Abortion news and discussion

[Smoove_B]

They just keep chipping away:

Iowa's Republican-led Legislature passed a bill banning most abortions after roughly six weeks of pregnancy during a marathon special session Tuesday that continued late into the night. Gov. Kim Reynolds immediately said in a statement she would sign the bill on Friday.

The bill passed with exclusively Republican support in a rare, one-day legislative burst lasting more than 14 hours over the vocal – and sometimes tense – objections from Democratic lawmakers and abortion advocates protesting at the Capitol.

Just after 11 p.m., lingering protesters in the gallery booed and yelled "shame" to state senators in the minutes after the bill was approved.

With an inability to pass federal protections for access, we're really heading down a dark path here.

[Smoove_B]

Ok, let's see how for VP Pence feels:

The former vice president, who is seeking the White House in 2024, is the only major candidate who supports a federal ban on abortion at six weeks, before many women know they’re pregnant. He has advocated pulling from the market a widely used abortion pill that has a better safety record than penicillin and Viagra. And he’s implored his Republican rivals to back a 15-week federal ban as a minimum national standard, which several have not done.

In a recent interview, Pence went even further, saying abortion should be banned when a pregnancy isn’t viable. Such a standard would force women to carry pregnancies to term even when doctors have determined there is no chance a baby will survive outside the womb.

Futhermore:

“I want to always err on the side of life,” he said. “I would hold that view in these matters because ... I honestly believe that we got this extraordinary opportunity in the country today to restore the sanctity of life to the center of American law.”

Yes, you were definitely "erring on the side of life" when you refused to do anything about the 2015 HIV outbreak in your home state of Indiana.

[Zarathud]

Fuck Pence. If you’ve ever had to terminate a wanted but non-viable pregnancy, you know it’s an excruciating decision that deserves compassion not judgment. I can’t imagine forcing others to live out your “sanctity of life” personal (and religious) values by putting their life and emotional well-being at risk.

[YellowKing]

Yes fuck him. If he had his way, my wife would be dead right now and I wouldn't have my two kids. Tell me how that's family values. I'd love to ask him that to his face, and ask him what gives him the right to take three lives away from me.

[Zarathud]

My second assistant brought a Trisomy 13 baby to term in her youth, and bore the emotional scars of the horrific experience of having a baby that couldn’t survive more than hours. It broke her and hurt her relationship with her daughter.

When my wife had a similar Trisomy 13 diagnosis in her first pregnancy, her father (a former Catholic priest) tried to come with us to the abortion procedure. Her late uncle was a journalist who wrote about the flaws and history of the Catholic Church on reproductive issues. It wasn’t easy even knowing why Pence is wrong in his biblical values.

Pence has no place substituting his judgment for her family’s strong Catholic faith that recognizes the internal church politics that drove its official anti-abortion stance.

[Isgrimnur]

FDA Approves First Nonprescription Daily Oral Contraceptive

[Smoove_B]

Looking forward to the legal challenges that I presume are imminent.

[Blackhawk]

...combined with the in-the-works challenges to medical birth control as a whole.

[Isgrimnur]

Missouri Supreme Court orders the GOP attorney general to stand down in fight over abortion costs

The Missouri Supreme Court on Thursday ordered the Republican attorney general to stand down and allow an initiative petition to legalize abortion in the state to move forward.

Supreme Court judges unanimously affirmed a lower court’s decision that Attorney General Andrew Bailey must approve the cost estimate provided by the auditor, despite Bailey’s insistence that the cost to taxpayers of restoring abortion rights could be as much as a million times higher than what the auditor found.

Because Bailey refused to approve Republican Auditor Scott Fitzpatrick’s cost estimate, the secretary of state has not been able to give the amendment his stamp of approval that is needed for supporters to begin gathering voter signatures to put it on the ballot in 2024.

In Thursday’s Supreme Court order, judges found that Bailey’s stonewalling meant plaintiff Anna Fitz-James, who was represented by the ACLU of Missouri, lost out on nearly 100 days she could have been collecting signatures.

[stessier]

You left out the fun stuff.

Fitzpatrick’s office in March found that the proposal would have no known impact on state funds and an estimated cost of at least $51,000 annually in reduced local tax revenues, although “opponents estimate a potentially significant loss to state revenue.”

Bailey said that the cost estimate was so low it would bias voters and told Fitzpatrick to change it. He argued the state could lose $12.5 billion in Medicaid funding and $51 billion in annual tax revenue because of fewer births.

Edit: For reference, for FY2021, Missouri had $58.7 billion total tax revenue.

[Smoove_B]

Starting to see consequences. Once again, Texas:

Texas’ abortion restrictions – some of the strictest in the country – may be fueling a sudden spike in infant mortality as women are forced to carry nonviable pregnancies to term.

Some 2,200 infants died in Texas in 2022 – an increase of 227 deaths, or 11.5%, over the previous year, according to preliminary infant mortality data from the Texas Department of State Health Services that CNN obtained through a public records request. Infant deaths caused by severe genetic and birth defects rose by 21.6%. That spike reversed a nearly decade-long decline. Between 2014 and 2021, infant deaths had fallen by nearly 15%.

In 2021, Texas banned abortions beyond six weeks of pregnancy. When the Supreme Court overturned federal abortion rights the following summer, a trigger law in the state banned all abortions other than those intended to protect the life of the mother.

Of note:

The increase in deaths could partly be explained by the fact that more babies are being born in Texas. One recent report found that in the final nine months of 2022, the state saw nearly 10,000 more births than expected prior to its abortion ban – an estimated 3% increase.

But multiple obstetrician-gynecologists who focus on high-risk pregnancies told CNN that Texas’ strict abortion laws likely contributed to the uptick in infant deaths.

[GreenGoo]

It was known this would happen but they are constantly tightening the screws on abortion anyway.

This won't move the needle. At all. Not in Texas anyway.

Where is Robertson to tell us God is killing babies in Texas for being a back-asswards dystopia full of sanctimonious pretend Christians?

[Unagi]

God finally killed him.

Leaving us all to wonder what horrible sins he was hiding from us.

[GreenGoo]

God finally killed him.

Leaving us all to wonder what horrible sins he was hiding from us.

If we donate enough God has promised to raise him from the dead! Call now!

[Smoove_B]

This crosses two topics, but the core issue is about abortion rights in Ohio:

Abortion opponents in Ohio are spending millions on attack ads taking aim at a proposed November ballot measure that would enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution.

But their attacks focus on two other issues: transgender rights and parental rights.

Officials with the group behind the ads, Protect Women Ohio, argue that the proposed amendment is intentionally worded to be interpreted to allow minors to obtain abortion care and undergo gender-affirming surgery without parental consent or notification.

...

The proposed November measure would allow voters to decide whether to insert language in the Ohio Constitution that enshrines the right of every person “to make and carry out one’s own reproductive decisions,” including, “but not limited to,” decisions about contraception, fertility treatment, continuing one’s pregnancy, miscarriage care and abortion. It also specifies that the state shall not “burden, penalize, prohibit, interfere with, or discriminate against” those rights.

They already hijacked the voting protocol (by having a random Ohio State constitutional amendment approval vote in August) and now they're initiating a full-court press on disinformation regarding abortion rights. These fucking people already.

[Zenn7]

God finally killed him.

Leaving us all to wonder what horrible sins he was hiding from us.

If we donate enough God Satan has promised to raise him from the dead! Call now!

FTFY

[Isgrimnur]

A judge has ruled Texas’ abortion ban is too restrictive for women with pregnancy complications

A Texas judge ruled Friday the state’s abortion ban has proven too restrictive for women with serious pregnancy complications and must allow exceptions without doctors fearing the threat of criminal charges.

The ruling was the first to undercut Texas’ law since it took effect in 2022 and delivers a major victory to abortion rights supporters, who see the case as a potential blueprint to weaken restrictions elsewhere that Republican-led states have rushed to implement.

However, the injunction was immediately blocked by an appeal to the Texas Supreme Court, the state attorney general’s office said.

[Kraken]

Could Ohio be feeling a slight blue tinge? Abortion rights are poised for another win there.

Ohio voters on Tuesday rejected a proposal that would have made it considerably harder to amend the state constitution in a major win for reproductive rights and democracy advocates in the state.

The result means that Ohio will keep its current process for amending the state constitution in place. The procedure first requires voters to collect a certain number of signatures from at least 44 of the state’s 88 counties to send an amendment proposal to the ballot and then a simple majority to pass it.

Issue 1, the proposal under consideration, would have made both of those steps harder. It would have required voters to collect signatures in all 88 counties and then required a supermajority of 60% to pass it.

There can now be a reproductive rights amendment on the November ballot.

A single issue like abortion hardly constitutes a turn to the blue, but there's also this:

The rejection also comes as activists are drafting a constitutional amendment that would strip lawmakers of their power to draw district lines and turn it over to a citizen-led commission instead. Last year, Ohio Republicans ignored repeated orders from the supreme court to draw maps that were not severely distorted to their advantage.

If Ohio had fair elections, could the blue people take charge?

[Scraper]

Could Ohio be feeling a slight blue tinge? Abortion rights are poised for another win there.

Ohio voters on Tuesday rejected a proposal that would have made it considerably harder to amend the state constitution in a major win for reproductive rights and democracy advocates in the state.

The result means that Ohio will keep its current process for amending the state constitution in place. The procedure first requires voters to collect a certain number of signatures from at least 44 of the state’s 88 counties to send an amendment proposal to the ballot and then a simple majority to pass it.

Issue 1, the proposal under consideration, would have made both of those steps harder. It would have required voters to collect signatures in all 88 counties and then required a supermajority of 60% to pass it.

There can now be a reproductive rights amendment on the November ballot.

A single issue like abortion hardly constitutes a turn to the blue, but there's also this:

The rejection also comes as activists are drafting a constitutional amendment that would strip lawmakers of their power to draw district lines and turn it over to a citizen-led commission instead. Last year, Ohio Republicans ignored repeated orders from the supreme court to draw maps that were not severely distorted to their advantage.

If Ohio had fair elections, could the blue people take charge?

The Ohio Democrats will be working hard to get an Amendment on the ballot that abolishes the current districting process wherein the Republicans get to decide how to draw district lines and instead puts in place a non-political commission that draws the lines. If this passes it will end the Republican super majority in the state but it will still be a red leaning state with a majority of the state government being Republicans.

[Remus West]

The Ohio Democrats will be working hard to get an Amendment on the ballot that abolishes the current districting process wherein the Republicans get to decide how to draw district lines and instead puts in place a non-political commission that draws the lines. If this passes it will end the Republican super majority in the state but it will still be a red leaning state with a majority of the state government being Republicans.

Thats what folks said regarding Michigan with our militias and rural areas. Then we had our first election with districts drawn by the nonpartisan commission and went fully Blue. I'd say not to underestimate the number of people in "red" areas that do not vote because they don't think it counts due to gerrymandering.

[Blackhawk]

Of whom I know quite a few, and I feel the same sentiment that leads them to not vote. Since I've moved here, I've had my candidate actually win exactly once. I'm well aware that everything possible has been done to make my vote irrelevant.

I still vote, because the alternative is to give up while the fight's still going on.

[Kraken]

At the very least, OH ought to be a purple state.

[Scraper]

At the very least, OH ought to be a purple state.

I agree with this. In fact Ohio has voted for the winning president every single time since Lyndon Johnson. (With the exception of 2020) Which is crazy to think about, the reality is that prior to 2020 if a presidential candidate wins in Ohio then they were highly likely to win the electoral college.

[Unagi]

At the very least, OH ought to be a purple state.

I agree with this. In fact Ohio has voted for the winning president every single time since Lyndon Johnson. (With the exception of 2020) Which is crazy to think about, the reality is that prior to 2020 if a presidential candidate wins in Ohio then they were highly likely to win the electoral college.

So; Trump is the only man in history to win Ohio, but lose the election?

[Scraper]

At the very least, OH ought to be a purple state.

I agree with this. In fact Ohio has voted for the winning president every single time since Lyndon Johnson. (With the exception of 2020) Which is crazy to think about, the reality is that prior to 2020 if a presidential candidate wins in Ohio then they were highly likely to win the electoral college.

So; Trump is the only man in history to win Ohio, but lose the election?

No ohio has gone the wrong way 10 times. So their average for getting it right is stil pretty good and from Johnson to 2020 they were undefeated.

[Unagi]

Okay, yeah - sorry - I meant to include that qualifier in my statement as well.

Still - it's a pretty good 'jab' in Trump's ego, I imagine. (Probably makes him feel even more cheated)

[waitingtoconnect]

I'd say if you are so dedicated to freedom then put abortion on the ballot and let the people decide for your state.

And if you do have abortion rights denied in your state you have to accept women will die, or be forced to carry non-viable foetuses to term because doctors won't want to risk going to jail by treating them even if you put in adequate subparagraphs in your laws saying its ok to do so. As in Italy and Poland, advocates will sue any doctor who tries to help, so doctors won't until it's utterly obvious the woman will die even to a conservative judge and jury.

[Smoove_B]

In case you wondering, yes there is still a war on women:

A federal appeals court on Wednesday said it would restrict access to a widely used abortion medication after finding that the federal government did not follow the proper process when it loosened regulations in 2016 to make the pill more easily available.

A three-judge panel of the conservative U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit said Food and Drug Administration decisions to allow the drug mifepristone to be taken later in pregnancy, be mailed directly to patients and be prescribed by a medical professional other than a doctor were not lawful.

Despite the court’s ruling against the government and the drug manufacturer, mifepristone will remain available for now under existing regulations while the litigation continues, in accordance with a Supreme Court ruling this spring. Wednesday’s decision is likely to be appealed to the Supreme Court.

[Smoove_B]

South Carolina:

South Carolina’s new all-male Supreme Court reversed course on abortion Wednesday, upholding a ban on most such procedures after about six weeks of pregnancy.

The continued erosion of legal abortion access across the U.S. South comes after Republican state lawmakers replaced the lone woman on the court, Justice Kaye Hearn, who reached the state's mandatory retirement age.

The 4-1 ruling departs from the court’s own decision months earlier striking down a similar ban that the Republican-led Legislature passed in 2021. The latest ban takes effect immediately.

Writing for the new majority, Justice John Kittredge acknowledged that the 2023 law also infringes on “a woman’s right of privacy and bodily autonomy,” but said the state Legislature reasonably determined this time around that those interests don’t outweigh “the interest of the unborn child to live.”

Until politicians, judges and other public figures pay a price, these fringe wing nuts are going to continue to push this nonsense.

[Smoove_B]

West Virginia:

West Virginia can restrict the sale of the abortion pill, despite federal regulators' approval of it as a safe and effective medication, a federal judge has ruled.

U.S. District Court Judge Robert C. Chambers determined Thursday that the near-total abortion ban signed by Republican Gov. Jim Justice in September 2022 takes precedence over approvals from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

“The Supreme Court has made it clear that regulating abortion is a matter of health and safety upon which States may appropriately exercise their police power,” Chambers wrote in a decision dismissing most challenges brought against the state by abortion pill manufacturer GenBioPro, Inc. in a January lawsuit filed in the state southern district’s Huntington division.

[gilraen]

One of the rare occasions when you are cheering on Big Pharma and hope they got really good lawyers.

[Smoove_B]

Once again, OHIO:

The Ohio Ballot Board approved language Thursday for a fall measure seeking to establish abortion access as a fundamental right, but one Democratic member blasted it as “rife with misleading and defective language.”

Key among opponents’ objections were several aspects of language developed by Republican Secretary of State Frank LaRose, an abortion opponent, which they warned could prompt a legal challenge.

Among the revisions, the word “fetus” in the amendment was changed to “unborn child” in the ballot description.

The original language seeks to assure access to abortion through what is called viability, when the fetus is able to survive outside the womb. It states, “abortion may be prohibited after fetal viability,” but not in cases where a treating physician deems the procedure necessary to protect the life or health of the pregnant person.

LaRose’s summary turned that section on its head. It now says the amendment would “always allow an unborn child to be aborted at any stage of pregnancy, regardless of viability if, in the treating physician’s determination” the life and health exception applies.

“The entire summary is propaganda,” said Lauren Blauvelt, co-chair of Ohioans United for Reproductive Rights, the statewide coalition of organizations supporting abortion rights and related causes that has proposed the amendment.

[waitingtoconnect]

Looking forward to the legal challenges that I presume are imminent.

Over 19 million women lack adequate birth control access, rights campaigners say, as anti-abortion groups target contraceptives

https://www.context.news/socioeconomic- ... ions-mount

It’s getting worse…

[stessier]

https://www.cnn.com/2023/08/31/politics ... index.html

Really Alabama?

Alabama’s Republican attorney general said in a court filing that he has the right to prosecute people who make travel arrangements for pregnant women to have out-of-state abortions.

In a court filing Monday, attorneys for Attorney General Steve Marshall wrote that providing transportation for women in Alabama to leave the state to get an abortion could amount to a “criminal conspiracy.”

[Smoove_B]

Is there a link where I can donate money to help women travel out of Alabama? I'd love for the Alabama AG to come after me.

[GreenGoo]

Forcing women to reproduce against their will feels like one of the most heinous violations western culture is capable of. The idea that ANYTHING inside their body takes precedence over their own rights is beyond horrifying to me.

Dystopian nightmare.

[TheMix]

I assume next is laws preventing any travel, or moving, without a pregnancy test. And if you are postive... denied.

Get a new job in another state? Well, too bad. One of your parents passed away, and you want to go to the funeral? Sorry, not gonna happen.

It's monstrous.

[Unagi]

Just want to move to another state? Sorry. Gonna have to wait here…

[YellowKing]

We're living in the Gilead Alpha Test.

Blessed be the .....food. Fork? We're still working on it but we'll be coming up with a slogan soon!

[Defiant]

Who could have possibly forseen this?

States geographically near ones that banned abortion after Roe v. Wade was overturned saw sharp increases in the number of procedures performed, likely due to an influx of border-hopping patients, according to a new analysis from the Guttmacher Institute.

https://www.axios.com/2023/09/07/aborti ... state-bans