The Nebraska GOP plan to deny Title X funds to health centers that perform, counsel about, or refer for abortion services would harm family planning health centers in the state, potentially setting them up to violate federal law.
Eighty-nine percent of Title X recipients are women, the majority of them younger than 30 and living at or below poverty level. Shutterstock
Evidence provided to Congress by state attorneys general and health departments proves that abortion is both extremely safe and highly regulated. Searchable by state.
Chelsea Dappen didn’t know where to turn after she was sexually assaulted on her college campus in Nebraska. She retreated into her dorm room, a shell of her former self for weeks, until her roommate realized what was going on and encouraged her to go to Planned Parenthood.
“A friend told me about her experience and how Planned Parenthood was very understanding and respectful, and had a certain sensitivity when she was in a similar situation,” Dappen said. “I don’t know if I could have gone anywhere else. I felt safe there.”
The staff at Planned Parenthood gave her a lifeline, she said, not only with the health care she needed, including STI screening, a pregnancy test and a general checkup, but by referring her to counseling and support groups that she still uses today, nearly six years later. She says those services have been critical in her recovery.
The services Dappen utilized at Planned Parenthood were covered by Title X, a federal family planning program that may no longer be accessible to thousands of Nebraskans if lawmakers move forward with a budget that includes a proposal denying Title X funds to any health center that performs, counsels about, or refers for abortion services. It’s a move that would block access to care for nearly 28,000 Nebraskanswho rely on Title X for family planning and reproductive health care.
Republican Gov. Pete Ricketts put the provision in the state’s budget for the second year in a row, saying it was a reflection of the state’s “pro-life” values. Last year the provision was struck down after pushback across the political spectrum.
President Trump in April 2017 cleared a path for state lawmakers to more easily block Planned Parenthood from public funds by rescinding an Obama-era rule that stated a qualified provider could not be excluded “for reasons other than its ability to provide Title X services.” Should Nebraska lawmakers approve the state budget with Ricketts’ provision, it would be the first direct attack on Planned Parenthood’s Title X funds since that move by the Trump administration, which has sought to undermine reproductive health care in myriad ways.
“For the second year in a row, Governor Ricketts and Lieutenant Governor [Mike] Foley are taking aim at people’s rights and access to care through Title X,” said Meg Mikolajczyk, associate general counsel and senior public affairs manager for Planned Parenthood of the Heartland. “Title X is meant to assure every person can access basic preventive health care regardless of where they live, how much money they make or whether they have health insurance. We have to keep fighting to make sure everyone gets the health care they need without politicians controlling when, how, or where they get their care.”
Ricketts’ proposal would not only jeopardize Planned Parenthood, but would harm other family planning health centers in the state, potentially setting them up to violate federal law, said Danielle Conrad, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Nebraska. The proposal excludes Title X funding from any entity that provides information about or referrals for abortion care. However, federal Title X regulations require providers to give information about abortion to any patient who asks.
“When it comes to patient care and ethics, when a patient expresses to you a need for additional information, you need to be able to have a candid conversation without the heavy hand of government in the middle of that private and personal conversation,” Conrad said.
The Title X family planning program was created in 1970 to fund preventive health services for people with low incomes. Title X services include breast and pelvic exams, pap smears, HIV testing, pregnancy testing, cancer screenings, and birth control. Eighty-nine percent of Title X recipients are women, the majority of them younger than 30 and living at or below poverty level.
Planned Parenthood makes up about 5 percent of all Title X providers in Nebraska, yet in 2015 saw more than one-third of all Title X patients. Ninety-three percent of Planned Parenthood patients in Nebraska rely on Title X services.
“We know that women and men in Nebraska and across the country trust Planned Parenthood and rely on Planned Parenthood, and other family planning providers to meet their basic health care needs,” Conrad said. “Really the crux of this issue is the government saying if you have the means to choose your doctor you are allowed to go to a family planning clinic or Planned Parenthood or a private practitioner. But if your income is such that you rely on Title X or Medicaid to access these life savings programs, we’re going to tell you which doctors you can or can not go to.”
This is something with which Dappen identifies, telling Rewire.News she went to Planned Parenthood because she trusted them, and she would not have been comfortable with another provider.
“It takes a lot of trust between a patient and their doctor, especially when you have experienced trauma, so to take away that from from me in choosing my health care provider, I just don’t think that’s right,” she said.
Under federal law, neither Title X nor Medicaid funds can be used for abortions, yet anti-choice legislators across the United States have tried for years to strip Planned Parenthood of public funds. Between July 2015 and the end of 2016, mostly Republican lawmakers in 24 states have tried to and those in 15 states have succeeded in adopting some kind of funding restriction on Planned Parenthood, according to the Guttmacher Institute. Many of those funding restrictions, however, have been tied up or struck down in court and therefore are not currently in effect.
Conrad said the ACLU is lobbying against Ricketts’ proposal and “exploring all of their options,” including litigation should the proposal pass. The GOP-majority Nebraska legislature discussed the budget on Wednesday, during which legislators read from the Trump administration’s recent funding order that encourages funding go to abstinence-only providers. After extensive debate, legislators put the budget on hold. The legislation will need to be finalized by April 18, the last day of the legislative session.
Dappen has lobbied her legislators and said she hopes they listen.
“After giving out my story, it’s just something difficult and vulnerable, and if they choose to ignore that part of the issue, it will be difficult not to take it personally,” Dappen said. “It’s not just statistics. There’s a human side to this.”
I can’t imagine a world where party leaders welcome candidates just as long as they pinky swear not to legislate based on their personal views.
Tom Perez, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, seems to envision a “big tent” political party that can include anti-choice legislators, even when that runs contrary to the national platform. Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
Abortion is among the safest medical procedures in the United States. Yet, myths about its safety abound. False Witnesses reveals the individuals behind these lies.
Last month, my Twitter feed erupted in joy when Missouri Democrats flipped state House District 97 in a special election. Even Democratic National Committee (DNC) Chairman Tom Perez issued a statement congratulating Mike Revis (D-Fenton) for his hard-fought win. I went to sleep dreaming of progressive momentum, but I woke up to the harsh reality that the 97th district had sent another anti-choiceDemocrat to Jefferson City.
Our current legislative session shows that the last thing Missouri needs is more anti-choice lawmakers in Jefferson City. So far, 24 anti-choice bills have been filed, including fetal heartbeat bills and a personhood resolution proposing an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would deem fertilized eggs full legal persons. While Missouri and national Dems are celebrating the election of an anti-choice legislator in Revis, reproductive health and justice advocates have to add his name to the long list of legislators who need to be educated and vigorously lobbied if we are to defeat Missouri’s regressive 22-week abortion ban bill moving this session.
Why is Democratic support of anti-choice politicians an urgent concern? Because we need all hands on deck to defeat attacks on access to reproductive health care at the state and federal level. We are in a critical election year, and we need to make sure that those who seek to benefit from the Democratic brand are willing to champion progressive values.
I find it insulting and unacceptable that party leaders treat support for access to reproductive health care and abortion like throwaway wedge issues even as they talk a good game about fighting for everyday Americans. There can be no economic justice without reproductive justice. For millions of people in America, access to abortion and reproductive health care means the difference between just getting by and financial crisis. And abortion access and reproductive health care are winning issues. Recent polls show broad support for birth control access and abortion rights. More importantly, Dems must not overlook the fact that the “backbone” of the party, Black women, overwhelmingly support a person’s right to abortion care. It boggles the mind that any political party would run away from these issues instead of enthusiastically embracing them. And yet here we are.
As a reproductive justice activist and a Missourian, I have called on the state Democratic Party to work with candidates to increase support for abortion rights because ready access to reproductive health care is critical for equality and justice. After the general election in 2016, I joined the platform committee of the Missouri Democratic Party in part to advocate for stronger support for abortion rights. When Democrats fail to support access to reproductive health care, they undermine their work to build strong and healthy communities.
But what is often overlooked is when and under what circumstances anti-choice Democrats break with the party on key issues like taxes, racial justice, sensible gun regulations, and LGBTQ rights. There’s more at stake than you might think at first glance—namely, future support for progressive policies within the party. But that hasn’t stopped Democratic leaders from asking anti-choice Dems to thedance.
Let’s explore the courting of anti-choice Dems. In May 2017, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi described abortion as a “fading” issue for Democratic voters. Pelosi’s shockingly out-of-touch statement came on the heels of Perez’s fumbling defense of the party’s decision to champion Heath Mello, a Democratic mayoral candidate in Omaha, Nebraska, who had an extensive anti-abortion voting record. Perez went on to derail his attempt to reassure abortion rights activists of the party’s commitment to abortion rights when just weeks later he met with Democrats for Life of America at DNC headquarters in Washington, D.C.
The national debate over whether the Democratic Party should support anti-choice candidates quickly made its way to Missouri. The new chair of the Missouri Democratic Party, Stephen Webber, caused alarm within progressive circles by seeming to signal a similar soft commitment to abortion rights. In an effort to clarify his statement, Webber wrote a St. Louis Americaneditorial stating, “Democratic candidates are welcome to their personal views on abortion, but the Missouri Democratic Party will never advocate that they use an elected office to limit or take away a woman’s ability to make her own reproductive health decisions—including the right to a safe, legal abortion.”
I can’t even imagine a world where party leaders would welcome anti-union or anti-Medicare candidates just as long as they pinky swear not to legislate based on their personal views. But apparently we are supposed to trust anti-choice legislators to not do what all anti-choice legislators eventually do.
I’ve been a reproductive justice activist organizing in Missouri for more than a decade, and the last thing I want to do right now is debate whether the Democratic Party should embrace so-called “pro-life” candidates. I would have preferred to hear political leaders champion access to abortion because our state’s relentless war on access to reproductive health care hurts women, causes financial hardship, diverts millions in tax dollars meant to feed hungry children to anti-abortion fake clinics, and prioritizes the anti-choice movement’s agenda over the pressing needs of Missourians.
I wish this debate had been triggered by the Democratic Party’s enthusiastic and full-throated support for abortion rights, but that’s just not the case. The reality is that the Missouri Democratic Party has long had a diverse mix of candidates and elected officials, including those who are anti-choice, mixed record, or solidly supportive of abortion access. There is a national platform, which states, “Democrats are committed to protecting and advancing reproductive health, rights, and justice. We believe unequivocally, like the majority of Americans, that every woman should have access to quality reproductive health care services, including safe and legal abortion—regardless of where she lives, how much money she makes, or how she is insured. We believe that reproductive health is core to women’s, men’s, and young people’s health and wellbeing.”
And then there are the people who run as Democrats in Missouri.
Any discussion of anti-choice Democrats must keep it real about what being an anti-choice Democrat in Missouri means. “Pro-life” as a political position is just that: a political position that demands a pattern of voting against access to birth control, reproductive health care, and abortion access. We’re not talking about personal convictions that folk just share over beer while tailgating. We’re talking about how a person will vote on bills like those that have already been proposed in our statehouse: a bill that would would give pharmacists the right to refuse to fill prescriptions based on their personal beliefs, demand women get permission from a man to have an abortion, force women to endure medically unnecessary and inaccurate propaganda prior to receiving care, and gut funding for preventative care and treatment in a state with high sexually transmitted infection rates.
Missouri Right to Life’s (MRL) policy statements are a helpful way to understand what anti-choice politicians are about. For example, MRL is opposed to abortion; exemptions for rape and incest except “in rare instances”; emergency contraception because the organization believes “like Russian roulette, it may kill at any time”; and school-based health clinics providing birth control services. MRL also opposes the Equal Rights Amendment; embryonic stem cell research; chimeras (seriously); living wills and advanced directives; euthanasia; organ donations; and the work of the March of Dimes; the Susan G. Komen Foundation and Race for the Cure; and the Girl Scouts. When we demand that the Democratic Party resist calls to open up a “big tent” and embrace anti-choice candidates, this broad regressive agenda is what we’re fighting against.
What does that look like in practice?
Former state Rep. Linda Black (R-Bonne Terre) supported Missouri’s 72-hour mandatory waiting period law. Black eventually switched parties to become a Republican, saying that she hoped the switch would help her pass a bill requiring a doctor show a video containing state-mandated information about abortion to a woman in addition to verbally sharing the information and giving it to her in writing.
But Black’s abandonment of the Democratic Party wasn’t motivated solely by opposition to abortion. In a 2014 Missouri Times interview, Black said this when asked why it was important to switch parties:
It was such an important decision to make because, just recently, the ruling on gay marriage—and the Missouri Constitution very specifically defines what marriage means in Missouri. The voters voted several years ago—71 percent of the people—said that marriage is between a man and a woman. Here we are with Democratic leadership who will not support Missouri’s position on marriage. That was one tipping point.
Then there’s former state representative and current business manager for the St. Louis Police Officers’ Association, Jeff Roorda. Roorda gained national attention for his incendiary rhetoric about the Ferguson uprising after the fatal shooting of Michael Brown by former Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson. He stoked controversy by fundraising for Wilson and for his comments after the not-guilty verdict in the trial of former St. Louis police Officer Jason Stockley for the shooting death of Anthony Lamar Smith. Jeff Roorda even went so far as to blame President Obama for a sniper attack on Dallas police officers at a Black Lives Matter rally.
During a failed state senate run, Jeff Roorda said his record while in office has “been consistently conservative on social issues my entire eight years.” He voted to override then-Gov. Jay Nixon’s (D) veto of a 72-hour mandatory waiting period for abortion. Roorda also voted to override Nixon’s veto of a bill allowing open carrying of firearms. But Jeff Roorda was a solid pro-union vote who spoke out against the Republican effort to pass regressive anti-union legislation like a so-called right-to-work measure. Missouri ultimately passed the right-to-work measure in 2017, and Jeff Roorda continues to be a controversial figureand to seek office as a Democrat.
Are the political pundits calling for a big tent on abortion also demanding the party accept candidates who think Missouri should have launched a political war with the federal government over marriage equality? Have they given interviews calling on voters to keep an open mind when considering the race-baiting opinions of divisive candidates like Jeff Roorda? Nope, because calls for a big tent on abortion are more about a strategic move to sell out abortion rights than accepting new political viewpoints to expand the candidate pool.
The aforementioned Rep. Mike Revis has already cast anti-choice votes in the Missouri House. Revis was one of five Dems to vote for HB 1383, a bill that requires two-parent notice prior to an abortion in addition to the existing requirement that a patient under the age of 18 obtain the written informed consent of one parent or guardian. His next bad vote was for HB 1288, a bill to allow tax credits for faith-based anti-abortion fake clinics. The next test Revis is likely going to fail will be on HB 1266, the 22-week abortion ban.
Anti-choice candidates become anti-choice politicians, and when they take office, they vote for regressive policies, medically unnecessary restrictions, and insulting hurdles meant to shame and humiliate women. Anti-choice Democrats in the Missouri General Assembly have not proposed policies to reduce the state’s infant or maternal mortality rates. They have not challenged the state budget practice of sending millions of dollars in federal hunger relief funds to anti-abortion fake clinics, and they aren’t pressuring the pro-life movement to take a stand against the death penalty, gun violence, or violence and discrimination against LGBTQ folk.
So when candidates like Robert Butler, the likely Dem nominee for state Senate District 22, say things like, “As a Catholic and person of faith, I will vote my conscience and defend life,” they are saying so much more. We know from past experience that these anti-choice candidates will turn into legislators who will refuse to protect LGBTQ Missourians from discrimination, will push policy to attack birth control access, will support the use of tax credits to fund shady anti-abortion fake clinics, and won’t vote to protect workers’ right to reproductive health-care coverage on the job.
To quote Maya Angelou, “when someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.”
Missouri Republicans are banking on benefiting from gerrymandering, voter suppression, and the unchecked influence of big money campaign contributions. Those aren’t advantages that developed overnight and they won’t be overcome in a single election cycle by selling out abortion rights for political expediency.
If Missouri Dems want to make progress, they need to respect that it can’t be achieved by circumnavigating progressive issues, including abortion rights. Then they must educate candidates on why it can’t be achieved that way and build campaigns that enthusiastically share that knowledge with voters.
There can be no victory, no giant blue wave win, built through the deliberate and strategic disregard for the key role access to reproductive health care and abortion play in the lives of all Missourians.
The inundation of misinformation about abortion is one of the most significant hurdles women face when attempting to make informed decisions about their own reproductive care. Thanks to newly released research from the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine, at least one pervasive misconception about women’s health care can be cleared up once and for all: the false notion that abortion procedures are dangerous. According to the study’s conclusions, it’s actually restrictive legislation, not the abortion procedure itself, that places women’s health in danger.
This newly released study, The Safety and Quality of Abortion Care in the United States, measured the quality of American abortion care against six standards: safety, effectiveness, timeliness, patient-centeredness (care that is based on individual patient needs and preferences), efficiency, and equity. Thirteen independent researchers convened to closely examine the patient experience before, during, and after receiving an abortion. Scientists were able to measure the safety of different abortion methods, determine the types of clinics and clinicians that can safely administer high-quality abortion care, and define the long-term effects an abortion has on the patient.
Find a sampling of the abortion-related myths that this study found to be false below:
Myth #1: Women who receive abortions are at a heightened risk for breast cancer, infertility, and other health problems.
Having an abortion does not increase a woman’s risk of the following physical health problems: secondary infertility, pregnancy-related hypertensive disorders, abnormal placentation, preterm birth, or breast cancer.
Having an abortion does not increase a woman’s risk of the following mental health problems: depression, anxiety, or post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
Myth #2: Abortions are highly dangerous procedures.
Serious complications resulting from an abortion are rare and occur far less frequently than during childbirth.
Abortions are safer the earlier they are performed, meaning mandatory waiting periods and required precounseling (laws that are in effect in 27 and 35 states, respectively) cause greater risk of complication.
Myth #3: Doctors in hospitals are the only medical professionals who can safely perform abortion procedures.
Most abortions can be safely performed in office-based settings, meaning a hospital setting is often unnecessary.
No special equipment or emergency arrangements are required for medication abortions.
Advanced practice clinicians (APCs), physician assistants (PAs), certified nurse-midwives (CNMs), and nurse practitioners (NPs) can safely and effectively provide medication and aspiration abortions.
Clinicians performing abortions do not require hospital privileges to ensure a safe outcome for patients.
Dr. Monica R. McLemore, a research scientist at Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health(ANSIRH) and assistant professor at the University of California, San Francisco, summarized the study’s conclusions to POPSUGAR as a confirmation of what she says abortion care providers have recognized for some time. “The quality of abortion care and patients’ experiences of that care are high,” McLemore explained, adding that the level of abortion care provided is compromised when lawmakers “create barriers to care by imposing medically unnecessary restrictions that ultimately push abortion out of reach.”
“Understanding any actual risks associated with abortion is important because we need to be able to provide medically proven information about all pregnancy decisions — including risks associated with continuing and spacing pregnancies — to anyone who walks through our doors,” Dr. McLemore told POPSUGAR.
The GOP bill would allow physicians and those who undergo the common medical procedure to be charged with murder, which is punishable by life imprisonment or the death penalty.
The bill is part of a trend among GOP state lawmakers to pass legislation that would challenge the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade, with the goal of creating a case allowing the Supreme Court to revisit legal protections for abortion care. Shutterstock
Ohio Republicans are once again proposing an unconstitutional ban on abortion care, as lawmakers have introduced a bill that would lead to the “abolition of abortion in the state of Ohio.”
Kellie Copeland, executive director of NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio, said in a statement that the legislation is part of an effort by “anti-choice extremists” to target Roe.
“For those who doubt the seriousness of this attack, let me remind you that President Trump said that a woman who has an abortion should be punished, Vice President [Mike] Pence allowed Purvi Patelto be imprisoned in Indiana for a miscarriage, and both GOP candidates for governor of Ohio have pledged to outlaw all abortions with no exceptions,” Copeland said.
HB 565, sponsored by state Reps. Ron Hood (R-Ashville) and A. Nino Vitale (R-Urbana), would prohibit the termination of a pregnancy by “any method, including, but not limited to, chemical methods, medical methods, and surgical methods.”
The GOP bill would allow physicians and those who undergo the common medical procedure to be charged with murder, which is punishable by life imprisonment or the death penalty. The lawmakers circulated a co-sponsor request for the bill in September, in which they criticized the legislation for passing abortion restrictions as “regulating evil” and that it was time to “abolish abortion in its entirety.”
Hood was the co-sponsor of a bill introduced last year that would have prohibited an abortion if the physician detects a fetal heartbeat. So-called heartbeat bans, which constitute a total ban on the procedure, have been introduced by Republicans several times in Ohio.
Studies find that women of all religious faiths and traditions, all political affiliations, and all races, classes, and backgrounds have abortions. Columnist Kevin Williamson believes all such women should be hanged.
Studies find that women of all religious faiths and traditions, all political affiliations, and all races, classes, and backgrounds have abortions. Columnist Kevin Williamson believes all such women should be hanged. Reason.tv / YouTube
At least one in three women in the United States will have at least one abortion in her lifetime.
Six in ten American women who have an abortion already have a child, and more than three in ten already have two or more children.
Studies find that women of all religious faiths and traditions, all political affiliations, and all races, classes, and backgrounds have abortions. It is one of the most common and safest surgical procedures in the United States. And these women—women like me, and like countless daughters, mothers, sisters, friends, nieces, and cousins—have abortions for a wide variety of reasons, ranging from their own judgment about whether and when they can afford to have a child (or another child), to experiences of violence and violation, to matters of life and death, to “none of your business.”
A columnist for the National Review believes we should all be hanged.
This weekend, Kevin Williamson, whose Twitter bio describes him as a “roving reporter for the National Review,” declared on Twitter that all abortions should be treated as premeditated homicide, and that women who have had abortions should face capital punishment, namely hanging. No exceptions.
@Green_Footballs Yes, I believe that the law should treat abortion like any other homicide.
He did not go so far as to describe in what venues these hangings should take place, but it might be fair to assume that Williamson has in mind public executions, so that other women are made very, very sure of their place in society—which is to say, subservient.
Reading several of Williamson’s columns, I see a man who desperately wants to be taken seriously. His pieces are full of pseudo-intellectual musings and plenty of Very Big Words, in a transparent attempt to prove how smart he is. In a recent piece on Lena Dunham and voting, he reveals deep condescension for women, voters, and anyone who is not (according to his judgment) as smart as himself. Voting, Williamson writes, “is the most shallow gesture of citizenship there is.”
That piece is titled “Five Reasons You Are Too Stupid To Vote.” Williamson offers only one reason. Did he forget the other four?
We should perhaps be thankful that, in another tweet, Williamson stated, “I don’t vote.”
In a piece on abortion and capital punishment, he notes that a “consistent life ethic” requires opposition to capital punishment, though he admits to finding reasons capital punishment should still be carried out. Tweeting this weekend, he said, “I’m torn on capital punishment generally; but treating abortion as homicide means what it means.” He further said, “I am against abortion per se in all circumstances.” In other words, he claims a “consistent life ethic,” which would mean he is against capital punishment per se but believes there are circumstances in which capital punishment should be employed anyway. Yet when women’s lives, health, or well-being are threatened, he sees no exceptions for abortion care. Rather, his answer when it comes to women and abortion is to promote capital punishment for them.
@AmateurPolSc I am against abortion per se in all circumstances.
In an ongoing Twitter exchange, I asked Williamson if he knew women who had had abortions. He said yes. I asked him if he had told them he thought they should be hanged. No answer. I asked again. No answer. I asked if he would tell the women in his circle who’ve had abortions that he believes they committed homicide. No answer. I asked Williamson if, being consistent and applying the laws he supports to his own family, he would allow his wife to die in a circumstance in which her life were imminently threatened by a pregnancy rather than break his no exceptions rule. He would not answer. I asked if his wife opted for an abortion in a given circumstance, including to save her own life, would he report her to the authorities. Again, no answer. The only reply I got was him calling my line of questioning an “elementary-school trolley problem gambit.”
“Go look it up if you don’t understand,” he added.
In short, he gave no answer when asked to apply his legal proposal to his own family. He refused to take responsibility for the laws and policies he espouses.
Pregnancy, however, is not an elementary school “trolley problem.” It is real life. Pregnancy, labor, delivery, childbirth, child spacing, child-rearing, and feeding, clothing, raising, emotionally investing in, and in all ways caring for children from birth throughout their lives are all real-life issues. Sometimes pregnancy, childbirth, and delivery result in the death or illness of women. These are not theoretical “trolley problems.” They are real. They are practical. They involve tradeoffs. I know this, as I am a mother and a woman who has had an abortion. And I understand that every time a woman faces a pregnancy—intended or unintended, healthy or untenable—she faces a set of circumstances unique to that pregnancy and that moment in her life.
Williamson’s answers therefore reveal exactly the problem with his pseudo-academic approach, and that of the anti-choice movement writ large, to the issues women face in sex, pregnancy, childbirth, and the lifelong commitment to other human beings that is involved in being a parent. He and they are bereft of compassion and understanding for the real circumstances of real women. They lack respect for the intellectual and emotional maturity and responsibility real women take as they make rational decisions about either abortion or childbirth when facing unintended pregnancy. In other words, they do not trust women as moral agents to make choices that are best for them and their families. Anti-choicers like Williamson lack understanding of or just simply deny immutable facts of public health, such as the fact that access to safe abortion care is directly correlated to improved health outcomes for women, infants, and children. He is either unaware of or irresponsibly ignores the fact that in many states in this country women are today being arrested for miscarriage and pregnancy loss on the basis of “suspected abortion.” His answers and his body of work reveal a dangerous mixture of misogyny and disgust for women, a wholesale lack of compassion, an inability to face reality, and complete ignorance of public health, medical, biological, and human rights evidence.
And, tellingly, he is unwilling to apply his own rules to his own family.
Congress maintained funding for a key family planning program. But President Trump’s abstinence-only Title X chief, Valerie Huber, will decide what to do with the funds.
“It’s unfortunate that Senator McConnell and Speaker Ryan have time and time again rejected bipartisan work on health care in favor of partisan health care politics, and chosen politically-driven show votes over getting a result for families,” said Sen. Patty Murray. Alex Wong/Getty Images
Top Republicans and Democrats in the U.S. Congress have negotiated a $1.3 trillion “omnibus” spending bill without including proposed attacks on reproductive health care. But the Trump administration could very well continue trying to undermine birth control access for millions of people with low incomes.
Republicans in the House of Representatives didn’t get their long-standing wish to eliminate Title X in the omnibus, which funds the government through the end of the 2018 fiscal year on September 30. The bill passed the House by a vote of 256-167 on Thursday and now proceeds to the Senate, which must pass it by Friday’s deadline to avoid a government shutdown.
The 2,232-page omnibus, unveiled Wednesday evening, ultimately funds Title X, the federal family planning program that helps provide contraception, breast and cervical cancer screenings and STI and HIV testing to a diverse, low-income population. Title X serves 4 million patients, the majority of whom are people of color and have incomes at or below the 2016 federal poverty level, according to the Obama-era annual report on the program.
Congressional negotiators failed to include a bipartisan Senate agreement that would have sought to limit how Trump’s virulently anti-choice U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) could spend around $286.5 million in Title X money and $101 million in Teen Pregnancy Prevention money.
Republicans and Democrats on the Senate Appropriations Committee agreed last September to effectively order HHS to administer both the Title X and Teen Pregnancy Prevention programs as they were under the Obama administration, with its emphasis on evidence-based contraception and embrace of Planned Parenthood, Rewire.Newsreported. The Susan B. Anthony List subsequently rebuked Sen. Roy Blunt (R-MO), who worked with Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) on the language, in a statement that perpetuated falsehoods about Planned Parenthood and the “abortion industry.”By early March, Blunt was open to dropping the bipartisan protection.
Now, Congress is about to hand over the $286.5 million designated in the omnibus for the program to Trump’s abstinence-only Title X chief, Valerie Huber. For the first time ever, Huber’s position will have sole decision-making power to award federal family planning grants, based on Trump-era HHS grant criteria that omitted any mention of “contraception” or “contraceptives.”
Power to Decide praised the omnibus for funding family planning programs. But the advocacy organization dedicated to preventing unplanned pregnancy expressed disappointment that Congress didn’t send a stronger message to the administration.
“We are concerned that the bill fails to include previous bipartisan Senate language, which made crystal clear the important role that Title X has historically played in providing high quality clinical contraceptive services,” CEO Ginny Ehrlich said in a statement.
Ehrlich was pleased that Congress maintained funding levels for both Title X and Teen Pregnancy Prevention. She urged the Trump administration “to honor the intent of these programs.”
Apart from Title X, the omnibus provides $25 million—$10 million more than the last fiscal year according to two different reproductive health advocates—to “exclusively implement education in sexual risk avoidance.” As Martha Kempner wrote for Rewire.News, abstinence proponents have rebranded their work as sexual risk avoidance amid evidence that the programs were “ineffective and even harmful.” But they rely on the “same tactics—using misinformation or questionable research—with an updated focus: reducing poverty.”
The omnibus indeed specifies that so-called sexual risk avoidance grants should emphasize “success sequencing for poverty prevention,” a related concept that Kempner debunked.
Details of the omnibus aren’t likely to change, especially after House passage. The massive legislation has the support of leaders in both parties and chambers. But some lawmakers expressed their opposition to it. Rep. Luis Gutiérrez (D-IL), for instance, vowed to vote against “funding that continues Trump’s war on immigrants,” including money for a border wall and excluding a deal for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, recipients. The Congressional Hispanic Caucus urged all members to oppose the omnibus.
Although Republicans control Congress, Democrats’ votes are needed on both chambers of the Capitol. House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI), as usual, couldn’t count on the GOP’s ultra-conservative wing to pass a massive spending package on a strict party-line vote. In the House, 111 Democrats voted for the bill. Meanwhile, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) will need at least some Democrats to reach a 60-vote supermajority and avoid a filibuster.
Democrats may be more inclined to vote for the omnibus without the reproductive health-care concessions that Republicans unsuccessfully demanded.
The omnibus omits the Conscience Protection Act, which would have allowed a broadened swath of health-care providers to sue if they’re supposedly coerced into providing abortion care, or if they face discrimination for refusing to provide such care. A Rewire.Newsanalysis found evidence that congressional Republicans and the religious right have been recycling the same purported conscience violations for years. The Trump administration is encouraging new allegations through its health-care discrimination wing.
A top Senate aide expected the Conscience Protection Act to be in the omnibus, according to Christian Broadcasting Network’s Abigail Robertson. But it wasn’t. Neither was a repeal of the Johnson Amendment, which could politicize churches.
House Republicans in early March wanted to use the omnibus to end all federal funding for Planned Parenthood and ban life-saving research on fetal tissue donated from abortions, according to a Politicostory. Those provisions aren’t in the bill text.
Planned Parenthood, which serves 1.5 million Title X patients in largely rural and underserved areas, nevertheless remains exposed to Trump’s anti-choice health department. Huber, the Title X program head, previously told reporters that Planned Parenthood is “free to apply” for her office’s family planning grants. But the health-care organization is a perennial target of Republicans on Capitol Hill and Trump’s health officials.
Last year, at congressional Republicans’ behest, Trump delivered the final blow to the Obama administration’s Title X safeguards against state-level interference in federal Title X funding for family planning clinics, including Planned Parenthood affiliates. Planned Parenthood was the real target of the GOP’s ire over the fact that it provides abortion care with its own funds. More recently, HHS reportedly worked with a hate group to jeopardize Planned Parenthood’s Medicaid funding stream.
The omnibus, moreover, doesn’t expand discriminatory abortion restrictions into the private insurance market. The manufactured abortion crisis first erupted over an otherwise bipartisan Senate plan temporarily stabilizing the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, Rewire.News reported in December. This week, Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) reneged on the bipartisan stabilization plan he crafted with Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), turning to Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) to craft a partisan alternative that included the abortion restrictions. Neither stabilization bill made it into the omnibus.
The Alexander-Murray stabilization bill could have lowered deductibles for people with low incomes, among other measures, Voxwrote last October. “But the health insurance landscape has shifted since last year, and simply adopting last year’s bipartisan bills, without significant changes, would do more harm than good,” the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities determined in early March. The landscape shifted in part after Trump signed the GOP’s regressive tax bill and repeal of Obamacare’s individual mandate into law.
“It’s unfortunate that Senator McConnell and Speaker Ryan have time and time again rejected bipartisan work on health care in favor of partisan health care politics, and chosen politically-driven show votes over getting a result for families,” Murray said in a statement on Wednesday.
Rep. Dan Lipinski, who has parroted Republican talking points pushing junk science to support anti-choice policies, won with 50.89 percent of the vote.
Lipinski’s opposition to abortion rights, LGBTQ equality, and the Affordable Care Act made him the target of progressive groups who hoped to unseat the “Blue Dog” Democrat. Scott Olson/Getty Images
Abortion is among the safest medical procedures in the United States. Yet, myths about its safety abound. False Witnesses reveals the individuals behind these lies.
Anti-choice Democratic U.S. Rep. Dan Lipinski won his primary on Tuesday by a slim margin against progressive challenger Marie Newman, capping off a race in Illinois’ District 3 centered on Lipinski’s opposition to abortion rights and LGBTQ rights.
As of Wednesday morning, Lipinski had won 50.89 percent of votes to Newman’s 49.1 percent, with less than 2,000 votes separating the two Democrats. The Associated Press called the race in the incumbent’s favor early Wednesday morning. Newman reportedly declined to concede as the results came in Tuesday night.
Newman, a first-time candidate, came within striking distance of a win despite polling released by the campaign in December noting she had low name recognition in the district.
Lipinski’s opposition to abortion rights, LGBTQ equality, the Affordable Care Act, and other issues commonly safeguarded by Democrats made him the target of progressive groups who hoped to unseat the “Blue Dog” Democrat.
Lipinski’s position on reproductive rights has earned him the support of several anti-choice groups. Not only has he co-sponsored legislation like a ban on abortion at 20 weeks’ gestation, he co-chairs the Congressional Pro-Life Caucus and sits on the federal advisory board of anti-choice group Democrats for Life of America.
Anti-choice group Susan B. Anthony List announced this month that it would deploy a team of 70 canvassers in support of Lipinski. The District 3 primary marks the first time that SBA List had canvassed for a Democratic candidate, according to the conservative National Review.
During this primary, it spent almost $120,000 “on not just ads and mailers but also money to fly canvassers to the district, put them up at hotels and transport them in vans to various neighborhoods,” CNN reported.
Though Lipinski skipped a scheduled speaking engagement for the anti-choice March for Life in January, he appeared at an affiliated event that week where he lamented that progressive groups had gone “all in” on the race to back Newman. Lipinski parroted Republican talking points pushing junk science to support anti-choice policy and noted that he was “hanging in there” to “evangelize” his opposition to abortion rights, as Rewire.News reported.
Newman had the backing of progressive groups and organizations focused on reproductive rights and health, including NARAL Pro-Choice America, Planned Parenthood Action Fund, and EMILY’s List. Her platform called for the protection of abortion rights, noting her belief that “reproductive decisions belong with women and her right to choose, not with government or politicians.”
Lipinski will take on Republican Arthur Jones in the November midterm elections. The seat is considereda “solid Democratic” stronghold by Inside Elections with Nathan Gonzales and Roll Call. Jones ran unopposed in the Republican primary, despite being a neo-Nazi and white supremacist who is openly campaigning as a Holocaust-denier. The state’s Republican Party has disavowed the candidate.
Abortion rights were a central issue in Illinois’ Republican gubernatorial primary, where Gov. Bruce Rauner beat state Rep. Jeanne Ives.
Ives throughout her campaign attacked Rauner’s decision to sign a pro-choice measure last September to expand insurance coverage for abortion care and strike down provisions in the state’s “trigger law” to outlaw abortion should Roe v. Wade be overturned. She vowed to “immediately” sign a measure to repeal it should she be elected.
Rauner will face Democrat J.B. Pritzker in the general election for governor.
U.S. District Court Judge Carlton Reeves wrote that Mississippi Republicans’ 15-week abortion ban was of “dubious constitutionality.”
Pro-Choice activists gather outside of the Supreme Court on March 20 during oral arguments in the abortion case NIFLA v Bercerra.
Lauryn Gutierrez / Rewire
Abortion is among the safest medical procedures in the United States. Yet, myths about its safety abound. False Witnesses reveals the individuals behind these lies.
Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant (R) on Monday signed a law—HB 1510—that bans abortion after 15 weeks’ gestation. The law went into effect immediately, giving Mississippi the honor of having the most stringent abortion ban in the United States.
Bryant tweeted that he was “committed to making Mississippi the safest place in America” for fetuses.
Within hours of Bryant signing the law, the Center for Reproductive Rights filed a lawsuit on behalf of Jackson Women’s Health Organization—Mississippi’s sole abortion clinic—challenging the law as unconstitutional and seeking a temporary restraining order to block it.
“Under decades of United States Supreme Court precedent, the state of Mississippi cannot ban abortion prior to viability, regardless of what exceptions are provided to the ban,” the complaint reads.
“Accordingly, the ban is unconstitutional as applied to all women seeking pre-viability abortions after 15 weeks.”
U.S. District Court Judge Carlton Reeves granted plaintiffs’ temporary restraining order on Tuesday afternoon in a brief two-page order. “The Supreme Court says every woman has a constitutional right to ‘personal privacy’ regarding her body. That right protects her choice ‘to have an abortion before viability,’” Reeves wrote, citing Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey.
“The plaintiffs are substantially likely to succeed on their claim that HB 1510 is unconstitutional. The law threatens immediate, irreparable harm to Mississippians’ abilities to control their ‘destiny and … body,’” Reeves wrote, citing Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt. “This is especially true for one woman scheduled to have a 15-week abortion this afternoon.”
The cases Reeves cited—Roe, Casey, and Hellerstedt—all prohibit a state from interfering with a pregnant person’s right to a pre-viability abortion. Medical consensus is that a fetus is not viable until about 24 weeks. Anti-choice activists have attempted to roll back the point of viability, arguing that some fetuses can survive outside the womb at 22 weeks.
But no fetus is viable at 15 weeks, as the plaintiffs note in their complaint.
“HB 1510 places viability at 15 weeks—about two months earlier than where the medical consensus places it,” Reeves wrote in his order, noting that the law is of “dubious constitutionality.”
Dubious constitutionality is putting it lightly. Anti-choice politicians have been laser-focused on enacting pre-viability abortion bans—a 20-week ban here, a six-week ban there—but all of them suffer the same problem: They’re wildly unconstitutional.
These abortion bans have been unconstitutional since Roe v. Wade legalized abortion in 1973, and they will remain unconstitutional unless the U.S. Supreme Court either overturns its landmark decision or reverses 40 years’ worth of case law about the importance of fetal viability. And given the Court’s 2016 Hellerstedt decision, that’s not likely to happen unless President Trump is able to stack the Court with conservative judges.
For now, pre-viability abortion bans like Mississippi’s are unconstitutional.
As a leader and founding member of the House Pro-Choice Caucus, Slaughter centered reproductive health-care access in her work on Capitol Hill.
Slaughter’s legacy dates back to her first years in Congress. In 1991, she was part of a core group of congressional Democratic women who successfully fought to allow Anita Hill’s testimony during Clarence Thomas’ U.S. Supreme Court confirmation hearings. Alex Wong/Getty Images
Abortion is among the safest medical procedures in the United States. Yet, myths about its safety abound. False Witnesses reveals the individuals behind these lies.
Advocates for women, reproductive rights, and LGBTQ equality paid tribute to the legacy of U.S. Rep. Louise Slaughter (D-NY) after the death of the 16-term lawmaker late last week.
Slaughter died Friday morning following a recent fall at her Washington, D.C., residence, according to a statement from her office. She was 88 years old.
Slaughter was first elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1986. In 2007, she became the first woman to chair the House Rules Committee.The powerful role put Slaughter in charge of setting procedures to consider legislation, and amendments, on the House floor for a final vote.
As a leader and founding member of the House Pro-Choice Caucus, Slaughter centered reproductive health-care access in her work on Capitol Hill.She redoubled her advocacy under the virulently anti-choice Trump administration.
“We are deeply disturbed by the Trump Administration’s constant willingness to ignore and bend the rules when it comes to women’s rights and reproductive health,” Slaughter and her caucus co-chair, Rep. Diana DeGette (D-CO), wrote in a letter to the thus-far immovable HHS Secretary Alex Azar last month.
After Slaughter’s death, DeGette called her “a warrior for all the issues she cared about.”
“As a champion of women’s reproductive rights, she was especially proud to represent Seneca Falls, home to the first women’s rights convention in the United States,” DeGette said in a statement. “I’ll miss her wisdom and wit every day.”
Slaughter’s legacy dates back to her first years in Congress. In 1991, she was part of a core group of congressional Democratic women who successfully fought to allow Anita Hill’s testimony during Clarence Thomas’ U.S. Supreme Court confirmation hearings.
Advocates for reproductive rights and health praised Slaughter’s legacy.
“Louise never shied away from an opportunity to speak out and protect a woman’s right to plan her future and control her body,” Planned Parenthood Federation of America President Cecile Richards said. Physicians for Reproductive Health President and CEO Jodi Magee similarly praised Slaughter’s “deep devotion to women’s well-being.”
Slaughter was a longtime LGBTQ ally, breaking ranks with most of her fellow Democrats in 1996 to vote against the Defense of Marriage Act. Her congressional website described her this year as a “major force” in expanding VAWA protections to LGBTQ people, as well as to Native Americans and immigrant women, as part of the 2013 reauthorization of the law.
Congressional LGBT Equality Caucus Co-Chair Rep. Jared Polis (D-CO) praised Slaughter, a caucus member, as “a champion for the rights of all people, but particularly for the LGBT community.”
“From her leadership on issues from marriage equality to comprehensive nondiscrimination protections, Representative Slaughter fought arm in arm with our community every day,” he said in a statement. “Her wit, passion, and depth of experience will be greatly missed in our Caucus.”
A bill advancing in the state would ban the procedure before most people even know they are pregnant.
A sign posted on a farm just of I-380 asks voters to vote morally against abortion and gay marriage outside of Waterloo, Iowa, January 25, 2016, ahead of the Iowa Caucus. / AFP / JIM WATSON (Photo credit should read JIM WATSON/AFP/Getty Images)
A bill prohibiting the sale of fetal tissue and banning abortion after six weeks passed the Iowa House and Human Resources Committee on Thursday, clearing the way for a floor vote in the state House that reproductive justice advocates say could have sweeping consequences in the state and all but ban the procedure before most people even know they are pregnant.
In a 12 to 9 vote, Iowa lawmakers endorsed the so-called “heartbeat bill”, which would ban abortion after a fetal heartbeat can be detected, or approximately six weeks. While the measure allows for an abortion in the case of physical threat to the health of the pregnant parent, no exceptions for rape, incest, or age are included.
“I think it will do a great deal to promote a culture of life in this state,” said Rep. Sandy Salmon (R-Janesville).
That sentiment is far from universal. The bill initially centered on banning the sale of fetal tissue, but the heartbeat component was attached to the legislation as a GOP-led subcommittee considered the measure on Wednesday before the wider House committee passed it on Thursday. Abortion rights supporters lobbied the subcommittee to reject the measure, speaking to their own experiences with the procedure and testifying that the lives of many in the state will be drastically impacted without access to abortion.
“If I did not have the choice to terminate my pregnancy, I would not be with you here today,” said Leah Vanden Bosch, who lives in West Des Moines. “I will not stop saying that until you understand what I am telling you. If someone were to force me to stay pregnant, I would have been so desperate to escape the reality that would have become my life, that I would have been willing to take my own.”
The sole Democrat on the three-person panel, Rep. Beth Wessel-Kroeschell (Ames), panned the addition of the six-week ban.
“I am disappointed that we have … basically a bait-and-switch,” she said.
Iowa already has among the most hardline anti-abortion laws in the country. The state currently bans the medical procedure after 20 weeks and requires parental consent for minors seeking abortions. Ultrasounds are mandated for those seeking abortions, while Medicaid-funded abortions must receive special approval by the governor. According to the Guttmacher Institute, as of 2014 some 89 percent of Iowa counties did not have clinics offering abortion.
That scenario mirrors a reality across much of the United States, where hardline laws and ongoing efforts on both the state and federal level have rolled back abortion rights. Heartbeat bills have gained popularity in recent years and present an appealing option for abortion opponents. Despite facing repeated opposition from federal courts and officials concerned over constitutional infringements, lawmakers in Ohio, Arkansas, North Dakota, and elsewhere have all attempted to install such legislation. In January, Republicans introduced a national heartbeat billfor the first time in Congress. Iowa Rep. Steve King (R) made the intention of the bill clear to reporters prior to the bill’s introduction.
“We think this bill properly applied does eliminate a large, large share of the abortions — 90 percent or better — of the abortions in America,” King said.
Iowa’s bill hits out at more than just abortion access. The sale of fetal tissue is another popular area of national debate. While fetal tissue donation is legal on a federal level, U.S. law prohibits any parties from profiting in such exchanges. But in 2015, a series of discredited sting videos released by the anti-abortion Center for Medical Progress purported to show Planned Parenthood representatives engaging in the sale of fetal tissue. The videos set off a firestorm of legislation, in addition to sparking a deadly attack on a Planned Parenthood location in Colorado. Last November, Arkansas cut off Medicaid funding to the organization for a second time, citing the videos as rationale. Earlier this year, Ohio passed a lawrequiring fetal tissue to be either buried or cremated.
That trend seems set to continue in Iowa, where residents expressed concern that the state’s advancing heartbeat bill would negatively impact pregnant people in need of help.
“At six weeks and for some time to come, that fetal heartbeat that’s in the bill is dependent upon another heartbeat,” Jane Robinette, an Urbandale resident, told the Des Moines Register. “What about the heartbeat of the 12-year-old incest or rape survivor who finds herself pregnant? What about the heartbeat of the 50-year-old [parent] of grown children. What about the heartbeat of the teenager who cuts herself because of emotional or psychological trauma or who is suicidal?”
The House bill notably removes language contained in a separate version of the legislation in the Senate repealing Iowa’s 20-week restriction if the heartbeat bill becomes law. Another provision in the Senate bill, which would impose a Class D felony on doctors for performing abortions after six weeks, was also removed. Due to procedural deadlines, the House must approve the bill by Friday in order for it to remain eligible for ongoing debate this session.
Iowa’s efforts are the latest in a recent string of anti-abortion measures in the South, Midwest, and Appalachia. After vowing to “end abortions in Mississippi” in 2014, Gov. Phil Bryant (R) is expected to sign a bill banning the procedure after 15 weeks. In Kentucky, the state House of Representatives passed a bill this week banning the commonly-used “dilation and evacuation” procedure, or D&E, after 11 weeks. Banning the procedure would make virtually all second trimester abortions in the state illegal. The bill is now headed to the Kentucky Senate.
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