In Senate testimony, NPWF President Jocelyn C. Frye called the right to travel, including for abortion care, an essential constitutional right
WASHINGTON, D.C. – June 12, 2024 – Today, National Partnership for Women & Families (NPWF) President Jocelyn C. Frye testified as an expert witness in the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Federal Courts, Oversight, Agency Action, and Federal Rights’ hearing on “Crossing the Line: Abortion Bans and Interstate Travel for Care After Dobbs.” In her testimony, Frye said efforts to prohibit residents from crossing state lines to receive abortion care are inconsistent with longstanding constitutional precedent and disruptive to our health care system.
Frye said, “Any woman – and, indeed, any person – should have the right to travel for health care. And this right to travel must be protected to ensure that all people can access essential care whenever they need it.”
Frye also said the Supreme Court’s overturning of the constitutional right to access an abortion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization wreaked havoc on the health care landscape and linked the chaos and disruption caused by abortion bans to the nation’s ongoing maternal health crisis. Frye said women of color, women with low incomes and disabled women have been among the most affected and also tied modern abortion restrictions to deeply-ingrained prejudices that have limited the futures of generations of women:
“These efforts to control women’s bodies, their choices, their opportunities, and their trajectories in life are not new. The willingness to take away individual freedom and access to abortion – often imposed by people who are disconnected from their lives – is not fair. And,too often, it is rooted in longstanding stereotypes about gender roles and responsibilities, race and gender bias, and whether women can participate fully and equally in society and chart their own course.”
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Opening Statement of NPWF President Jocelyn C. Frye Hearing of the United States Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Federal Courts, Oversight, Agency Action, and Federal Rights “Crossing the Line: Abortion Bans and Interstate Travel for Care After Dobbs”
As prepared for delivery.
Chairman Whitehouse, Ranking Member Kennedy, and members of the Committee: I appreciate this opportunity to appear on behalf of the National Partnership for Women & Families.
We are a policy and legal advocacy group that has worked for more than 50 years to improve women’s lives and to ensure that gender is never a barrier to anyone’s opportunities or successes. We believe that guaranteeing meaningful access to reproductive health care – including abortion care – is a vital part of creating a quality, reliable system of health care that extends throughout a person’s life.
Access to abortion is essential health care and should be clearly understood as a basic human right – because reproductive freedom is fundamental to upholding the individual autonomy of all women and their ability to control their own bodies.
The overturning of Roe v. Wade has been devastating and chaotic for both patients and our health care system. When we consider all the states with severe abortion restrictions in place or pending, more than 36 million women of reproductive age are either currently banned – or likely to be banned – from accessing abortion in the states where they live. This means more and more people must travel further to access care.
No one should have to travel to get the health care they need – or face additional burdens if travel is their only option.
In some states, lawmakers have contemplated or tried to enact policies that would effectively prohibit residents from crossing state lines to receive abortion care. These efforts are highly problematic, inconsistent with longstanding constitutional protections and Supreme Court precedent, and would bring even more disruption to our health care system.
The new health care landscape and the lack of abortion access have already erected hurdles to obtaining care. Some providers have stopped practicing in certain states, while some hospitals have been forced to cut back services in their maternity units – or close them entirely.
Nearly one in three counties in the United States is now considered a maternity care desert – meaning they lack access to a hospital maternity care facility, a birth center, an OB-GYN, or a certified nurse-midwife. Some providers report that patients must now wait three months to receive prenatal visits or ultrasound appointments – and sacrifice their time, money, and job security to travel for care. This occurs while maternal health rates in our country already lag far behind many industrialized nations.
The maternal health crisis is especially severe among Black and Indigenous women, as maternal mortality rates are three times higher among Black women than white women. Abortion restrictions only deepen inequities in our health care system.
The costs of traveling for care are significant. They can include gas, food, hotels, taking time from work or losing a job altogether, and childcare or caregiving costs while a patient is away. These costs often fall on those who can least afford them. Research shows that people who must travel the farthest to access abortion care also tend to earn less income.
For example, of the nearly seven million Black women of reproductive age live in states that have banned or are likely to ban abortion, nearly three million of them are economically insecure.[1] The economic hardships of now having to travel for care could put the care they out of reach.
Travel bans also create steep hurdles for disabled women – who may need to navigate mobility challenges and to bear the added expense imposed by accessible transportation services when trying to secure abortion care.
These efforts to control women’s bodies, their choices, their opportunities, and their trajectories in life are not new. The willingness to take away individual freedom and access to abortion – often imposed by people who are disconnected from their lives – is not fair. And, too often, it is rooted in longstanding stereotypes about gender roles and responsibilities, race and gender bias, and whether women can participate fully and equally in society and chart their own course.
Any woman – and, indeed, any person – should have the right to travel for health care. And this right to travel must be protected to ensure that all people can access essential care whenever they need it.
I am grateful for this chance to speak with you – and look forward to answering your questions. Thank you.
[1] We define “economically insecure” as households who live at below 200 percent of the federal poverty line.
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