Repro Roundup 09.20
We know that reproductive equity means so much more than just the right to abortion care. Reproductive equity demands both rights and meaningful access to the full spectrum of reproductive health care, including birth control, abortion care, gender-affirming care, prenatal and maternity care, and assisted reproductive technologies – so that no one’s reproductive future is determined by the whims of politicians.
That’s why Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer brought legislation protecting the right to IVF back to the Senate floor this week, where it was promptly killed by anti-abortion extremists in the Senate minority. Only two Republican members of the Senate voted to protect IVF and increase access to the procedure.
One member of our delegation, Senator Ed Markey, held a photo of our friend and board member, Kate Dineen, at a press conference held just before the vote. After being forced to travel out of Massachusetts for abortion care following a devastating fetal diagnosis, Kate has been able to continue growing her family through the miracle of IVF.
Families across the country have been able to grow their families with the help of assisted reproductive technologies, and anti-abortion extremists want to take that away from us. That’s what is at stake on Election Day – which is now only 46 days away. Are you ready to hit the ground running for reproductive equity champions up and down the ballot?
Connecticut
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Massachusetts
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New Hampshire
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On to this week’s headlines –
News from New England
→ The Joy Continues at Keene Pride!
June might have come and gone, but Repro Equity Now has pride all year long! We were thrilled to join folks in the Monadnock region of New Hampshire at Keene Pride, celebrating New Hampshire's LGBTQ+ community and reminding everyone that abortion access, gender-affirming care, and trans rights are human rights. While pride was a joyful celebration, we also must remember that anti-abortion politicians in New Hampshire just passed three new laws that severely harm transgender youth in the Granite State. With November just around the corner, it is critical that New Hampshire voters understand who is on their ballot, what they stand for, and that Granite Staters pledge to vote for reproductive equity up and down the ballot so we can repeal these inhumane, anti-trans laws. New Hampshire voters can use our voter guide to make sure we send reproductive equity champions to Concord!
→ Instagram Live with Bay State Birth Coalition and Neighborhood Birth Center
After two years of staunch advocacy and multiple decades of work to empower midwives in the legislature, Massachusetts is finally taking action to address the maternal health crisis in the Bay State with a groundbreaking maternal health care package, signed into law by Governor Healey last month. We joined our friends at the Neighborhood Birth Center and the Bay State Birth Coalition on Instagram Live to unpack this groundbreaking legislation, talk about the power of coalition building, and the work still ahead of us! Missed our deep dive into the maternal health care package? You can watch it here.
→ Abortion is on the Ballot Everywhere – Including Connecticut (and all of New England)
We know that with the threat of a second Trump presidency, abortion is on the ballot in all fifty states – even where abortion care is protected by state law. We spoke with Connecticut Insider about the stakes Nutmeggers are facing this election cycle. We know that even though Connecticut has taken bold action to address the fallout of the Dobbs decision, there is still more work to be done to ensure true reproductive equity for all in the Nutmeg State. It is critical that we remain vigilant and vote for reproductive equity for every line on our ballots.
→ Tight Race for a Repro Equity Governor in New Hampshire
Now that Granite Staters have made it through the state primary, it’s time to buckle in and get ready to elect repro equity candidates that we can trust at all levels of state office. Recent polling shows that former Senator Kelly Ayotte, who has a long anti-abortion record, and former Mayor of Manchester Joyce Craig are neck-and-neck in the race for the corner office in New Hampshire.
As a reminder, Kelly Ayotte helped Donald Trump install anti-abortion Justice Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court, who voted to overturn Roe v. Wade. She has pledged to continue withholding funding from community sexual and reproductive health care providers, who provide family planning services to nearly 17,000 Granite Staters at low or no cost. She has also voted for national restrictions on abortion as a Senator.
Meanwhile, Joyce Craig supports eliminating criminal penalties for physicians who provide the highest standard of care to their patients and has pledged to work to restore funding for community sexual and reproductive health care providers. The choice is clear: one candidate can be trusted to defend reproductive freedom and work for reproductive equity, and one cannot.
→ CVS Pharmacists Begin Prescribing Birth Control to Bay Staters
A year after the Massachusetts Legislature passed the FY2024 budget that authorized pharmacists to prescribe birth control, CVS Pharmacy announced that it will begin offering hormonal contraceptive prescribing services! Patients interested in receiving a birth control prescription can be evaluated by a CVS pharmacist and, if clinically eligible, receive a prescription for birth control without visiting their provider’s office. Empowering local pharmacists to prescribe birth control will drastically improve access to contraception, particularly for folks in rural areas or folks who struggle to find primary care or gynecological care. We’re happy to have CVS as partners in the fight for expanded access to contraception and abortion care.
National Notice
→ Abortion Bans Caused by Dobbs are Literally Killing Women
This past week, ProPublica published research that names at least two patient cases in Georgia in which a pregnant woman died as a direct result of the state’s abortion ban. In the case of Amber Nicole Thurman, she was forced by Georgia’s extreme abortion ban to travel eleven hours to North Carolina for abortion care. Because of the high cost of travel, child care, and overnight accommodations, and the extreme demand on clinicians in North Carolina to support patients traveling from across the South, she chose to return to Georgia to complete her medication abortion. Unfortunately, her medication abortion protocol did not fully expel all of the tissue from her uterus, which is typically easily treatable—except in a state with an abortion ban. Physicians at the Atlanta hospital where she sought emergency care failed to operate until it was too late, fearing criminal prosecution under the state’s extreme ban.
In the case of Candi Miller, she sought abortion care to end her fourth pregnancy, after physicians warned her that another pregnancy would likely be deadly for her due to her lupus and diabetes. Too afraid to seek abortion care from a doctor in the midst of Georgia’s abortion ban, Candi ordered medication abortion pills online. She also experienced the rare failure of abortion pills to fully expel all of the tissue from her uterus, a condition that can be extremely painful. Because of Georgia’s abortion ban, and the fear that patients are facing to see doctors and obtain treatment, Miller did not survive.
As feminist scholar Moira Donegan clearly stated, abortion bans are already killing patients, and there are likely victims of these inhumane laws that we do not even know about yet as maternal health committees review cases in the post-Dobbs era. Amber and Candi should be alive today – but post-Dobbs abortion bans killed them.
While we work to undo these horrifying bans, restore abortion access nationwide, and ensure that every patient can access the care they want and need where they want, when they need it, it is critical that patients also understand the options available to them. For patients in Massachusetts or traveling to Massachusetts for abortion care, you can call the Abortion Legal Hotline for free, confidential legal advice on what your care options are. While navigating draconian abortion laws, it is critical that patients and providers understand their rights and obligations.
→ Ken Paxton Sues Biden Administration for Private Medical Records of Abortion Patients
President Biden announced in April that the Department of Health and Human Services was issuing new guidance on hospitals and health care providers’ obligations under HIPAA, which protects the privacy of medical records. This guidance makes clear that physicians are under no obligation to violate HIPAA and give personal medical history to law enforcement officials, including in the instance of investigations regarding the pursuit of abortion care. These protections will help prevent law enforcement from intimidating physicians and hospital administrators from aiding them in their efforts to criminally prosecute patients for obtaining abortion care, including when patients travel from ban states to states with legal abortion care.
Last week, Texas Attorney General (and anti-abortion supervillain) Ken Paxton announced that Texas is suing the Biden Administration over the enforcement of this policy, arguing that they need access to patients’ private medical records to prosecute Texans for their pregnancy outcomes. This is why it is critical that pro-abortion states pass robust shield laws to further bolster privacy protections for patients who travel out of state for abortion care or seek telemedicine care.
→ Anti-abortion Activists in States with Already-Extreme Abortion Bans Seek to Ban Telemedicine Care
A group of anti-abortion Attorneys General from rural states with some of the harshest abortion bans – including Idaho, Iowa, Montana, Nebraska, South Carolina, Texas and Utah – have asked the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals to resurrect efforts in these states to fully ban telemedicine abortion care. This comes after the Supreme Court punted earlier this year on its decision whether to reinstate restrictions on mifepristone, one of two drugs used in a typical medication abortion protocol. We know that attacks on mifepristone will continue to loom on the horizon without national protections for abortion care and serious court reform.
Get Involved!
📍NEW ENGLAND! Save the Date for Repro Equity Now’s 2025 Gala!
Reproductive Equity Now will be hosting our 2025 Gala on May 15th at the InterContinental in Boston, and we would be thrilled to have you join us! Please save the date and keep an eye out for information on tickets and sponsorship opportunities in the coming weeks.
📍PORTSMOUTH, NH! Join us for Moms Night Out!
Missed our Concord Roe’d show but excited to learn about organizing for repro equity in New Hampshire? No worries! We’re joining forces with MomsRising, United Together, and Chamber of Mothers to host an exciting panel on how to vote like a mother! We’ll talk all about how to use our New Hampshire voter guide, how to vote for reproductive equity up and down the ballot, and write some postcards to encourage our communities to join us in voting for reproductive equity! RSVP here.
📍WESTPORT, CT! Join us for a screening of Preconceived!
We’re bringing Preconceived to Westport, CT for back-to-back screenings on Wednesday, October 16th! Preconceived is a new documentary that exposes anti-abortion centers' deceptive and dangerous practices. In Connecticut, these centers outnumber legitimate abortion clinics by nearly two to one. We will be hosting one matinee screening at 10am and one evening showing at 7pm with a panel of local advocates following the film.
📍ANYWHERE! Join the Abortion Access Advocates!
The next AAA meeting – Volunteering 101 and Talking Repro This Election Season – will be on October 7th at 7pm! We’ll cover what to expect when volunteering during the election season and how to use the best messaging to make sure repro wins! RSVP here.
Our Resources
Need to understand your legal rights to provide or access abortion care? Reproductive Equity Now’s Abortion Legal Hotline will help connect Massachusetts-based health care providers and helpers, as well as patients obtaining care in Massachusetts, with free legal advice and resources about abortion access.
Looking for an abortion provider in your area? Our New England Abortion Care Guide allows you to search by zip code for legitimate abortion clinics near you. It even flags dangerous and deceptive anti-abortion centers to avoid at all costs.
Do you want to help advance reproductive equity in your community? Our Win & Deliver Toolkit offers policy proposals and supporting materials to serve as a starting point for municipal leaders looking to move the needle forward on reproductive equity.
Thank you so much for powering this fight. We’re grateful to have you in the movement with us.
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