Click to skip ahead: In the States, news from Indiana, Missouri, Oklahoma, Massachusetts, and Illinois. In Legislation Watch, setting the record straight on HR 7. Anti-Abortion Strategy looks at local anti-abortion ordinances. And In the Nation, anti-abortion activists say they have a free speech right to harass abortion patients.

In the States

An Indiana Republican has proposed legislation that would ban abortion medication entirely in the state, and require rape victims to sign an affidavit under penalty of perjury before being allowed care. What’s more, SB 171 would criminalize abortion funds in the state, making it illegal for nonprofits to help with the cost of an “abortion-inducing drug.” (More on this phrase later in the newsletter.)

Remember, Indiana already has a near-total abortion ban, with exceptions for lethal fetal abnormalities and sexual violence victims who are early in their pregnancies. So this bill would mean that the few people who can obtain abortions in those very limited circumstances would have to get a procedural abortion.

Introduced by Sen. Mike Young, who resembles Nosferatu on a good day, the legislation would make it a crime to possess abortion medication, and would allow the state’s Attorney General to bring a case against someone even if a local prosecutor declined to. (When you remember who the Indiana AG is, it makes that mandate even worse.)

As is so often the case with Republican abortion bills, this one is very much about punishment and shame. Consider the additional requirement for rape victims: Mandating that a victim sign an affidavit is bad enough, but threatening her with perjury—which is punishable by up to two and a half years of prison—is beyond disgusting. Not to mention, who will determine whether a woman is ‘lying’ about being raped? Sen. Nosferatu?

Naturally, Young claims that his legislation is simply protecting women from abortion medication. In keeping with conservatives’ messaging about ‘coerced’ abortion, the lawmaker cited incidents where abusers have slipped the pills into women’s drinks.

We know, of course, that these men don’t give two shits about women. As OBGYN Dr. Caitlin Bernard told the Indiana Capital Chronicle, “This is a government intrusion into medicine and health care with no other purpose but to put extreme ideology into law and take medical options away from patients.”

The good-ish news is that apparently Young has battled it out with fellow Republicans over abortion before—specifically around abortion for rape victims. So I’m curious to see what kind of pushback his bill might get from his colleagues.

Meanwhile, we’re still waiting to hear whether a judge will lift onerous licensing requirements on abortion clinics in Missouri—mandates that have thus far made it impossible for Planned Parenthood to resume abortions in the state. Remember, Judge Jerri Zhang temporarily lifted Missouri’s abortion ban because of Amendment 3’s win. But she kept some TRAP laws in place, including a law that puts the power of licensing clinics with the state health department.

While we wait on that decision, Missouri Republicans are trying to think of ways to limit abortion access in spite of Amendment 3—and they’re honing in on the amendment’s language around viability to help them do it. St. Louis Public Radio reports that Republican Jon Patterson, expected to be House speaker, said, “The amendment says that it should be regulated after fetal viability; I think one of the things we could do is define what that is.”

In other words, the GOP thinks that if they can define ‘viability’ as broadly as possible, they might be able to implement restrictions in spite of voters’ wishes. What makes this worrisome is that fetal ‘viability’ isn’t a real medical standard; that’s one of the reasons some abortion rights activists were so opposed to including a ‘viability’ restriction in the ballot measure. Not only does it exclude later abortion patients, but it also leaves room for Republicans to define the term to suit their agenda. I’ll keep you updated as I find out more.

Support Abortion, Every Day

Sometimes I hate to be right. It was just a few days ago that I warned we’d be seeing more Republican lawmakers coming forward to support abortion ‘abolition’—the idea that abortion patients should be punished as murderers. (You can read more about this movement here and here.)

Enter Oklahoma Republicans. This week, extremist lawmakers turned a dispute over the number of abortions in the state into a call for the “equal protection” of fetuses—a phrase that’s code for ‘charge abortion patients with homicide.’

Here’s how it went down: Oklahoma’s House Speaker Kyle Hilbert gave a quote saying that there had been “zero” abortions in the state. In response, Oklahoma Sens. Dusty Deevers and Warren Hamilton put out a press release pointing to self-managed abortions in the state, which they estimated at more than 3,000 annually.

“As I desperately wish there were zero abortions in Oklahoma, zero ‘reported’ abortions is not the same thing as zero abortions,” Deevers said. The Oklahoma Republican then called on the legislature to “do our part by passing a clear law providing preborn children equal protection.”

Now, if you have any doubts that Deevers is referring to charging women who have abortions with murder, please know that this is a man who identifies as an abortion ‘abolitionist.’ That’s quite literally what he’s there to do.

Deevers also took aim at abortion funds and telehealth providers that advertise in Oklahoma on billboards or online, reminding us that Republicans’ goal isn’t just punishment—but suppressing free speech.

In better news, a new law just went into effect in Illinois that prohibits discrimination based on reproductive healthcare decisions, including abortion. The law applies to discrimination around things like housing and employment, which pisses anti-abortion activists off to no end. Specifically, Illinois anti-abortion groups say that the law is discriminatory against them because it stops them from refusing to hire someone who has had an abortion. Cue the world’s tiniest violin.

Anti-abortion groups have managed to challenge similar laws in other states with some success. For example, a crisis pregnancy center in New York sued over a law that prohibits retaliation against employees who have had abortions. While the case was initially dismissed by a judge, a U.S. appeals court ruled just a week ago that the dismissal should be reconsidered, potentially giving anti-abortion activists another opportunity to undermine the state protection.

You will not be surprised to find out that the case was brought by conservative legal powerhouse Alliance Defending Freedom. ADF has been bringing obsessively filing lawsuits on abortion, speech and religious rights.

Finally, Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey’s administration has announced emergency measures to bolster abortion rights ahead of Trump’s inauguration. Specifically, they made moves to protect nurses who provide or help provide abortions. The state Department of Public Health’s Board of Registration in Nursing voted to adopt the state’s Shield Law into state regulations, language that protects nurses “from disqualification from licensure and from board discipline for providing, or assisting in providing, reproductive health care services in Massachusetts.”

In a statement, Healey said, “In Massachusetts, we’re always going to protect people’s rights and freedoms, and we’re going to make sure that everyone can access the high-quality health care they need.” The move comes as pro-choice governors across the country are working to shore up reproductive rights access.

Quick hits:

• “Four More Years” from Illinois Public Media explores what a Trump administration means for abortion rights in Illinois and beyond;

• Jezebel on why Idaho’s new birth control win doesn’t fix the broader repro rights and health problem in the state;

• And Prism looks at how Texas is expanding their ‘bounty hunter’ laws.

Legislation Watch

I’ve gotten quite a few messages from folks asking me to write about HR 7, a Republican bill proposed last week that claims to “recognize the importance of access to comprehensive, high-quality, lifeaffirming medical care for women of all ages.”

Sponsored by Reps. Andy Biggs (AZ) and Clay Higgins (LA), the legislation is an affirmation of support for an anti-abortion consortium called “Pro Women’s Healthcare Centers.” The bill calls the group “an example of the high-quality, comprehensive, life-affirming care that women deserve,” and recognizes it as “standards worth implementing nationwide.”

The part of the bill that’s received viral attention over the last few days, however, is a line declaring that “health care for women should also address the needs of men, families, and communities as they relate to women’s health care.”

Given the ongoing attacks on women’s bodies, folks are understandably wary of language claiming that women’s health care should address “the needs of men.” I’ve also seen some widely-watched videos and tweets calling the legislation the launch of Project 2025’s attacks on women.

There’s good news and bad news about the legislation. The good news is that this isn’t some new Project 2025-type tactic; Rep. Biggs has been reintroducing this bill over and over again for the last seven years. The first time he introduced it was in 2018, the same year that Pro Women’s Healthcare Centers was founded, and the language has remained identical since.

Rather than an attack on women’s health coinciding with Trump’s return to the White House, my guess is that Biggs’ office simply introduced HR 7 because that’s what they’ve been doing for the past seven years.

Now, onto the bad news: This legislation is a perfect example of how lawmakers are trying to trick Americans into believing that their attacks on abortion rights are actually ‘pro-women.” Not to mention, the group they’re calling a model for national standards is scary extreme.

Pro Women’s Healthcare Centers (PWHC) was launched by some of the most radical anti-abortion activists in the country, including Dr. John Bruchalski—an OBGYN who argues that women shouldn’t be able to get life-saving abortions. It was just in November that Bruchalski said, “There are no advantages for a mother to end her pregnancy by an elective abortion, even in the most life-threatening circumstances.”

Bruchalski has also argued that providing abortions for women with doomed pregnancies is “robbing our patients of an opportunity for courage, or underestimating their capacity to face suffering.” So yeah, real charmer. PWHC is also supported by the Charlotte Lozier Institute and the American Association of Pro-Life OBGYNs (AAPLOG)—groups that say abortion is never necessary and that women with life-threatening pregnancies should be given c-sections, even if the fetus won’t survive.

The idea around PWHC was to create a list of standards that crisis pregnancy centers would have to adhere to in order to be ‘accredited’ by the group. One anti-abortion activist called it like “a Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval for the pro-life medical community.” For example, centers that are certified by PWHC must offer STI testing and treatment and be able to refer women to mental health counseling. The goal is to provide anti-abortion crisis pregnancy centers some kind of medical credibility—even as they mislead women and jeopardize their health.

Now, PWHC’s website is down, and I think there’s a good chance the group has been disbanded. But the people behind the group are constantly launching and relaunching organizations—Bruchalski, for example, was recently behind a new org dedicated to pressuring women into keeping doomed pregnancies. And we know that crisis pregnancy centers are a centerpiece for Republicans’ plan to attack abortion rights while pretending that they’re supporting women’s healthcare.

And that’s what’s most important about HR 7. Rather than seeing it as something to be urgently worried about, it’s legislation we should see as a map or key of sorts—something that paints a clear picture of what Republicans are up to.

Anti-Abortion Strategy

Despite the battle over Amendment 3 and restoring abortion rights, we did have some good-ish news out of Missouri this week. It looks as if the Rolla City Council isn’t falling for an anti-abortion effort to pass a ‘Sanctuary City for the Unborn’ ordinance.

If you need a refresher on what these ordinances are all about: Anti-abortion maniac Mark Lee Dickson goes town-to-town lobbying city councils to pass local laws that ban the mailing of abortion medication, prohibit driving someone on city roads to get an abortion, or both. Unfortunately, he’s been successful across the country. Multiple counties in Texas, for example, implemented what amounts to local travel bans. (Though on election night, he lost in Amarillo thanks to incredible abortion rights activists there!)

Dickson also works with Jonathan Mitchell—the architect of Texas’ ban and the asshole who represents aggrieved men who sue over their partners’ abortions. But Mitchell and Dickson aren’t just passing these ordinances to punish providers and scare women out of getting care; they’re also trying to get a case sent to the Supreme Court.

The short version is that they’re passing local versions of the Comstock Act (which bans mailing abortion pills) in the hopes that someone will bring a legal challenge that goes all the way to SCOTUS. I’m betting that’s at least in part why they chose Missouri; they know that the state just passed a pro-choice amendment, so the ordinance would certainly spark a suit.

But it appears the city council in Rolla—a town of just 20,000 people—saw through the bullshit. They worried that passing the ordinance would lead to costly lawsuits and bad press. Councilman Matt Fridley said, “It creates problems where individuals may go, ‘I don’t want to live in this community.’”

Even Rolla’s Mayor told Dickson to get lost: Dickson said he “threatened to cut my nuts off.” You love to see it. (Seriously, kudos to the Missouri Independent for these gems.)

As much as I want to laugh at Dickson and his ilk, because they are indeed pathetic, it’s vital that we’re paying attention to what they’re up to. And I don’t just mean on the ordinance front, but watching the kind of language they’re using. For example, when Rolla’s mayor asked if the ordinance would specify what kind of medication would be prohibited, Coalition Life’s Brian Westbrook—a Dickson ally—responded, it’s “about abortion-causing drugs that cause abortion.” So not ‘abortion medication’ or ‘abortion pills,’ but “abortion-causing” drugs.

The mayor called it “a slick answer.” And it is! I’ve seen ‘abortion-causing’ or ‘abortion-inducing’ language quite a bit recently, and I can’t help but wonder if Republicans plan to use it to attack contraception that they claim are ‘abortifacients.’

Read more on the GOP’s plan to redefine certain types of birth control:

The GOP’s Plan to Ban Birth Control (Part I)

Jessica Valenti

·

August 14, 2023

Read full story

In the Nation

We’re seeing lots of AED predictions proving right this week, I’m afraid. In my look ahead at 2025, I warned that there would be more attempts by anti-abortion activists to use free speech as a cover for their harassment outside of clinics. Lo and behold, an Ohio man is claiming that his arrest at a Cuyahoga Falls clinic is a First Amendment violation.

Zack Knotts, who was arrested for disorderly conduct, is out doing the conservative media rounds. He says he was “unlawfully detained and charged” because he was “peacefully preaching the Gospel outside an abortion clinic on a public sidewalk.” Since his arrest, headlines have bemoaned the “Growing Threat to Pro-Life Advocates,” declaring that Knotts was “arrested for ‘annoying’ those outside abortion facility,” or detained for “preaching gospel” and “offering to adopt babies.”

Anyone who has ever volunteered as a clinic escort or defender knows that police don’t just arrest anti-abortion activists willy-nilly; they often let them get away with a lot. So the idea that this guy was just pleasantly “offering to adopt babies” is absurd.

But as I’ve written before, this is all about making the offenders look like victims; conservatives want Americans to believe that it’s their rights being infringed upon.