Abortion, Every Day (5.3.23)

In the States

I’m sorry to start with shitty news, but you knew this was coming: North Carolina Republicans have introduced a 12-week abortion ban that they seem pretty certain they have the votes for, now that Rep. Tricia Cotham has switched parties. Republican leaders announced the bill late last night, with Sen. Joyce Krawiec calling it “reasonable, commonsense legislation.” Those words sound familiar! So let’s talk about just how “reasonable” it is.

The ban would prohibit abortions after 12-weeks, with ‘exceptions’ for rape and incest up to 20-weeks of pregnancy. There is no language so far about how doctors would confirm that a pregnancy is the result of rape or incest, but we know that exceptions aren’t real and almost never used.

The law would allow for an abortion up to 24-weeks if the fetus has a “life-limiting anomaly.” Here is where it gets incredibly dark. The bill requires the anomaly to be “uniformly diagnosable,” which is already tricky because so many of these cases aren’t black and white, or don’t have a singular diagnosis. The law also requires doctors provide women with written and oral information about how “life-limiting anomalies have resulted in live births of infants with unpredictable and variable lengths of life.” Essentially, they want to force doctors to tell patients that maybe their baby will survive.

And this was an absolute gut-punch: “The qualified physician proposing the abortion will offer referrals to the woman for neonatal and perinatal palliative care consultations.” They know this law is going to result in women giving birth to babies who will die soon after. It’s a total nightmare. (But don’t worry, Sen. Krawiec says the law “will undoubtedly save lives and improve health outcomes for many pregnant women.”)

One last bit of horror: The legislation defines ‘woman’ as “a female human, whether or not she is an adult.” (Emphasis mine)

If abortion is banned in North Carolina, and the Florida Supreme Court comes down as expected (allowing the state’s 6-week ban to take effect), access in the South will be decimated. I’m so sorry, all. If you want to support abortion funds in the state, you can find a list here.

CONTENT WARNING: INFANT LOSS.

This is what we can expect to see in North Carolina: Back in February, I told you about Deborah Dorbert, a Florida woman who was denied an abortion despite a severe fetal abnormality. I’m sorry to say that she wasn’t able to get care, that she was forced to carry to term, and that her son Milo died just as doctors said he would. Dorbert says, “He gasped for air a couple of times when I held him. I watched my child take his first breath, and I held him as he took his last one.”

What this country is doing to women is inhuman.

Meanwhile, a Missouri Republican has proposed legislation that would allow the state to charge a woman with murder if she obtained an abortion. The Kansas City Star reports that Sen. Mike Moon’s bill would give fetuses the same rights as human beings, and allow for murder charges to be filed against anyone who has an abortion, provides an abortion, or helps someone get an abortion. We’ve seen this sort of legislation in multiple other states over the last months; and while the anti-abortion movement keeps trying to distance themselves from criminalization, this is the natural consequence of banning abortion.

I also worry that part of the reason we’re seeing bills like this is so that other Republicans have the opportunity to come against them, painting themselves as somehow ‘reasonable’. When South Carolina considered a bill that would make abortion punishable by the death penalty, for example, the governor responded by calling it “lunacy” and promising that “no one that I know wants to criminalize women.” The problem? A woman was arrested for having an abortion in the state just a few weeks earlier.

Speaking of abortion and punishment: The Nation reports that an incarcerated woman in Texas was moved to solitary confinement after she explained to other women in the prison that there was no such thing as ‘partial-birth abortion’. Kwaneta Harris, who was a nurse before becoming incarcerated, was overheard by an anti-abortion prison guard who “threatened to file a new criminal charge against her,” and then had her placed in solitary. It’s a horrific story, but an important one—make sure to read the whole piece.

I reported last month that Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird had ended funding for emergency contraception for rape victims—money that primarily went to children who had been assaulted. This week, two Democratic Senators sent Bird a letter asking that she explain the decision, which has kept reimbursements from nearly 70 rape survivors.

Sens. Janet Petersen and Todd Taylor wrote, “Depriving victims of essential care while your office continues its months-long audit is an attack on justice…Victims, advocates, prosecutors, and law enforcement deserve to know why needed resources are being withheld by your office.”

In better news, a judge has blocked a Utah law from going into effect that would have banned abortion clinics in the state, despite abortion itself being legal. The law was a move by Republicans to ban abortion without actually enacting a ban: It mandated that abortions only be performed in hospitals, even though hospitals generally don’t provide abortions unless there’s a medical emergency. Judge Andrew Stone issued a temporary injunction, writing that the state’s reasoning for the new law was “nebulous.” (Without the block, the law would have went into effect today.)

Sarah Stoesz, president of Planned Parenthood Association of Utah, said: “While we welcome this victory, the threat to Utahns’ health and personal freedom remains dire.” (A near-total ban in the state is currently blocked while it’s being considered by the Utah Supreme Court.)

In Rhode Island, OBGYN Dr. Ogechukwu Ezike has written an op-ed in support of the Equality in Abortion Coverage Act (EACA), legislation that would require Medicaid and state insurance plans to cover abortion care:

“Policies that limit abortion access to patients with private insurance, like the one currently upheld in Rhode Island, are discriminatory and contribute to the growing gap in health equity. This may mean someone has to decide between paying their rent or paying for a necessary health procedure.”

A new Tennessee poll shows that voters are overwhelmingly against the state’s total abortion ban—a good reminder that people support legal access to abortion, even in red states. (For example, nearly 60% of Tennessee voters think mifepristone should be legal.)

In Maryland, Gov. Wes Moore is signing a package of abortion rights legislation today, including protections from out-of-state prosecutions targeting patients and providers; digital health data protections; and a law requiring state colleges to refer students to places that offer reproductive health care.

And in Maine, where lawmakers are considering allowing later abortion with a doctor’s recommendation, the Judiciary Committee heard hours of testimony yesterday—mostly from anti-choice activists who had been mobilized by Maine Right to Life. The Maine Medical Association, however, is backing the bill; and doctors were also present to offer expert testimony. OBGYN Dr. Kathryn Sharpless told legislators, “My heart breaks every time I am forced to give pregnant people who need an abortion later in pregnancy a list of out-of-state providers because Maine’s current law bans it and includes criminal penalties.”

And in your what-the-fuck news of the day: After Wellspring Health Access clinic re-opened last month in Casper, Wyoming, nearly a year after being destroyed by arson, the Casper mayor thought it would be a good idea to take to Facebook and post a picture of a fire in response. Yes, really. Mayor Bruce Knell defended the post by saying he wasn’t referring to the arson, but “hellfire.”

“I put a picture of a guy dancing in a fire because in my religious beliefs, if you sin against God you go to Hell unless you repent.” Well in that case!! After calls for his resignation, Cowboy State Daily reports that Knell “wept intermittently” while apologizing at a city council meeting yesterday. I…do not feel bad for him.

Quick hits:

• Oral arguments start tomorrow in the challenge to Wisconsin’s 1849 abortion ban;

• New York passed a package of abortion protections yesterday, including legislation to ensure that SUNY and CUNY schools offer abortion medication;

• A new tele-health organization has launched in Mississippi to help expand contraception access in the state;

• Colorado is seeing more out-of-state patients than ever, increasing in-person wait times;

• And an Oklahoma bill protecting access to contraception has passed the Senate and is headed to the governor’s desk.

In the Nation

One of the biggest problems facing anti-abortion states is how little doctors want to be there. And who can blame them? No one wants to work in a place that would arrest them for simply doing their jobs. ABC News spoke to some of those physicians who are leaving states with abortion bans, as well as medical students who are actively avoiding them as they look for placements. Alyssa Colwill, director of a training program that includes abortion care at Oregon Health & Science University, for example, told reporters that she’s spoken to multiple trainees who are trying to leave their anti-choice states:

“A lot of them have seen patients, get unnecessarily sick, that have had hysterectomies, lost their fertility, because they've had pregnancy complications that could have been resolved with a safe and timely abortion, but instead had to wait until their life was at risk for intervention to happen.”

Just a small FDA lawsuit update: A coalition of 24 state Attorneys General filed an amicus brief this week in support of mifepristone access.

Quick hits:

• A new study shows that internet searches for abortion- and contraception-related terms surged in the wake of Roe being overturned;

• Media Matters on how Fox News praised TikTok for letting abortion misinformation flourish unchecked;

• CBS News with an important read on how states are pushing personhood;

• Dr. Jennifer Lincoln from Mayday Health tells us how to spot an anti-abortion center;

• And States Newsroom has a really good roundup of the kind of anti-abortion legislation we’ve seen pop up in the last few months, from Comstock and banning clinics to attacks on ballot measure standards.

Do A Little Something

I told you earlier this week about the federal investigation into two hospitals that denied a Missouri woman abortion care despite having a doomed pregnancy that was putting her life at risk. What you may not know is that the woman, Mylissa Farmer, who had to travel out-of-state for care, has been struggling since. If you’d like to support her, you can find her GoFundMe here.

You Love to See It

I think we could all use a little bit of positivity today, so please check out this story: A Nebraska man lost his appeal seeking a protection order from a woman who donated to Planned Parenthood in his name. For real. Apparently Isaac Koch sent unsolicited anti-abortion mailings to a woman’s address, and in response she replied with a handwritten thank-you note “for the lovely reminder about misinformation. I have donated to Planned Parenthood in your name.” Lol. Queen behavior.

Koch didn’t like that much, however, and argued that the act “intimidated him,” that he required an order of protection, and that she needed to withdraw the donation. The court said…nah. (We have to take our wins where we can get them.)