JD Vance Is Open to Prosecuting Abortion Patients

6.25.26

Click to skip ahead: Punishing Women Gains Mainstream Momentum; JD Vance Is Open to Prosecuting Abortion Patients; In the States: Illinois, Florida, Tennessee, New York, Wyoming & More; Democratic Senators Are Calling Out Moms.gov; Planned Parenthood is Coming Back to Louisiana; Ballot Box: Abortion Wins Elections; National Abortion Federation Rejects Viability Restrictions

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Punishing Women Gains Mainstream Momentum

More of this please: The New York Times published an article yesterday about the growing call to punish abortion patients.

You all know this is something I’ve been warning about for years. Not too long ago, I predicted the country was “on the verge of a major criminalization push”—a warning that proved unfortunately prescient. ‘Abolitionists’ who want to punish women with the death penalty are introducing more bills than ever, running more candidates, and are becoming more accepted by the ‘mainstream’ anti-abortion movement.

Yet somehow they’re still being dismissed as radical outliers—even as the Texas Republican party adopted an “equal protection” plank and Students for Life became the first national anti-abortion organization to endorse legislation that would punish patients.

We urgently need a broad, mainstream audience to understand just how quickly the push to jail women has been normalized. So yes, I was thrilled to see this Times piece. Reporter Caroline Kitchener also published some important scoops:

• A group of more than 60 conservative leaders and influencers signed a public petition calling for the end of “legal immunities” for abortion—aka exempting patients from prosecution. (I specifically warned about the terms ‘immunity’ and ‘loophole’ a little over a year ago.)

• Kitchener also reports that Texas Right to Life—arguably the state’s most powerful anti-abortion group—is “formulating an idea to test the political waters on the issue.” They want to target a narrow group of women—those with medical licenses—and revoke those licenses if they’re caught taking abortion pills. Consider how truly nefarious this is: they don’t just want to punish women, they want to strip them of their ability to work. We know that’s what conservatives want for women more broadly, so it’s a particularly telling move.

And then there’s our favorite psychopaths, Students for Life (SFL)—which did some clever maneuvering in their statement to the Times. Communications director Kelsey Pritchard said, “We do not support legislation to attach criminal penalties to women and qualify them for the death penalty.” Does that mean they support penalties that wouldn’t qualify women for the death penalty?

After all, it was just in April when AED uncovered that the group endorsed a South Carolina bill that would jail women for two years (rather than life). And president Kristan Hawkins has been dropping hints about punishing patients for a while now—saying the movement is “working to change culture” before they explicitly call for punishing women. She repeated a similar sentiment to Kitchener:

“My message is, ‘not now,’ but I’m not saying ‘not ever. You have to make abortion unthinkable before you get to that point when you ask, how are you going to prosecute?”

There’s something else I’d love SFL to answer: since they believe common forms of birth control (like oral contraceptives) are actually ’abortifacients’, does that mean they believe women who take the Pill should be prosecuted, too? Just wondering!

JD Vance Is Open to Prosecuting Abortion Patients

I wish we were done talking about the push to punish patients, but alas—JD Vance has made that impossible. The vice president weighed in on the abolitionist movement in a podcast last week, and the Times reports, “Mr. Vance hinted at the potential peril for Republicans in expressing opposition to the idea, saying that ‘we can’t be immune to the realities of modern politics.”

But Vance was actually a lot more open to the idea of jailing women than that quote leads readers to believe. Here’s what he said:

“We can’t be immune to the realities of modern politics, and I worry sometimes that we have lost the persuasion battle and that’s what really has to change for the pro-life community to win big in the future.”

Essentially, Vance is taking Hawkins’ stance: that the anti-abortion movement needs to get Americans on board before politicians will follow. He’s not saying he opposes punishing abortion patients. In fact, Vance comes back to ‘abolition’ a few moments later—to compare himself to Abraham Lincoln, and abortion to slavery. 🤡

“You know, who ultimately freed the slaves? Was it William Lloyd Garrison or was it Abraham Lincoln? It was the pragmatic guy who was working within the confines of the system. And I, I think that’s fundamentally how we have to think about this, is that we have to be pragmatic, we have to win the argument, and then we can save the lives of many unborn kids.”

Watch for yourself, if you can stomach it:

Let’s be plain about what happened: a frontrunner for the 2028 Republican presidential nomination left the door open to jailing abortion patients. Shocking—but not surprising. In 2022, Vance actually questioned whether a “federal response” was necessary to stop women from crossing state lines for care. He’s always been an extremist.

The next journalist who gets Vance in a room has a moral responsibility to ask him directly: do you oppose prosecuting women for abortion? Will you promise, on the record, to reject any such efforts? We all know he won’t answer.

This is a powerful pressure point—and Democrats should be using it everywhere, not just in national races. (The catch: we don’t want Republicans using that as an opportunity to paint themselves as moderates simply for not wanting to execute or jail women.)

In the States: Illinois, Florida, Tennessee, New York, Wyoming & More

Buckle up, we have a lot of state news today! (Don’t worry, it’s not all bad.)

Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker commemorated the 4th anniversary of Dobbs by signing new protections for abortion patients. The Reproductive Health Records Privacy Act (which AED has mentioned a few times before) will shield digital medical records pertaining to reproductive and gender-affirming healthcare from out-of-state entities. That information would only be shared in certain circumstances, with consent.

“A woman seeking care should not have to wonder whether her private health information could be used against her,” Gov. Pritzker said.

Meanwhile, 34% of Florida women report difficulty in obtaining reproductive healthcare—from pelvic exams and birth control to abortion. Florida has a six-week abortion ban, which is before most women know they’re pregnant. Patients also face a 24-hour waiting period, a ban on telehealth, and forced parental involvement for minors.

It’s worth remembering that Florida used to be a major abortion access hub in the South before the six-week ban. And despite the clear majority of voters supporting abortion protections, lawmakers have kept that restriction in place despite the will of the people.

In Tennessee, Republicans used the anniversary of Dobbs to erect a “monument to the unborn” at the state Capitol. At the unveiling, legislators were joined by anti-abortion activists from Tennessee Right to Life—a group that spent months lobbying against an exception for women’s lives. (Charming!)

I appreciated this coverage of the monument from the Nashville Scene, in part because they include pictures of the many protesters holding signs that read: “Where is the monument for the mothers?” and “Maternal mortality is not pro-life.”

“Leave our doctors alone. Leave our moms alone. Leave our kids alone. Just leave us alone.”

- Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont

Proud of my home state of New York, where Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Gov. Kathy Hochul have expanded the city’s Abortion Access Hub—a call center for abortion patients both in and out of the state getting care in New York. Mayor Mamdani said the program is getting an additional half million dollars “because abortion is health care, and health care is a human right.”

Finally, Wyoming Republicans are still attacking the state Supreme Court as “activists” for ruling that abortion is constitutionally protected healthcare. At the same time, former Speaker of the House Tom Lubnau is slams the state GOP for pushing unconstitutional bans.

Quick hits:

• The Des Moines Register introduced us to three Iowa women fighting for abortion rights;

• Patients and providers in Virginia reflected on what the constitutional amendment on November’s ballot means for access to reproductive healthcare;

• And Nevada abortion patients are increasingly turning to abortion medication.

Democratic Senators Are Calling Out Moms.gov

A group of Democratic Senators, led by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, have written a letter to Donald Trump and HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr, blasting them over the new government website, Moms.gov.

The lawmakers note that instead of directing pregnant Americans to “concrete resources,” the site pushes users to anti-abortion crisis pregnancy centers, raising “profound concerns about the health, safety, and privacy of people who access this government website at a time when women’s health and reproductive rights face increasing attacks.”

As I reported last month, the issue isn’t just that Moms.gov directs women to CPCs—which would be bad enough. It’s that they’re funneling women to Option Line, a data collection tool for Heartbeat International. The senators flag that, too, citing Abortion, Every Day’s 2024 reporting on a massive data breach at Heartbeat that revealed the private information of over a dozen women—down to the date of their last menstrual period.

The senators urge the White House to remove the link to Option Line, and to cease using federal dollars to recommend dangerous fake clinics. They also ask that Trump and RFK answer some critical questions, like: whether Option Line shares data with law enforcement, how the government will protect women’s data given CPCs aren’t protected by HIPAA, and whether the administration has plans to redirect Title X family planning dollars to CPCs. (This is something AED has been warning about for a while now.)

Read the full letter here. `

Planned Parenthood is Coming Back to Louisiana

After being forced to shutter in Louisiana last year, Planned Parenthood is opening a New Orleans clinic and expanding telehealth services in the state. I love that they announced this right around the anniversary of Dobbs!

The Louisiana Illuminator reports that the Planned Parenthood Great Plains affiliate, which covers Arkansas, Kansas, parts of Missouri and Oklahoma, will add Louisiana to its coverage area.

Obviously, the group will not be able to provide abortions—which are illegal in Louisiana. But they’ll be providing birth control, STI and pregnancy testing, gender-affirming care, cancer screenings and more. The new clinic will also help patients who need to travel for abortion care.

As you can imagine, Louisiana Republicans are pissed. And Attorney General Liz Murrill—who is suing the FDA to end the mailing of abortion pills—is preemptively threatening the organization:

“Abortion remains illegal in Louisiana — including any attempt by activists to facilitate the trafficking of dangerous and illegal pills through the mail or via ‘telehealth.’”

Scare tactics aren’t going to work today, Liz! Seriously, I’m so thrilled for the folks in Louisiana.

Ballot Box: Abortion Wins Elections

We all know abortion wins elections: it’s Democrats’ most popular issue, voters are increasingly pro-choice, and bans are widely-hated—even in red states. That’s why I’m so sick of the calls for Democrats to find the middle on abortion: it’s bad advice that often comes from men who are stuck in the abortion politics of twenty years ago.

Lauren Egan at The Bulwark flips the script with a necessary reality-check:

“There is a growing sentiment among that same consulting class that abortion access can actually serve as a winning issue for Democrats running in red parts of the country. They increasingly view the traditional pro-life versus pro-choice faultline as a relic. In its place, they see a series of state-specific battles in which candidates focus on the state- and local-level restrictions directly affecting their constituents rather than a larger narrative about the legacy of Roe v. Wade.”

Zac McCrary, an Alabama-based Democratic pollster, tells Egan that it was easier for voters to be ‘pro-life’ before bans were enacted. “But that abstraction has been replaced by the messy reality of government-enforced mandates,” he said.

“The Republican party has pivoted from defending a moral principle to enforcing a restriction that compromises individual freedom. That’s an overreach that voters, even in red states, have found deeply uncomfortable.”

The timing for Reproductive Freedom for All’s new $23.5 million dollar campaign couldn’t be better. The group reminds us that “support for abortion access is popular across party lines—more popular than any individual politician or political party,” and that they’re using that popularity to elect pro-abortion candidates up and down the ballot.

While the midterms inch closer, Democratic legislators and leaders commemorated yesterday’s Dobbs anniversary by vowing to protect abortion rights—and reminding voters of the potential fallout should Republicans take the helm in their states.

Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs, for example, has spent her tenure proactively supporting abortion rights: in addition to vetoing anti-abortion legislation, she issued an executive order to prevent the prosecution of abortion patients and providers—and transferred prosecution power of such cases to her pro-choice Attorney General Kris Mayes.

“The reality can be really different with a different governor in office,” Hobbs said. “I’m committed to continuing the fight to protect what we fought for and won.”

In Pennsylvania, incumbent Gov. Josh Shapiro will face Republican state treasurer Stacy Garrity this November—a woman who used to sell campaign merch like “Life Won” bumper stickers and “Born to be Pro-Life” baby onesies. But like most Republican candidates, she saw the writing on the wall and the merch quietly disappeared from her website.

Yesterday, Shapiro said, “As long as I’m Governor, abortion will remain safe, legal, accessible here in our Commonwealth and I will continue using my authority to protect care.”

And over in Kentucky, the inimitable Hadley Duvall lent her support to Lt. Gov. Jacqueline Coleman for the 2027 gubernatorial race. Duvall helped bring home a win for Gov. Andy Beshear by sharing her story of childhood sexual abuse in a gut-punch ad that made his opponent’s anti-abortion extremism impossible to ignore. Duvall was the second person the governor thanked in his acceptance speech, after his family.

Duvall says that Coleman is “the leader Kentucky needs to protect fundamental freedoms, medical autonomy and support working families.”

“We know affordability is top of mind, but what pundits who question abortion’s salience misunderstand is how closely reproductive freedom is tied to economic security. According to research across 16 battleground states, 82% of voters say it has gotten harder to afford to raise children compared with five or 10 years ago. The freedom to decide when to start a family and the ability to afford that decision are inseparable questions.”

- Mini Timmaraju, president, Reproductive Freedom for All, MS NOW

National Abortion Federation Rejects Viability Restrictions

I couldn’t love this more: in its first policy position since Roe was overturned, the National Abortion Federation (NAF) is affirming abortion access throughout pregnancy and rejecting viability limits. Fantastic.

You all know by now how I feel about ‘viability’ restrictions: not only are they cruel and arbitrary—they’re nonsensical. If the idea is to preempt conservative accusations of supporting abortion “up until birth,” then guess what: they say that shit about us anyway!

We have never been in a better position to fight for the policies we want and demand zero government involvement in pregnancy. Which, coincidentally enough, is what voters want, too.

And it makes sense for NAF—which represents individual abortion providers, clinics, and hospital-based clinicians across the country—to be leading the charge. From NAF president Brittany Fonteno:

“While anti-abortion extremism pushes the boundaries of make-believe in medicine—animating fetuses, embryos, and zygotes—NAF will continue to fight to ensure the laws of our land respect evidence-based care for women and pregnant people. It’s time to be explicit: we must resist the political compromise of viability and arbitrary gestational limits. People deserve abortion access throughout pregnancy, without government interference or fear of punishment.”

On a personal note: I had the chance to speak at NAF’s last annual conference, and I have never left a room feeling as energized and optimistic as I did that day. Having the opportunity to be with those who’ve dedicated their lives—at great personal risk—to providing abortion care was the honor of a lifetime.

Read NAF’s policy position here, and remember that pregnancy is too complicated to legislate at any point.