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Top Lawmakers Drop Abortion Limits From Defense Bill, Setting up Fight With the Right

Politico, December 7, 2023

A compromise defense policy bill unveiled late Wednesday will not include a Republican-backed proposal to block the Pentagon’s abortion travel policy, nixing a controversial measure that threatened to tank the legislation. The exclusion sets up a test for Speaker Mike Johnson, who will need to sell a deal that is more moderate than the hard-right defense bill the House passed in July largely along party lines. Johnson’s task of uniting Republicans behind the $886 billion National Defense Authorization Act will be further complicated by congressional leaders’ decision to attach a four-month extension of warrantless government surveillance authorities. The Senate is set to consider the deal first, and could take an initial procedural vote as soon as Thursday. The House will follow and is likely to consider the measure under suspension of the rules – an expedited process that requires a two-thirds majority. The tactic could ease Johnson’s push to pass the deal by bypassing tricky procedural votes that hardliners have tanked recently. This new version of the bill is on track to pass both houses with bipartisan support. Yet the abortion policy omission is a blow to conservatives who muscled the provision into the House version of the bill over the summer. Hard-right Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), a member of the conference committee on the defense bill, described her position as “hell no” after GOP provisions on abortion and transgender troops fell away and an extension of the surveillance authorities was included. “This was a total sell-out of conservative principles and a huge win for Democrats,” Greene tweeted. Still, Republicans saw wins with some concessions that rein in Pentagon efforts to promote diversity and inclusion in the ranks. Lawmakers in both parties expect Johnson to help shepherd a bipartisan bill through the House. But pushing through a bill that drops many conservative priorities could earn Johnson even greater ire. He’s already taking heat from his right flank on government funding, Ukraine aid and other issues. The Pentagon instituted a policy this year to reimburse troops for the costs of traveling to seek abortions. Republicans argue it undermines laws that bar taxpayer money for abortions.

Court Grants Texas Woman’s Request for Emergency Abortion in Historic Ruling

ABC News, December 7, 2023

A judge granted a Texas woman’s request for an abortion for a pregnancy with a severe anomaly on Thursday. The woman, Kate Cox, had filed a lawsuit against the state over its restrictive abortion bans, asking a judge to grant her a temporary restraining order that would allow her to get an abortion. “The idea that Miss Cox wants desperately to be a parent, and this law might actually cause her to lose that ability is shocking, and would be a genuine miscarriage of justice,” Judge Maya Guerra Gamble said Thursday. It’s the first publicized case of a woman suing for an emergency abortion since Roe vs Wade in 1973. Cox is currently carrying a pregnancy with virtually no chance the baby – who has trisomy 18 – will survive to birth or long afterward. She’s said she has been denied the safest form of abortion care for her – a dilation and evacuation procedure. The hearing was held in Travis County’s 459th District Court in Austin, and lasted about a half hour before the ruling was delivered. Cox’s lawsuit stands separate from a suit filed by 20 women who say their lives were put in danger due to Texas’ abortion bans. That suit is before the Texas state Supreme Court for a ruling on whether the challenge can continue and if a temporary hold on implementation of the bans in cases of fatal fetal anomalies and medical emergencies can go into effect. Texas has multiple overlapping abortion bans in effect with severe punishments for violations of the bans. Texas’ bans include exceptions that allow abortions in cases of medical emergencies and fatal fetal diagnoses, but doctors and patients claim, in another lawsuit filed in March, that they are unable to provide care or have been denied care, respectively, under the laws. Under Texas’ bans, it is a second-degree felony to perform or attempt an abortion, punishable by up to life in prison and a fine of up to $10,000. The law also allows private citizens to sue anyone who “aids or abets” an abortion.

Post-Roe, Nearly 1 in 5 People Seeking an Abortion Traveled Out of State, Analysis Finds

CNN, December 7, 2023

With abortion banned in more than a dozen states and restricted in many others, it’s become about twice as common for people in the United States to travel across state lines for their abortion care, a new analysis found. Nearly 1 in 5 people who had an abortion in the first half of 2023 – more than 92,000 people – traveled across state lines for their care, according to a report from the Guttmacher Institute, a research and policy organization focused on sexual and reproductive health that supports abortion rights. In a similar timeframe in 2020, before the US Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision revoked the federal right to abortion, less than 1 in 10 people left their home state for an abortion – about 50,000 fewer people. The data probably understates the impact that the Dobbs decision has had, says Isaac Maddow-Zimet, a data scientist with the Guttmacher Institute and lead researcher for the new report. More people are traveling for abortion care, and they’re traveling farther – largely because many states with bans and restrictions border each other. “Folks from Texas, for example, might have been traveling to Oklahoma [in 2020]. Now, in 2023, those folks are still traveling, but they can’t travel to Oklahoma anymore. It leads to a situation where people have to cross multiple state lines and travel very far distances,” Maddow–Zimet said. “And when you have to travel so much farther, the costs start to multiply. It really implies much higher financial costs and much higher logistical costs.” The increase in travel is changing the clinical needs for people seeking abortions, and providers are adapting. Clinics in Ohio are seeing patients at later gestational age, said Dr. Adarsh Krishen, chief medical officer of Planned Parenthood of Greater Ohio. And although medication abortion is still most common, more patients are opting for procedural abortion, he said, especially those who have traveled from other states who want to be sure it was effective. “We treat each patient as an individual.”

Pregnancy Loss in America Has Long Been a Lonely Experience. Abortion Bans Have Made It Perilous.

The 19th, December 7, 2023

[…] About 3.7 million babies are born in the country each year, around half of which are considered the result of planned pregnancies. But those numbers tell only part of the story – the version that ends in a nursery, in baby names, in onesies and birthday parties. Less discussed are the pregnancies with very different outcomes: Miscarriages, which occur in up to 1 in 3 pregnancies, are often the most commonly discussed form of pregnancy loss. But for many people, miscarriage isn’t the only nonviable pregnancy. There are situations that threaten the health of pregnant people themselves, such as ectopic pregnancies, a life-threatening condition. There are the pregnancies terminated because of medical complications and health concerns that are often only discovered in the second trimester. Stillbirths represent yet another form of loss, defined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as when a fetus dies after 20 weeks of pregnancy. And the standard medical treatment for any of these conditions often relies on access to abortion. Abortion bans have jeopardized access to care for miscarriages and other pregnancy-related complications. The stakes associated with losing a pregnancy are high, with increased medical and legal risks, especially in the 14 states where abortion is now almost entirely outlawed and the two more that ban the procedure for people past six weeks of pregnancy – including Georgia, Carver’s home state. […] Pregnancy loss in America has long been a lonely experience. A 2015 study found that a majority of American adults believed that miscarriage occurred in 5 percent of pregnancies or fewer. About 47 percent of people who had a miscarriage said they felt guilty; 41 percent said they felt like they had done something wrong. It’s a consistent theme across different kinds of pregnancy loss; a smaller study also published that year found that Americans who terminated their pregnancies because of fetal anomalies often blamed themselves for their diagnoses, and reported social isolation because of the stigma surrounding abortion.

State Abortion Bans Bar Exceptions for Suicide, Mental Health

Roll Call, December 7, 2023

In the year since the Supreme Court outlawed the national right to an abortion, 18 states have implemented abortion bans that specify that mental health or suicidality do not qualify as a health-related exception for the woman – a deviation that’s occurring despite growing national momentum to treat physical and mental health equally. Suicide is one of the leading causes of death among women of reproductive age. Nearly 23 percent of pregnancy-related deaths are attributed to mental health conditions, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “These are the conditions that are killing women and the absolute greatest risk factors for them are mental health conditions like depression and substance use disorders,” said Constance Guille, founder and director of the Women’s Reproductive Behavioral Health Division at the Medical University of South Carolina. “So these conditions are absolutely just as deadly as many other conditions in medicine.” Despite the June 2022 Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision overturning the federal right to an abortion, federal law still requires states to provide abortions in the case of medical emergencies or risk losing Medicare funding – a significant source of their revenue. But what constitutes a medical emergency is not uniform, at least not in a legal sense. While state statutes vary in specificity, no state explicitly offers protections for mental health emergencies. The gray area has been confusing for medical providers. “There’s a lot of confusion. There’s a lot of anxiety, particularly when you then link that into potential prosecution of the provider,” said Guille, a reproductive psychiatrist. “People are afraid to step in and do the right thing and care because they’re so worried that they’re going to do something illegal, especially when the laws are confusing and it’s not quite certain.” The push to distance mental health from physical health in state abortion laws comes despite decreasing stigma and broader bipartisan acceptance of policies related to many areas of mental health. Congress passed bipartisan mental health parity laws in 1996 and 2008, requiring insurers to provide equal coverage for mental health and physical conditions.

ICYMI: In Case You Missed It

While our sister organization @nwlc is under attack for standing up for trans rights, We’re joining @fgossgraves saying loud and clear: excluding trans women and girls hurts ALL women and girls. https://t.co/pr0hApbA5z

– National Partnership (@NPWF) December 6, 2023

 

 

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Note: The information contained in this publication reflects media coverage of women’s health issues and does not necessarily reflect the views of the National Partnership for Women & Families.