Abortion, Every Day (8.23.23)

South Carolina ban goes into effect

In the States

Some awful news today: The all-male South Carolina Supreme Court has upheld the state’s abortion ban. That means the 6-week ban, which was previously blocked, will now go into effect. You may recall that the Court ruled in January that a different 6-week ban was unconstitutional—but that was before Justice Kaye Hearn, the only woman on the Court, retired. (Hearn wrote the lead opinion in the decision that found the previous ban unconstitutional because it violated the right to privacy.)

South Carolina is the only state that has an all-male Supreme Court.

In the ruling, Justice John Kittredge admitted that the law “infringes on a woman’s right of privacy and bodily autonomy,” but “the legislature has made a policy determination that, at a certain point in the pregnancy, a woman’s interest in autonomy and privacy does not outweigh the interest of the unborn child to live.”

To be clear: they are saying outright that the ban is a violation of our bodily privacy and autonomy but that it doesn’t matter. It’s always in moments like these that I think about the images of early pregnancy and abortion and remember that this is what these men are saying has more rights than we do.

For a recap on the details of the ban, you can read previous Abortion, Every Day coverage here. But it’s as about as bad as you can imagine. And with South Carolina’s ban now in effect, access in the South is further decimated. (Though please remember and remind others that you can still order abortion medication via Aid Access and other tele-health providers.)

One last thing: Only 37% of the people in South Carolina support the 6-week ban.

If you need another reminder of why the attacks on abortion rights and trans rights are inextricable, consider what happened this week in Alabama: On Monday, a federal appeals court ruled that the state could enforce a ban on gender-affirming care for minors, using Dobbs as a legal justification. The judges ruled that the plaintiffs didn’t have a right to care because, just as Dobbs found that abortion is not “deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition,” neither is the use of puberty blockers or hormones. Nightmare.

Meanwhile in Iowa, more than 160 reimbursement requests for emergency contraception for rape victims are “pending” in the state. Iowa Public Radio got ahold of records showing the unpaid requests—the result of Attorney General Brenna Bird’s decision to stop funding the program that paid for rape victims’ care.

Louisiana gubernatorial candidate Hunter Lundy is running as an independent, hoping to collect votes from either side. But we know that he’s a total extremist on abortion. For example, you may remember that in March, an Abortion, Every Day reader found an interview with Lundy where he claims that women who have abortions suffer from mental illness. And check out what Lundy has to say about why he opposes a rape and incest exception in Louisiana’s abortion ban:

“There’s always two victims to an abortion, always the child and the mother. I just know too many people that were birthed and have been born out of what some would call rape or some would call incest. And how do you define that in Louisiana.”

WHAT SOME WOULD CALL? I think the definition of rape and incest is pretty clear, but I’m glad to know exactly where Lundy stands.

Grace reported yesterday that Republican Sens. Josh Hawley and Eric Schmitt claim to support Missouri voters having a say on abortion rights. Their comments come at the same time that Republicans in the state have done everything in their power to stop a pro-choice ballot measure from moving forward. Attorney General Andrew Bailey had to be forced by the state Supreme Court to sign off on a cost estimate of the measure, and Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft is being sued by the ACLU right now for trying to include false and inflammatory language in the ballot description.

In light of the Senators comments, the editorial board of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch write that if they actually believe voters should have a say on abortion, “they should call out their fellow Missouri Republicans to stop sabotaging the referendum effort.” They also point out why Hawley and Schmitt are suddenly so interested in telling Missourians that they support their right to vote on abortion:

“[T]hey both can follow referendum results and read polls—and those indicators overwhelmingly signal that Republicans in the post-Roe v. Wade world have vastly overreached in their anti-choice policies, to the point that even red-state voters are starting to rebel.”

Speaking of Republican politicians realizing that their anti-abortion stance isn’t going to serve them well on election day: North Carolina Lt. Gove. Mark Robinson—the leading Republican candidate for governor—has been walking back his past statements on abortion. When he was asked about his position on the issue during an event yesterday, Robinson said he no longer thinks bans are the right approach because women can just travel to another state for care, and that instead they should be promoting “a culture of life.”

This is quite a shift from Robinson, who has said that once a woman gets pregnant, “it’s not your body anymore,” and suggested that pro-choice states allow infanticide. Apparently the polls are finally starting to sink in with some of these candidates.

Meanwhile, Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb is burying his head in the sand over the consequences of his state’s abortion ban, which just went into effect on Monday. Holcomb said yesterday he doesn’t believe that the ban will have a negative economic impact on the state by causing it to lose business or tourism.

“I understand there’s a difference of opinion…If you just follow the facts, our state is growing. And we’re growing by about every measure.”

Holcomb also said that enrollment at colleges in the state remain high despite predictions that young people wouldn’t want to come to an anti-choice state. (Considering that the ban just went into effect, it stands to reason that enrollment hasn’t been hit yet—but I’d also be curious to see the gender breakdown at some of those colleges.)

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again and again: the ripple effects of abortion bans—economically and otherwise—are going to be far-reaching and devastating. Anyone who denies that is just fooling themselves.

Illinois has been seeing a massive uptick of out-of-state patients with dangerous pregnancies who need abortion care. WBEZ in Chicago has been covering the trend, which is a perfect demonstration of how ‘exceptions’ for a person’s health or life aren’t real. From Alina Salganicoff, director of women's health policy at KFF:

“It's very, very difficult to get an exception. It's like, how imminent is this threat. And in many cases, patients can't wait until they're about to die before they get an abortion.”

Luckily, the state launched a new initiative last month to help deal with the influx of high-risk patients: the Complex Abortion Referral Line for Access (CARLA), a referral and navigation program, staffed by nurses, created for patients who need hospital-based abortion care.

This piece from The Washington Post about a sex educator in Michigan who was targeted by anti-LGBTQ activists absolutely broke my heart. Still, it’s an incredibly important read that gets into the details of how extremists aren’t just ruining their children’s educations, but destroying people’s lives. There’s never been a better time to get on your local school board.

Quick hits:

• CNN on Iowa Republican voters’ conflicting views on abortion;

• The Columbus Dispatch on how an increase in early voting could impact Ohio’s pro-choice ballot measure;

• The Advocate on California Republicans’ possible platform change on marriage equality and abortion rights;

• How North Carolina’s new law allowing pharmacists to prescribe birth control is helping combat the state’s “contraceptive deserts”;

• Two Wisconsin women share their abortion stories;

• And the mother of the 13 year-old Mississippi girl who was forced to give birth is speaking out—the article include a link to the family’s Go Fund Me, if you’d like to help.

In the Nation

The five anti-abortion activists changed with violating the FACE Act began their trial last week in a D.C. court. Something worth noting is that the lead defendant, Lauren Handy, took the stand to claim that she believed “live-birth abortions” were happening in the clinic. This comes in a moment when Republicans are continually lying about the existence of ‘post-birth’ abortions—dangerous rhetoric that endangers the lives of providers and patients. How much more proof do we need that these kinds of lies do actual, real life damage?

Republicans continue to be furious that the Biden administration won’t be moving the Space Force to Alabama (as former president Donald Trump planned), but instead will keep the headquarters in Colorado. House Armed Services Committee Chairman, Republican Mike Rogers, called on the leaders of the Space Force and Air Force to come testify about the decision. “We will get answers on President Biden's political manipulation of the selection process,” Rogers said. (Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall has already come out in support of Biden’s decision.)

I really loved this Los Angeles Times op-ed from Rhonda Garelick, an English and journalism professor at Southern Methodist University, about the bizarre mifepristone opinion from Judge James Ho. (If you need a recap, essentially Ho argued that abortion causes “an aesthetic injury” to doctors by robbing them of the “profound joy” of seeing a baby be born.)

You should read all of Garelick’s very smart piece, but here’s a snippet:

“To construe abortion as a crime against the privilege of looking inside women is to construe them as objects offered up for the visual consumption, pleasure and, of course, control of others.

…Mifepristone in this way offers women a powerful mode of resistance to the kind of compulsory bodily visibility that Ho advocates. Perhaps that’s why the judge chose the seemingly bizarre grounds of ‘aesthetic injury’ to argue against access to the drug. It allows him to reposition abortion in the very realm from which mifepristone effectively frees it: that of prurient visual surveillance.”

WHEW.

The 19th reports on a new bill that would make sex education a national requirement (sort of unbelievable that it’s not already!). The Real Education and Access for Healthy Youth Act, introduced by Rep. Barbara Lee, would mandate that students be given lessons about sex that are “evidence-informed, comprehensive in scope, confidential, equitable, accessible, medically accurate and complete, age and developmentally appropriate, culturally responsive, and trauma-informed and resilience-oriented.” Love it.

“Education is power, and young people have the right to make decisions over their own bodies,” Rep. Lee says.

And it couldn’t come at a better time. A new poll from KFF shows that medical misinformation is widespread in the U.S., with some particularly disturbing results around reproductive health:

“When asked about birth control leading to issues getting pregnant after cessation, younger adults—particularly younger women—are more likely to have heard this and to say this is probably or definitely true. However, when asked about sex education among teens leading to more sexual activity, older adults are more likely to say it is definitely or probably true.”

The next installment of my series on the conservative war against birth control focuses on the cultural misinformation campaign around hormonal contraception and young women—and this study definitely aligns with what I’m seeing. (Unfortunately.)

Quick hits:

• Female veterans are speaking out against Sen. Tommy Tuberville’s block on military promotions and nominations;

• PBS NewsHour on Tuberville’s ‘protest’ and what it means for military readiness;

• Stat News on how to make contraception more affordable and accessible;

• And in international news, a new study shows that a majority of people across the globe want abortion to be legal.

2024

Ahead of tonight’s Republican presidential debate in Wisconsin, Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America president Marjorie Dannenfelser has written an op-ed about the “mistakes” candidates need to avoid. Much of it is what you would expect: She claims that American voters want politicians to support extreme abortion bans (never mind every poll that shows otherwise); that candidates should go on the offense on abortion; and that they should support a federal abortion ban. Though as you can guess, Dannenfelser doesn’t use the word ‘ban’, instead calling for a “national minimum standard.”

As is always the case with Dannenfelser, her messaging is 99% projection. As women go into sepsis, raped children are forced into childbirth, and cancer victims are denied abortions, she argues that “it is the Democrats who are extreme.” And while every bit of science and medicine backs up abortion rights proponents, Dannenfelser writes that pro-choicers “deny science, sonograms and sensibility.”

Once you understand that everything the anti-abortion movement does is projection and defensiveness, it becomes much easier to glean their strategy. In this case, it’s that anti-abortion leaders know that they are losing.

The White House knows that conservatives are losing on abortion, too. In anticipation of the debate, the Biden administration is pushing out talking points focused on reproductive rights and how badly the GOP is going to lose because of their stance on the issue. In a Biden-Harris 2024 campaign phone call, a spokesperson told reporters that the debate will be a “race to who can be the most extreme on banning abortion nationwide.” And Democratic Sen. Tina Smith said, “In red states and in blue states and in presidential battleground states, when abortion is on the ballot, Democrats and abortion rights win.”

The Americans for Contraception Education Fund has also launched a series of ads ahead of the debate in Wisconsin about Republican attacks on birth control. Hate that this is necessary, but it really needs to be talked about:

Last bit of debate news: A new poll shows that abortion is not at the top of Republican primary voters’ minds.

Stats & Studies

A new CDC study shows that 1 in 5 women were mistreated while getting medical care during pregnancy. From NPR:

“The women reported signs of mistreatment, such as being verbally abused, having their requests for help go unanswered, having their physical privacy infringed upon and receiving threats to withhold treatment.”

Another third reported being discriminated against during their medical care because of their age, weight, income, race and ethnicity.

The results of the study aren’t particularly shocking, of course, but they do serve as a good reminder of what it really means to force someone into pregnancy.

Anti-Choice Strategy: Buffer Zones & ‘Free Speech’

For a few months now, Abortion, Every Day has been raising the alarm about how anti-abortion activists are trying to challenge clinic buffer zones by claiming that they violate the protesters’ free speech. (Apparently harassing and intimidating patients is free speech now!) It’s a conservative strategy that’s increasing by the day, so I was happy to see this story out of Illinois about a clever tactic that a Chicago alderman is using to protect a local clinic.

Alderman Bill Conway is calling for a new rule that would ban protesters from creating too much havoc around the Family Planning Associates Clinic by implementing a “quiet zone” in the area. Love a little creative politicking! Listen to an interview with Conway about the strategy here at WBEZ.

Abortion, Every Day will have an open thread available tonight for paid subscribers during the Republican presidential debate. So if you’re looking to commiserate and be furious, now is a good time to sign up for a paid subscription!