The UK is Decriminalizing Abortion. Why Can't We?

6.18.25

Click to skip ahead: Rest in Peace, Adriana reports that Adriana Smith’s body has been taken off life support in Georgia. In SCOTUS’ Trans Attack, what today’s ruling really means. In the States, news from Idaho, South Carolina, and Ohio. Anti-Abortion Violence has the latest on the Minnesota shooter, and what it was like for providers trying to figure out if they were on his hit-list. Policing Pregnancy asks what we can learn from the UK’s move to decriminalize abortion. Stats & Studies reports on a new study linking domestic violence to abortion bans. You Love to See It highlights a group founded by a college student that sends supportive letters to abortion providers. And in Coming Soon, what to expect in tomorrow’s newsletter.

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Rest in Peace, Adriana

The truth is that Adriana Smith died months ago. In February, to be exact, when doctors declared her brain dead. But because Adriana was 9-weeks pregnant at the time, Emory Hospital told her family that Georgia’s abortion ban meant they couldn’t take her off life support.

Adriana’s family didn’t get a choice. For months, they’ve had to watch her body forcibly kept alive—used as an incubator for a gravely ill fetus. And they’ve had to shoulder all the medical bills along the way.

Yesterday, doctors performed a c-section on Adriana’s body to extract her fetus. I’m not going to say “delivered,” because that’s not what happened. Adriana didn’t ‘give birth’, and she didn’t ‘deliver’ a baby. She couldn’t have—because she died in February.

The newborn, named Chance, weighs just 1 pound, 13 ounces. We haven’t heard anything about his prognosis, but as the mother of a once-2-pound baby, I can tell you this: the family has a long and uncertain road ahead. I’m hoping for the best—whatever that means to them.

I also hope they find a bit of peace: Adriana’s body was scheduled to be removed from life support yesterday.

In her honor, Rep. Nikema Williams and two other House Democrats have introduced a resolution calling for an end to anti-abortion and fetal personhood laws. Citing the Black maternal health crisis specifically, the resolution asks lawmakers to “reaffirm and guarantee autonomy and dignity to pregnant people over their life, well-being, and medical needs.”

SCOTUS’ Trans Attack

This wasn’t unexpected—but that doesn’t make it any less wrenching: The Supreme Court has ruled in favor of Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care for minors, claiming the law doesn’t amount to sex discrimination.

The decision in United States v. Skrmetti will have a devastating impact on trans kids and teens: Roughly half the states in the country have restrictions like Tennessee’s, and around 40% of trans youth live in those states. In her scathing dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor warned that the Court’s ruling “authorizes, without second thought, untold harm to transgender children and the parents and families who love them.”

This ruling comes at a time of escalating attacks on trans people—attacks that we know are deadly. One study from the Trevor Project found that bans on gender-affirming care are tied to a 72% increase in suicide attempts among trans and nonbinary youth.

And as Carter Sherman at The Guardian writes, today’s decision will impact any case involving sex discrimination—from abortion rights to pregnancy discrimination. Johns Hopkins University professor Jules Gill-Peterson told Sherman, “By the court declaring that Tennessee’s law has nothing to do with sex discrimination—it has nothing to do with sex at all, somehow—basically they’re weakening the standard in what kinds of laws sex-based scrutiny is triggered.”

In other words: you can’t separate what’s happening to trans people from what’s happening to abortion rights. As National Abortion Federation CEO Brittany Fonteno points out, the same clinics that provide abortion care often provide gender-affirming care as well. “Just like abortion bans,” she says, “these politically-driven bans on essential health care are a threat to people’s well-being and are not informed by medical expertise.”

If you want to dig deeper into what this means for sex discrimination and abortion cases, read Vanity Fair’s coverage and revisit Mary Ziegler’s 2023 piece in Slate. (Ziegler will be joining me for a livestream tomorrow to talk about her book—but I’m sure we’ll discuss today’s ruling, as well.) And if you need a primer or a refresher on the case, Vox has an explainer you might find useful.

“I got to grow up in an era where I wasn't afraid of my body's capability for reproduction. But my daughter now is in an era where she has to be afraid of getting pregnant.”

- Texas Sen. Sarah Eckhardt, marking three years since the end of Roe

In the States

Idaho’s Supreme Court ruled this week that Republican officials have to revise the title and financial impact statement for a pro-choice ballot measure.

Quick refresher: Idaho doesn’t allow citizen-led constitutional amendments, but voters can pass legislation. So last year, a group called Idahoans United for Women and Families proposed the Reproductive Freedom and Privacy Act—a law that would repeal Idaho’s ban and legalize abortion until ‘viability’.

Before a measure like this goes to voters, it gets reviewed by the Secretary of State’s office. The Attorney General’s office also writes a short and long title, and another agency drafts a financial impact statement—basically a note explaining how the law could affect the state budget.

Idahoans United sued, arguing that the titles and statement for their measure were “misleading, inaccurate and prejudicial.” (Sound familiar? That’s because Republicans have pulled similar fuckery in nearly every state where abortion has been on the ballot—most notably in Ohio and Missouri.)

This week, the Idaho Supreme Court agreed partially with Idahoans United, ordering officials to revise the financial impact statement and the measure’s short title.

I have to pause here and acknowledge that yes, this is boring—and that is very much the point. One of Republicans’ favorite ways of quashing democracy is via excruciating bureaucratic shit that no one wants to hear about. They’re counting on voters being too disinterested to care. That’s why it’s so vital that we try to translate these tactics into plain, accessible language!

Speaking of real-world impact: South Carolina’s abortion ban is driving doctors out of the state. Amalia Luxardo, CEO of the Women’s Rights and Empowerment Network (WREN), writes in the South Carolina Daily Gazette that senior OBGYN residency applications are down nearly 6%, and overall senior residency applications have dropped by almost 7%.

“This ‘brain drain’ is happening in real time. And in a state already struggling with provider shortages, the long-term consequences for maternal and reproductive health care are alarming.”

Luxardo also points out that three years after the fall of Roe, and 13% of counties in the state are classified as maternity care deserts—and that 15 counties have zero OBGYNs per 10,000 women.

Meanwhile, Ohio just became the 13th state to introduce legislation that would punish abortion patients as murderers. (As expected!) The Ohio Prenatal Equal Protection Act is another copy-paste bill from the abortion ‘abolition’ movement: If passed, getting an abortion would be considered homicide.

Introduced by Reps. Levi Dean and Jonathan Newman, the bill was drafted by End Abortion Ohio, one of the many so-called ‘abolition’ groups popping up across the country. They don’t much care that voters just passed protections for abortion rights in November—they just want to see women in jail.

Don’t worry, though: They oh-so-generously make exceptions for miscarriages. Assuming you can prove it was really a miscarriage, of course.

As I’ve said a million times before: We would do well stop treating these bills like radical outliers, and start seeing them as warning signs. And not just legislative ones. As Kellie Copeland, executive director of Abortion Forward, told ABC News:

“When people equate reproductive health care with murder, that kind of rhetoric invites violence. It invites violence that we have seen at abortion clinics, that we have seen perpetrated against abortion providers.”

I mean, really! You can’t say abortion patients and providers are killers who murder babies and then be surprised when people want to hurt or kill them. It’s like Ed Kilgore wrote at New York Magazine this week about the shooting in Minnesota:

“[I]t’s not a big reach for some to deploy the language and logic of self-justified violence on behalf of innocent life, much like a soldier defending the victims of military aggression.”

Anti-Abortion Violence

Sticking with Minnesota for a moment: I know we’ve all been ill over this weekend’s deadly shooting that killed two people, including state Rep. Melissa Hortman. In the days since, we’ve learned more about shooter Vance Boelter, and what happened in those chaotic hours after Hortman’s assassination.

We found out quickly that Boetler was anti-abortion, and that he had a list of over 70 potential targets—including abortion providers, advocates, and pro-choice politicians. Today, HuffPost and The 19th report that while Boetler was on the loose, abortion providers in the area were scrambling to find out if their names—or their clinics—were on that list.

Amy Hagstrom Miller, president of Whole Woman’s Health, said she “immediately freaked out,” because one of the organization’s clinics in Bloomington, Minnesota—just 30 minutes from where Boelter had last been seen—was open and seeing patients.

“It’s pretty sobering that something like this happened with an anti-abortion activist in Minnesota, in a place where abortion is protected and where the vast majority of people believe people should have access to safe abortion in their community.”

And Ruth Richardson, CEO of Planned Parenthood North Central States, found out that she was on the list. “This is not the first time that Planned Parenthood has been targeted; it’s not the first time that I’ve been targeted,” she said.

Providers and clinics have always been on the receiving end of harassment, threats, and violence. But we know why it’s getting worse: since Trump took office, his administration has been giving violent anti-abortion activists a wink-wink-nudge-nudge okay to attack clinics at will.

Richardson, who was friends with Hortman and her husband, Mark, said it best:

“Running for office shouldn’t be a death sentence. Having a different political viewpoint shouldn’t be a death sentence, and attempting to access care or provide care or advocate for reproductive freedom shouldn’t be a death sentence.”

The latest on Boelter? Wired reports that he may have ties to Christian Nationalism and “Charismatic” Christianity, a fringe movement that believes in supernatural spiritual warfare and literal battles against demons. These are the people that the Trump administration is emboldening.

Policing Pregnancy

Since we could all use a palate cleanser, let me share some good news from across the pond: U.K. lawmakers have overwhelmingly voted to decriminalize abortion, approving an amendment that would prohibit women from being criminally punished for ending a pregnancy.

Abortion is legal there until 24 weeks, and later only if a woman’s life is at risk. But in recent years, the country has seen a disturbing uptick in women being investigated and arrested for their pregnancy outcomes—including abortion, miscarriage, and stillbirth. (Sound familiar?)

But now, in what NPR calls “the biggest reform to British abortion laws in nearly 60 years,” lawmakers have voted to put an end to those investigations. The law, which only covers England and Wales, is part of a broader crime bill. It still needs approval in the upper house of Parliament, but is expected to pass.

MP Tonia Antoniazzi, author of the decriminalization amendment, says the law is about “recognizing that these women need care and support, and not criminalization.”

So where is our version? It blows my mind that Democrats haven’t made a real push to protect Americans from pregnancy criminalization. Perhaps it’s because too many lawmakers buy Republicans’ bullshit about not targeting abortion patients. But I don’t see how that’s possible given women are being arrested for not miscarrying properly.

Here’s the thing: National and state lawmakers have an opportunity to do something proactive! They could introduce legislation to explicitly decriminalize abortion and protect all pregnancy outcomes from investigation and prosecution. Seems like a win-win to me—because even if you can’t pass the bill, you get Republicans on the record admitting that they want the option of arresting women for miscarriages and stillbirths.

There’s never been a more important time for it. As I wrote last week, we’re on the verge of a major criminalization push against patients:

Three Years After Dobbs, They’re Coming for Patients

Stats & Studies

A new study from the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) reports that domestic violence is on the rise in states with abortion bans. Which, unfortunately, tracks.

Researchers found that intimate partner violence (IPV) increased by 7-10% in counties where people had to travel farther for abortion care in 2023 than they did in 2017. That adds up to around 9,000 additional incidents of violence against women—violence that came with an estimated $1.24 billion in social costs.

Why the connection? Well, we already know from massive projects like the Turnaway Study that women who are denied abortions are more likely to stay with violent partners. And NBER researchers posit that being unable to access care could exacerbate stress and financial strain.

This isn’t the first (or second, or third) study showing a link between IPV and abortion bans. A study published just last year found that pregnant women living in anti-choice states faced a 75% higher risk of peripartum homicide. Seventy-five percent.

Let’s be real, pregnancy is already one of the most dangerous times in a woman’s life. In the U.S., murder by a current or former partner is a leading cause of death during pregnancy. Of course abortion bans—and the misogyny that fuels them—make it worse.

For more on the link between abortion bans and domestic violence, read this 2024 Jezebel piece from incoming Abortion, Every Day reporter Kylie Cheung.

You Love to See It

I needed this: Ms. magazine has a piece today about Write and Rights, a group that hosts letter-writing campaigns on college campuses to boost the spirits of abortion providers and patients. The organization—which was started by a college student!—has sent more than 1,000 anonymous letters from students at 30 colleges to providers and patients at over 20 clinics across the U.S.

Founder Iha Rastogi, a sophomore at the University of California, Davis, says they’re using the letters “to combat harassment and foster solidarity.”

“I feel like there’s a power in the youth voice that doesn’t always get acknowledged. And I really want to foster Gen Z being able to own their voice, especially because we’re the ones that are also the most impacted because we’re the ones who are growing up in this post Roe v. Wade era.”

Ms. published a few of the letters, and I snagged one below. This is why I love young activists!

Coming Soon

• The latest news on Republicans’ attempts to ‘defund’ Planned Parenthood and how the organization is responding

• Conservative lawmakers in Wisconsin are trying to shore up co-sponsors for a radical anti-abortion bill

• A report on the consequences of Meta’s new content moderation policies

• And how TikTok is pushing out anti-abortion propaganda