Texas GOP Proudly Partners With 'Abolitionists' Who Want Women Executed
6.2.26
Click to skip ahead: South Dakota Sued Over Abortion Advertising Ban; Keep An Eye On: ‘Abortion Trafficking’; Tennessee Gubernatorial Candidate Would Criminalize Miscarriage; Texas Republican Party Openly Supports Abortion ‘Abolitionists’; Illinois Passes Abortion Record Protections, Contraception for Teens; In the States: Ohio, Maryland, Texas & More; CPS Took Her Daughter Away to Stop Her From Getting an Abortion
South Dakota Sued Over Abortion Advertising Ban
Love this: Mayday Health is suing South Dakota over a new law that bans advertising abortion pills—arguing that it criminalizes lawful speech.
A refresher for those who need it: South Dakota lawmakers passed HB 1274 back in March. The legislation makes advertising abortion medication a felony, with language so broad it could criminalize even providing information about abortion pills. Which, of course, is the point.
The law was sparked in part by a legal fight between South Dakota Attorney General Marty Jackley and Mayday Health: the Republican AG threatened Mayday with prosecution over a gas station ad campaign that directed women to the group’s website. But as Mayday points out in their suit, the organization doesn’t “sell, handle, provide, offer for sale, or distribute any medications.” They only provide information.
Former state senator Nancy Turbak Berry joined Mayday in the legal challenge, arguing that her free speech is also being quashed by the law:
“Apparently, our state government isn’t satisfied with controlling women’s reproductive organs—they even want to control our eyes and ears. They even want control over what women in South Dakota can see and hear. It’s outrageous.”
South Dakota Gov. Larry Rhoden, who is named in the suit along with Jackley, posted on Twitter, “If Mayday Health and the abortion lobby want to sue us for defending unborn life, bring it on.”
I’ll keep you updated as the suit moves forward, but please remember that what’s happening in South Dakota is just the latest in a long line of attacks on abortion-related speech: social media giants are censoring content about abortion medication, conservative campuses are refusing to host events about abortion, and Republican legislators want to shut down pro-choice websites.
This fight is happening whether we like it or not; I’m glad Mayday is taking it head-on.
Keep An Eye On: ‘Abortion Trafficking’
While we’re talking about attacks on free speech, let’s catch up on “abortion trafficking” in Tennessee.
In 2024, legislators passed a law that criminalizes anyone who “recruits, harbors, or transports” a minor with the purpose of getting an abortion. Republicans claimed the law would only target those who took teens out-of-state for abortions without parental consent. But last summer, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals blocked the “recruitment” piece of the law, pointing out that the broad language could criminalize someone who so much as texts a teen a link to an abortion clinic.
“Tennessee cannot criminalize ‘disseminating information about an activity that is legal in another state,’” Senior Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Julia Gibbons wrote at the time.
Now, Tennessee is back at the Sixth Circuit, arguing that their law doesn’t violate the First Amendment at all. There’s a lot to dig into with this one, so I’ll write more about the case later this week—but consider this a reminder that Republicans are hitting abortion-related speech on all fronts.
Tennessee Gubernatorial Candidate Would Criminalize Miscarriage
Tennessee Rep. Monty Fritts has never really bothered hiding that he’s an anti-abortion extremist. Last year, for example, the Republican gubernatorial candidate said, “If you kill a baby from embryo on up with a pill or a scalpel, we oughta execute you.”
When asked to clarify his comments, the Republican legislator doubled down—making clear he wasn’t just talking about executing abortion providers, but patients: “Murder is murder. I know that’s hard for people to hear,” he said.
Fritts was back on his bullshit this week in an appearance on News Channel 5 Nashville. In a wide-ranging interview with reporter Phil Williams, Fritts said he believed abortion patients should face murder charges, that birth control can “become abortive,” and that rape victims should be denied emergency contraception.
Another interesting moment? When Williams asked Fritts if his desire to punish women would also extend to miscarriage patients who need abortions to save their lives, the Republican representative gave a telling answer:
“If you have a molar pregnancy or an ectopic pregnancy, that’s excluded. The bill from this last year that I signed on to still honored those two conditions.”
In other words: no, Fritts doesn’t think miscarrying women should be allowed abortions—and no, he wouldn’t spare them from his bananas belief that women who end their pregnancies should be jailed for life or executed.
Don’t worry though, ladies. Fritts says if you’ve already had an abortion, he won’t have police knock down your door. “We don't do anything retroactive in Tennessee law,” he said.
KEEP AN EYE ON YOUR INBOX: Abortion, Every Day is naming names—publishing a complete guide to the abortion ‘abolitionists’ running for office. (It’s a longer list than you’d think.) Tracking them all takes serious time and digging, so please subscribe to help power our reporting.
Texas Republican Party Openly Supports Abortion ‘Abolitionists’
We’re not done talking about ‘abolitionists’ yet—and you shouldn’t miss this one.
The Texas Republican Party is now proudly and publicly aligning itself with an organization that calls for abortion patients to be executed. A little over a week ago, the Texas GOP wrote on Facebook and Instagram that it was “proud” to have Abolish Abortion Texas as a sponsor for its 2026 state convention. The post lauded the extremists for “mobilizing Christians to influence civil government,” and thanked the group for “its investment in the grassroots delegates who help shape the future of our state.”
They’re not even hiding it anymore. The ruling party of the second-largest state in the country is openly backing extremists who want to kill a quarter of American women. (That’s not hyperbole.)
This partnership with ‘abolitionists’ isn’t a total shock, of course: almost exactly two years ago, I broke the news that the Texas Republican Party platform included an “equal protection” plank—a call for abortion patients to be punished with homicide charges, which in Texas can mean the death penalty. The language was adopted after a long-running lobbying effort by none other than…Abolish Abortion Texas:
It’s tempting to shrug news like this off, dismissing it as just Texas being Texas. But this is a big deal! Republicans want us to treat this story like it’s business as usual: it’s not.
Illinois Passes Abortion Record Protections, Contraception for Teens
This is terrific news: Illinois lawmakers passed a bill this weekend that establishes special protections for the medical records of abortion patients. The Reproductive Health Records Privacy Act will allow information related to abortion care to be separated out from other medical records, and would restrict out-of-state entities trying to access that data.
From Gov. JB Pritzker:
“I look forward to signing this bill into law to fortify the protections around choice and consent, and that anyone receiving safe, legal abortion care here will not be criminalized.”
Bills like this are more important than ever, especially as calls for abortion patients to be punished become increasingly normalized.
Interestingly, it’s another piece of Illinois legislation that has conservatives spitting mad: lawmakers just passed a bill that ensures teenagers can obtain birth control without forced parental involvement. Under current law, young people can only get contraception without their parents’ consent under narrow circumstances—like if they’re married or already have children.
Rep. Dagmara Avelar says, “We’re trying to modernize antiquated Illinois statute and make it clear that minors may consent to these services.” But Republicans and right-wing media outlets are losing their collective shit over the legislation, claiming that allowing teens to obtain birth control is a violation of “parental rights.”
If you’d like to learn more, Capitol News Illinois has an in-depth piece on both new protections that’s well worth the read.
“Leading anti-abortion groups still speak out against abolitionists, but their strategy is clear: normalizing the idea of punishing women. The more extreme proposals conservatives advance, the more previously unthinkable ideas become politically realistic.” - Law professor Mary Ziegler, Slate
In the States: Ohio, Maryland, Texas & More
Ohio conservatives are back at it—this time with a ballot measure to repeal the abortion protections voters overwhelmingly passed in 2023. As regular AED readers know, Ohioans codified abortion rights in the state constitution after Roe fell, and Republican lawmakers and anti-abortion groups have been trying to reverse or defang them ever since.
Their latest attempt is a proposed amendment with a deceptively benign name—“Reproductive Healthcare and Legislative Authority Over Abortion”—that would strip abortion out of the constitution entirely. In its place, voters would get protections for “contraception, miscarriage treatment, and fertility care”—while the regulation of abortion would become “the exclusive authority of the Ohio General Assembly.”
In other words: hand abortion back to the same Republican legislators voters just overruled.
Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost rejected the measure’s summary language this week—but don’t get too excited. As The Plain Dealer notes, Yost “rejects petitions on technical grounds on a fairly regular basis the first or second time they’re submitted.” (That, and we know he’s a total anti-abortion freak.)
In better news: I told you last week that Maryland Gov. Wes Moore signed legislation requiring hospitals to provide emergency abortions. SB 169—essentially a state-level EMTALA—makes Maryland one of the few states to codify protections for emergency abortion care.
As WYPR reports, Maryland has “some of the most robust abortion protections in the nation.” But here’s the hard truth we’ve seen in story after story: living in a pro-choice state doesn’t always protect you. Just yesterday, AED wrote about a young woman left with no fallopian tubes after being denied care for her ectopic pregnancy—in Illinois, one of the most pro-choice states in the country.
That’s exactly why laws like Maryland’s matter. As Lynn McCann-Yeh of the Abortion Fund of Maryland puts it: “While people may have individual religious beliefs, those shouldn’t be imposed on pregnant people who are coming to the hospital.”
Finally, The Guardian reports that U.S. Rep. Maxine Dexter is demanding answers about how pregnant minors are being treated in Texas ICE detention centers. After she was blocked from speaking to young people held at a San Benito facility, Dexter wrote to the Department of Health and Human Services and the Office of Refugee Resettlement, asking about the “rights, due process, health, and well-being of pregnant and parenting unaccompanied minors and their infants.”
The concern is well-founded: earlier this year, Houston Public Media reported that the Trump administration was funneling all pregnant teens to a single shelter in South Texas—seemingly to ensure they gave birth. A former health official from Trump’s first administration put it bluntly: “This is 100% and exclusively about abortion.”
Dexter didn’t mince words either:
“What I saw in Texas was an immigration system that treats children, pregnant girls, and families as problems to manage instead of human beings deserving of dignity and care. Children should not be imprisoned. Pregnant minors should not be navigating medical crises in detention. And families should not be denied healthcare, justice, or basic human dignity while in government custody.”
To learn more about the treatment of women and girls at ICE detention centers, read Kylie’s January column here.
Quick hits:
Rewire digs into the revived legal challenge against Arkansas’ abortion ban;
Axios Boulder has more on the new Colorado law requiring college campuses to make abortion pills available to students;
Planned Parenthood of Michigan is looking for some bridge funding;
And we’re sorry to report that a Planned Parenthood clinic in Gainesville, Florida will be shuttering.
CPS Took Her Daughter Away to Stop Her From Getting an Abortion
Last month, Abortion, Every Day told you the horrifying story of a mother in an anti-abortion state who had her daughter taken by Child Protective Services after they learned she planned to bring the teen out of state for an abortion. This weekend, Ali Velshi brought that story to his MS NOW audience:
I’m super grateful to Ali for sharing our reporting—and for continually keeping abortion rights in the spotlight on his show.
FUCK! WAR ON WOMEN IS REAL.
Thank you for this essential report.