politicians shouldn’t get to make these personal, private decisions. And if we want Michigan’s protections to stay in place, we need Joe Biden back in the White House.
I’m a mom of two wonderful daughters who are growing up with fewer rights than I had at their age. I myself have lived my entire adult life with the constitutional right to abortion. It’s easy to give in to a feeling that this will take a long time to reverse. But it doesn’t have to, if Michigan shows Donald Trump and extreme Republicans exactly what we think of them taking away our rights.
We know this race is going to be close, and we know the path to the White House runs through Michigan. Follow the leadership of the women I met with in Flint, or the women who passed our ballot measure to protect reproductive freedom, or the women who made their voices heard at the historic Women’s March. Get involved, doorknock, and most importantly, make sure your friends and family vote. Our freedoms depend on it, here in Michigan and everywhere else.
I’ll fight like hell, too.
Texas man wants court order to investigate woman’s out-of-state abortion | CNN
A Texas man is seeking a court order so he can depose a woman he was dating who traveled to Colorado to get an abortion, in a case that may have ramifications in the ongoing legal battles over abortion rights.
Collin Davis, a resident of Brazos County, filed a legal petition in March stating that on February 20 — the day after he learned the woman intended to obtain the abortion — he retained an attorney, who sent the woman a letter requesting that she preserve all records related to her plans to terminate the pregnancy.
According to the petition, the letter warned that he “would pursue wrongful-death claims against anyone involved in the killing of his unborn child.”
Davis argues that the deposition is necessary to determine whether there was a violation of the Texas wrongful-death statute, which the petition references alongside a Texas civil code that includes among those defined as individuals “an unborn child at every stage of gestation from fertilization until birth.” His petition additionally points to Texas’ civil enforcement six-week abortion ban, known as SB 8.
The woman filed a petition for court records to be sealed so her identity would remain anonymous, her attorney told CNN. She began dating Davis in November 2023 and found out that she was pregnant in January, according to the petition.
The case, which was reported on by The Washington Post on Friday, is being cited by abortion rights supporters who fear that anti-abortion advocates will use — or at least threaten to use — strict abortion laws to target abortions obtained even in states where the procedure is legal. Texas’ law, passed in 2021, targets doctors and those involved in facilitating abortions, not the women who undergo the procedure themselves, but opponents say that legal uncertainty about restrictions in a post-Roe America has the intended consequence of intimidating women.
Davis is seeking the deposition to obtain information about those involved in the abortion, including the identity of the doctor who performed the procedure in Colorado, and he considers filing a lawsuit against all of them, according to the court filings.
Davis is being represented by Jonathan Mitchell, a well-known lawyer and abortion rights opponent who also represented former President Donald Trump in his Colorado ballot case.
Mitchell helped craft SB 8, also known as the Texas Heartbeat Act, which uses a novel civil enforcement mechanism to prohibit abortions after fetal cardiac activity is detected, a point usually around six weeks into a pregnancy. Davis cited the law in his petition for the deposition.
CNN has reached out to Davis for comment.
Mitchell said in a statement, “Fathers of aborted fetuses can sue for wrongful death in states with abortion bans, even if the abortion occurs out-of-state. They can sue anyone who paid for the abortion, anyone who aided or abetted the travel, and anyone involved in the manufacture or distribution of abortion drugs.”
Critics decry legal maneuvers
The case is seen by some abortion rights advocates as an example of the new legal landscape facing women who wish to obtain an abortion, even by legal means.
“We don’t think there is a basis (for a lawsuit),” Marc Hearron, an attorney at the Center for Reproductive Rights, which is representing the woman, told CNN. “It is perfectly legal to leave Texas or any state and go get an abortion in a state where it is legal. And it is perfectly legal to help someone or be involved in someone going out of state and obtaining an abortion where it is allowed by law.”
Nancy Northup, president & CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights, said the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization to overturn Roe v. Wade “opened the door to this kind of frightening and unacceptable fearmongering and harassment by one citizen against another.”
Mitchell has spearheaded other legal efforts in the wake of Texas’ abortion law. Last June, he represented a man who filed a wrongful death lawsuit against three friends of his ex-wife who allegedly assisted her in terminating her pregnancy with abortion medication, in an early legal test of the reach of wrongful death statutes in the wake of Roe’s reversal. That case has not yet been resolved.
It’s unclear whether Davis’ petition could lead to a lawsuit against the woman, said Drexel University Law Professor David Cohen.
“I definitely don’t think there is a basis for this,” he said. “But we have no confidence to know exactly what the Texas courts will say anymore, at any level.”
Other Republican-led states have sought to pressure women against seeking abortions in other states, particularly minors. Idaho’s legislature last year passed a bill — later blocked by a judge over constitutionality concerns — that would prohibit adults from helping minors cross state lines to get an abortion without parental permission. Meanwhile, Tennessee’s legislature is advancing a law that would similarly criminalize so-called “abortion trafficking” for minors in the state.
“This is all part of a scare campaign to make people afraid that if they go out of state and get an abortion, that they or their loved ones might be sued,” Hearron said. “We really want to emphasize that people should not be intimidated.”
Temple University Beasley School of Law Dean Rachel Rebouché called Davis’ legal maneuver “bizarre and concerning” but said it was not “surprising.”
“I think that we’ll see much more of this in the years to come, so long as Dobbs is in the books. And, frankly, this is exactly the type of example we should point to when we talk about when the Supreme Court should overturn Dobbs,” Rebouché told CNN.
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Trump's anti-abortion stance helped him win in 2016. Will it hurt him in 2024? : Consider This from NPR
Former President Donald Trump speaks at a rally outside Schnecksville Fire Hall in Schnecksville, Pennsylvania.
You're reading the Consider This newsletter, which unpacks one major news story each day. Subscribe here to get it delivered to your inbox, and listen to more from the Consider This podcast.
1. Trump wasn't always anti-abortion.
Trump will forever be known as the president who appointed the justices who helped overturn Roe v. Wade in June of 2022. But the former president hasn't always been against abortion rights. In 1999, when he was considering a run for the White House, Trump told NBC's Tim Russert on Meet the Press:
"I'm very pro-choice. I hate the concept of abortion. I hate it, I hate everything it stands for. I cringe when people debate the subject. But I still believe in choice," he said.
'If You Can Keep It': The Legacy Of Roe V. Wade In The 2024 Election
By 2011, Trump had changed his position. Once again he was considering a run for president, and Trump described himself as "pro-life" when speaking to the Conservative Political Action Conference, or CPAC.
2. When he first ran for president, about half the country supported a legal right to abortion.
But a key group of voters overwhelmingly opposed it – white evangelical Christians. Trump needed their support, and he was successful: exit polling in the 2016 election showed nearly two-thirds of Christian voters chose Trump.
Their candidate delivered. Trump appointed three Supreme Court justices during his term, which ultimately led to the overturning of Roe v. Wade.
Trump backed a federal abortion ban as president. Now, he says he wouldn't sign one
Some Republicans in Congress are pushing for a federal ban on abortion, with many in the Republican base pressuring Trump to voice his support. Last week, Trump posted a video on Truth Social that supported leaving abortion access up to the states:
"My view is that now that we have abortion where everybody wanted it from a legal standpoint. The states will determine by vote or legislation or perhaps both, and whatever they decide must be the law of the land, in this case the law of the state."
By saying he will instead leave the issue to the states — essentially the status quo — Trump appears to be trying to avoid strengthening Democrats' ability to rally their voters around abortion rights.
People gather in Raleigh, North Carolina in June 2022 to protest against the the Supreme Court's decision.
3. Now, an anti-abortion stance could be a political liability.
Every time there's been an abortion referendum since Dobbs, voters have favored abortion rights.
- In the almost two years since the Dobbs decision, more than a dozen states have banned most or all abortions. Those bans have meant that women have been turned away for emergency abortions in some states; and some people have been unable to access abortions in instances of rape.
- Voter backlash is apparent in several states where abortion has been on the ballot, with ballot casters signaling support for abortion rights — even in red states.
- Key Democratic voting blocs — including women, younger voters and non-white voters — all list abortion as a major motivating issue.
Supporting a national abortion ban is a position that some Republicans like Chris Christie and Nikki Haley have said was unwise or at least impractical.
This election year, Trump's position on abortion could influence whether he wins or loses the race. But if he is elected, anti-abortion activists will likely push Trump to use the power of the executive branch to restrict abortion access.
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Will SCOTUS Allow Pregnant Women to Die? Survivors Share ‘Dobbs’-Related Near-Death Experiences with the Court
Update Wednesday, April 24, at 3:40 p.m. PT: On Wednesday morning, the Supreme Court held two hours of oral arguments on whether states can require women to sacrifice their health and well-being in order to continue nonviable pregnancies.
Idaho’s attorney Joshua Turner argued that women experiencing pregnancy complications have no federal right to medical care unless they are dying. Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas clearly agreed, and Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh also appeared to agree. These five men expressed utter disregard for women’s lives and dignity.
The bipartisan group of women on the Court were the only ones asking questions reflecting concern about the impact of the decision on women’s lives and health—demonstrating the importance of having women on the Court.
Chief Justice John Roberts said hardly anything.
Reproductive rights and legal advocates are collecting stories from over 100 women who almost died—and at least one who did—after being denied emergency abortion care.
On April 24, the United States Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in two cases, Idaho v. United States and Moyle v. United States, about whether states can prohibit doctors from treating women with life-threatening pregnancies until a patient’s condition deteriorates to the point where they are about to die.
The National Women’s Law Center (NWLC) filed an amicus brief in these cases describing several of the more than 70 documented cases of women almost dying—and at least one who did die—when they were denied emergency medical care because of abortion bans enacted across the country after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022. And “the true number of cases is likely significantly higher,” according the NWLC brief.
In these cases, the Department of Justice (DOJ) is challenging Idaho’s “Defense of Life Act,” which prohibits abortions unless necessary to save the life of the mother. The DOJ is arguing that Idaho’s law violates the federal Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA), which requires Medicaid-funded hospitals to provide medically necessary stabilizing treatment to patients, including pregnancy termination, regardless of state laws restricting or banning abortion. The DOJ argues doctors violate federal law if they wait until a patient’s condition deteriorates to the point where they are about to die before doctors provide the necessary care to stabilize them.
Federal law requires federally funded hospitals to provide “necessary stabilizing treatment” to any patient with an emergency medical condition that, in the absence of medical attention, could reasonably be expected to result in putting a patient’s health in serious jeopardy, including “serious impairment of bodily functions or serious dysfunction of any bodily organ or part.”
The Idaho law prohibits treatment until a woman is on the brink of death, without regard to the impacts on her health otherwise.
“It’s not harmless to wait until the brink of death to intervene in emergency medicine,” said emergency room physician Dr. Dara Kass at Columbia University Medical Center. “Having to wait until that window to intervene is dangerous for people… [and] will have consequences to your life and future fertility and organs and a lot of other things.”
NWLC Brief: Harrowing Stories of Denied Emergency Medical Care
The National Women’s Law Center brief detailed the excruciating stories of several pregnant women denied emergency medical care, demonstrating the harms of such denials.
One involved a woman experiencing preterm premature rupture of membranes (PPROM), which is when the amniotic sac or “water” breaks prior to 37 weeks. PPROM complicates 2 to 4 percent of all singleton pregnancies and 7 to 20 percent of twin pregnancies, and impacts 150,000 women in the U.S. every year. In states banning abortion, women experiencing PPROM face life-threatening dangers.
The NWLC brief outlined:
One patient experienced PPROM before her fetus was viable. The stabilizing treatment for pre-viable PPROM may be terminating a patient’s pregnancy, either through an induction of labor or a dilation and evacuation (D&E)—a routine procedure. But this patient was sent home without that care. She returned to the emergency room two days later with severe sepsis and bacteremia.
Her pre-viable fetus was delivered, but clinicians could not deliver her placenta. Eventually, a physician performed a D&E, but unlike healthy patients, this woman bled “from everywhere.” The patient miraculously lived, but after her gut-wrenching experience, the concern she expressed to her doctor was whether her severe infection “count[ed] as life-threatening,” or whether she and her doctor would “go to jail” for the procedure that saved her life.
Another story involved hospital anesthesiologists, who refused to provide an epidural to a woman in early labor because he feared criminal prosecution:
Another patient in an abortion ban state sought treatment for a dilated cervix, through which her amniotic sac was protruding, when she was 19 to 20 weeks pregnant. She was sent home.
The following day, she came to the emergency department in severe pain and advanced labor. While EMTALA requires stabilizing treatment for pain and stabilizing care during labor, the hospital’s anesthesiologists refused to provide an epidural.
As the patient’s physician described:
“[The anesthesiologists] believed that providing an epidural could be considered [a crime] under the new [state] law. The patient received some IV morphine instead and delivered a few hours later but was very uncomfortable through the remainder of her labor. … I overheard the primary provider say to a nurse that so much as offering a helping hand to a patient getting onto the gurney while in the throes of a miscarriage could be construed as ‘aiding and abetting an abortion.’ Best not to so much as touch the patient who is miscarrying…”
Denial of emergency care not only endangers the lives and health of pregnant women, but can cause devastating financial impacts—including the costs of traveling out of state to obtain emergency treatment, lack of insurance coverage for out-of-state care, and absence from work, which can endanger employment status.
These impacts are particularly burdensome to low-income patients and their families:
Mylissa Farmer was denied the emergency abortion care she needed, first by her local hospital in Missouri, and then by a hospital in Kansas. After diagnosing her with PPROM, doctors at both hospitals told Mylissa her fetus could not survive, and continuing her pregnancy would put her at risk of serious infection, hemorrhaging, the loss of her uterus, and even death.
Still, both hospitals refused to end the pregnancy, in violation of EMTALA. With her health deteriorating rapidly, Mylissa and her boyfriend drove more than four hours to an Illinois abortion clinic while she was in labor.
The medical and financial consequences of crisscrossing state lines to obtain life-saving abortion care linger to this day. Mylissa was docked pay for missing work and had to raise funds to pay for the Illinois care that her insurance refused to cover. Her boyfriend also lost his job because he was forced to miss work over the days he helped her travel. They could not regain steady employment for months.
Yeniifer Alvarez’s Story
Some women never get the care they need. The NWLC brief details the case of one young woman, Yeniifer (Yeni) Alvarez, who died from pregnancy complications after a Catholic hospital in Texas failed to offer stabilizing abortion care.
Yeni lived in an immigrant community in Luling, Texas, where 65 percent of residents lack health insurance—Yeni included. She learned she had hypertension and diabetes during her pregnancy, and developed pulmonary edema at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Because she was uninsured, she was unable to afford the care and medications needed. As her condition deteriorated, she went to the emergency room multiple times, but doctors did not offer abortion care.
Experts agree that Yeni’s death likely could have been prevented with an abortion, but hospital records show that, despite multiple emergency room visits (including one where she was struggling to breathe), healthcare providers never offered to end her pregnancy.
Yeni’s death represents what the lack of access to healthcare can mean for a pregnant person marginalized by lack of health insurance, poverty, and a draconian abortion ban.
As Yeni’s family mourn her preventable death, her loss has led to serious financial and familial hardship because Yeni contributed to the mortgage payments and was a frequent caregiver for a cousin and an autistic sibling.
How Abortion Bans Harm Reproductive Healthcare Access Overall
Pregnancy in the United States is now 10 times more lethal than in other high-income countries, the National Women’s Law Center points out. Pregnant Indigenous women die twice as often as white women, while Black women die three times as often as white women.
States restricting abortion have much higher maternal mortality rates than states with abortion access. In 2020, restrictive states had a 62 percent higher maternal death rate than other states, and experts estimate that total abortion bans today are causing a nearly 25 percent increase in maternal mortality overall.
One third of counties in the United States are “maternity care deserts,” with no obstetric providers, hospital-based obstetric care or birth centers. And Dobbs has worsened this dearth of providers.
In the first 15 months after enacting an abortion ban, Idaho—the state at the heart of the EMTALA case in front of the Court—lost 22 percent of its practicing obstetricians and 55 percent of its high-risk obstetricians. At least two Idaho hospitals closed their labor and delivery units in 2023.
Obstetric providers are moving away from states where they cannot save their patients’ lives and health without the looming threats of imprisonment, bankrupting civil penalties and losing their medical licenses.
“With fewer providers, all pregnant people, especially Black and Indigenous people, will suffer life-changing harms, and many will die preventable deaths,” argued the NWLC brief.
One third of counties in the United States are ‘maternity care deserts,’ with no obstetric providers, hospital-based obstetric care or birth centers. And Dobbs has worsened this dearth of providers.
Louisiana’s abortion ban is endangering the lives of women needing emergency medical care for pregnancy complications, as shown by a recent report, “Criminalized Care: How Louisiana’s Abortion Bans Endanger Patients and Clinicians,” by Lift Louisiana, Physicians for Human Rights, RH Impact and the Center for Reproductive Rights.
It also documented how some doctors in Louisiana are doing medically unnecessary and dangerous cesarean sections instead of safe abortions due to fears of violating the law.
“The bans’ narrow and ill-defined exceptions create confusion, uncertainty and fear for both pregnant patients and clinicians, who face significant professional, civil and criminal penalties for providing the patient-centered and compassionate care they were trained for and could legally offer before Roe v. Wade was overturned,” according to the report.
EMTALA and the Need for Clarification
In addition to the federal government’s attempts to enforce EMTALA, the Center for Reproductive Rights (CRR) has filed lawsuits in Tennessee, Texas, Oklahoma and Idaho asking states to clarify whether doctors can offer emergency medical care to pregnant patients experiencing complications, sharing many harrowing stories of pregnant women and their doctors.
Confusing language and non-medical terminology in the law has left doctors uncertain about when they are legally able to provide abortion care without being prosecuted.
Center for Reproductive Rights
In the Tennessee case, Blackmon v. Tennessee, the Center for Reproductive Rights is asking a court to clarify what circumstances qualify under the “medical emergency” exception in Tennessee’s abortion ban. CRR filed the case on behalf of nine plaintiffs: seven Tennessee women denied medically necessary abortion care who faced severe and dangerous pregnancy complications, and two Tennessee physicians who have been prevented from offering their patients the medically indicated treatment during obstetrical emergencies.
“Confusing language and non-medical terminology in the law has left doctors uncertain about when they are legally able to provide abortion care without being prosecuted,” argued CRR.
Doctors in the state face loss of licensure and up to 15 years in prison for violating the law, while the law forces pregnant women to either wait until they are near death to receive care or flee the state if they have the means to do so.
The Center for Reproductive Rights Takes on Tennessee’s Abortion Ban
The following stories, excerpted from The Center for Reproductive Rights, are some of the stories from pregnant women in Tennessee whose lives were put at risk due to delayed or denied abortion care.
Nicole Blackmon
Nicole Blackmon discovered she was pregnant just months after the murder of her teenage son. But at 15 weeks, her baby was diagnosed with a condition that made it unlikely her baby would survive the pregnancy. In addition to suffering from depression and anxiety, Nicole had health conditions that put her at high risk of having a stroke during labor and delivery. Without resources to travel to another state for an abortion, Nicole was forced to continue the pregnancy against her will until, at 31 weeks, she gave birth to a stillborn baby.
Allie Phillips
Allie Phillips was 18 weeks pregnant when she learned that her baby had multiple fetal diagnoses that made it unlikely her baby would survive the pregnancy, including a congenital condition of the brain. The continuation of the pregnancy posed risks to Allie’s own health. Allie was able to raise the funds to travel to New York City, where she learned her baby had already died in utero, leaving her at a high risk of infection and blood clots. She was able to receive the abortion care she needed in New York.
Katy Dulong
Katy Dulong was diagnosed with cervical insufficiency early in her second trimester and told that she would inevitably lose the pregnancy. Though she asked to receive abortion medication to expel the pregnancy, she was instead sent home. Katy did not receive the abortion care she needed until 10 days later—when her cervix was fully dilated, all amniotic fluid had drained, and most of the fetus’ body was in her vaginal canal. Katy’s doctors told her she was extremely lucky to have survived; without the abortion medication, she could have died within days.
Rebecca Milner
Rebecca Milner was 20 weeks pregnant when she learned she had suffered pre-term premature rupture of membranes (PPROM) and her baby was unlikely to survive. Continuing the pregnancy put her at risk of potentially life-threatening infection. She was able to travel to Virginia to obtain the abortion she needed. However, Rebecca still developed an infection that doctors said resulted from the delay in abortion care and needed emergency treatment for sepsis when she returned to Tennessee.
Rachel Fulton
Rachel Fulton learned from an ultrasound that her baby showed inadequate fetal development of the nervous system, lower spine, lungs, abdomen, feet, and hands, as well as fluid buildup in tissues and organs. The pregnancy was unlikely to survive to birth or long past birth, and continuing the pregnancy put Rachel at risk of developing mirror syndrome, a life-threatening complication. Rachel’s grandmother had died in childbirth, a tragedy that had a lifelong effect on Rachel’s father and his siblings. To safeguard her health and spare her family from such tragedy, she drove with her husband to Illinois to obtain abortion care.
Monica Kelly
Monica Kelly was 12 weeks pregnant when her doctor told her that her pregnancy had Trisomy 13, a severe fetal condition, and was unlikely to survive to birth or would die shortly after birth. Monica’s doctor warned her that continuing the pregnancy would put her at risk for preeclampsia and infection, among other conditions. Monica traveled to Florida to receive the abortion care she needed.
Kathryn Archer
Kathryn Archer was 20 weeks pregnant when she learned that several severe fetal conditions, including irregular brain development and improperly developed organs, made it unlikely that her pregnancy would survive to birth. After struggling to find an appointment out of state, Kathryn obtained abortion care in Washington, D.C.
Center for Reproductive Rights Intervene on Behalf of Idaho Women
CRR’s Idaho plaintiffs have similarly harrowing stories of near-death experiences while pregnant.
Jennifer Adkins
Lead plaintiff in the case Jennifer Adkins, of Caldwell, was pregnant with her second child when her 12-week ultrasound revealed her baby had skin edema and cystic hygroma, both of which carry a high mortality rate. During the same appointment, a geneticist told Jennifer that her daughter was also likely to have Turner syndrome, a rare chromosomal condition that affects female fetuses and results when one of the X chromosomes is missing. Doctors told Jen her pregnancy was likely not viable, as Turner syndrome almost always results in miscarriage. They also said that if she did not miscarry, Jen was likely to develop mirror syndrome—a condition leading to the development of edema and preeclampsia which, if left untreated, could be fatal.
Though Jennifer was devastated by the news, it was clear to her that continuing the pregnancy would endanger her health. Aware of Idaho’s abortion ban, she questioned her doctors, who admitted that if the state’s laws were different, they would have referred her to an in-state abortion clinic. But because of Idaho’s abortion laws, she would instead have to travel outside Idaho to get the care she needed. After calling several clinics in neighboring states, Jen was able to travel with her husband to Portland, Oregon, to obtain abortion care—but only after receiving financial assistance from two abortion funds. Later, Jen was able to get her fetal tissue tested, and the diagnosis of Turner syndrome was confirmed.
While Jen hopes to become pregnant again, she is anxious about being pregnant in Idaho. She worries that because her hospital has recently lost its obstetric genetics counselor and will soon lose its only remaining maternal fetal medicine (MFM) specialist, she will be left with little to no in-state options for genetic counseling and high-risk pregnancy care should she need it in future pregnancies.
Kayla Smith
Kayla Smith, formerly of Nampa, pregnant with her second child, was shocked to learn at her 19-week ultrasound scan that her baby had a serious and inoperable congenital heart condition. After consulting with a maternal fetal medicine (MFM) specialist and a pediatric cardiologist, she and her husband learned that their baby was not likely to survive past birth and there were no viable medical interventions available. Kayla’s doctors also explained that because Kayla had previously developed preeclampsia during her first pregnancy (her daughter is now 3), she had a heightened risk of developing preeclampsia again if she carried her pregnancy to term.
Devastated by the news but determined to spare their baby from suffering and ensure Kayla’s safety and health, Kayla and her husband decided that what Kayla needed was abortion care. But because of Idaho’s abortion bans, her doctors could not provide that care for her. Kayla and her family traveled to Washington to obtain abortion care—a trip that cost thousands of dollars and required them to take out a personal loan, as well as receive assistance from friends and family. Worse than the financial toll, Kayla was upset that she had been forced through such an ordeal just to obtain necessary medical care.
Kayla is pregnant again, with a girl—but she and her husband were so concerned about raising two daughters in a state like Idaho, where their bodily autonomy rights are not guaranteed or protected, that they have since moved to Washington.
Rebecca Vincen-Brown
Rebecca Vincen-Brown, of Ada County, was thrilled to be pregnant with her second child when she began experiencing vaginal bleeding approximately 12 weeks into her pregnancy. She had several ultrasounds and appointments with her obstetrician-gynecologist (OB-GYN) and MFM because her baby was measuring small and low in her uterus. After she underwent two rounds of non-invasive prenatal testing—which were inconclusive but showed a likelihood of severe chromosomal conditions—she went in for an early anatomy scan at 16 weeks and learned her baby had a number of fatal fetal conditions including dangling choroid plexus, micrognathia, significant cardiac issues and horseshoe kidney. Doctors told her the baby was unlikely to survive to birth, and if Rebecca were to continue her pregnancy, she risked developing preeclampsia or severe hemorrhaging.
Rebecca wanted to prevent her baby from suffering and remain healthy and present for her 2-year-old daughter, but her doctors were not able to provide her the care she needed due to the abortion bans. So she, her husband and their daughter drove for seven hours to Oregon so that she could obtain abortion care. After Rebecca had gone to the abortion clinic for the first day of her abortion procedure, she passed her pregnancy in the hotel bathroom in the early hours of the next morning. Her husband had to perform multiple rounds of fundal massage on her stomach to help stop the bleeding. They both had to be careful not to make any noise while their daughter slept.
Rebecca is pregnant again and recently learned she is carrying a baby girl. While happy to be pregnant, she is anxious about her health while pregnant in Idaho and is concerned about her daughters’ rights and safety.
Moving Ahead, Will the Court Allow Women to Die?
As Republican lawmakers and judges impose draconian abortion bans in more states—including Florida and Arizona just last week—more and more pregnant women are suffering and dying, especially women of color and low-income women and women of color.
“We have never seen legislators look at the idea of intervening to prevent harm to somebody as then limited in its practice, but not for medical knowledge, not for changes in safety and efficacy, but only because legislation has decided that that procedure is only allowable in certain circumstances,” said Dr. Dara Kass.
Will the Supreme Court allow women to die?
Oral arguments in Moyle v. United States are on Wednesday, April 24, at 10 a.m. ET. Listen to the arguments here or here. That same day, NWLC will be leading a rally in front of the Supreme Court from 9 a.m. to noon.
For more Dobbs survivor stories, visit the website of the Center for Reproductive Rights, including Voices from Abortion Ban States and stories of the plaintiffs in Zurawski v. Texas, Cox v. Texas, and the Idaho, Tennessee and Oklahoma cases. Here’s a CRR press conference with patients speaking out. CRR features the stories of plaintiffs in cases against Idaho, Tennessee and Oklahoma here.
The Center for American Progress has a provider storyteller series, featuring four medical professionals from Idaho and other rural states testifying about how the criminalization of abortion care and the interference of the Supreme Court in their daily medical practice has changed their personal and professional lives.
The Ms. series “Our Abortion Stories” also chronicles readers’ experiences of abortion pre- and post-Roe. Share your abortion story by emailing myabortionstory@msmagazine.com.
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