Oh Boy, The Supreme Court Is Gonna Weigh In On Abortion Again!
Your reproductive rights roundup, a day early because THERE'S JUST SO MUCH.
On Wednesday, the Supreme Court of the United States announced that it will be taking on a case related to the accessibility of the abortion drug mifepristone — at the behest of the Biden administration. So it’s a good thing. Or at least as good of a thing as we can hope for right now.
Mifepristone has been used for decades and complications are very rare, but as we all know, a bunch of anti-abortion organizations and activists have been asking the courts and state legislatures to pretend that it is not safe, because they don’t want people to have abortions. This has actually been pretty successful.
Earlier this year, the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) brought their “case” to Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, a Trump appointee and former anti-abortion activist, who issued a preliminary ruling invalidating the drug's FDA approval … from 20 years ago. Following that, a three-judge panel from the Fifth Circuit partially struck down his ruling and allowed the drug to stay on the market, with some restrictions. The Justice Department then asked the Supreme Court to intervene, and surprisingly they decided to hold any major changes to the drugs availability until the case made its way through the courts.
In August, another three-judge panel from the Fifth Circuit ruled that the FDA’s approval could remain in place but that things had to revert to the pre-2016 rules, which require patients to see a doctor three times during the process and pick the pills up in person, and which are entirely unnecessary.
Apparently, our very anti-abortion Supreme Court is the best shot we have at keeping the medication accessible, which does not sound great.
“Every court so far has agreed that the FDA acted unlawfully in removing common-sense safeguards for women and authorizing dangerous mail-order abortions. We urge the Supreme Court to do the same,” ADF Senior Counsel Erin Hawley — yes, Sen. Josh Hawley’s wife — said in a statement. Sure, but that is only true because the judges themselves were also wacky anti-abortion people. No one without an agenda to end abortion would think that. The FDA, if anything, tends towards being overly cautious — hell, we’re still decades behind the times when it comes to broad spectrum sunscreen technology because they are so cautious.
The FDA is not required to abide by what people with no medical expertise consider “common sense,” that is not a thing. That is not what they are there to evaluate. They evaluate what is actually necessary. What is it that these people imagine would take three doctor visits? Like what do they think happens when people go to see a doctor to get medication? It’s not like they do tests on you beforehand. The FDA realized that these things were ridiculous and unnecessary and they eliminated them. These people can’t explain why they’d be necessary because they are obviously not. Unfortunately, it seems we cannot count on judges to grasp that.
Missouri Republican Backs Off On “Murder Charges For Abortions” Bill
Following an avalanche of criticism, state Rep. Bob Titus of Billings, Missouri, has withdrawn a bill that would have allowed for those who have abortions to be prosecuted for murder.
Although he killed the bill, Titus whined to the Kansas City Star that “media has mischaracterized my interest as hostile toward women.” Because what could possibly be seen as “hostile towards women” about throwing women in prison for having abortions?
“Nothing could be further from the truth. My heart breaks for the killing of children,” he explained. Oh, we are all very sure it does. He cares so much about children, except for the children whose mothers he will be throwing in prison for having abortions.
Alas, after Titus scrapped the bill, another Missouri Republican, Sen. Mike Moon, went and made an identical bill with the exact same name: the “Abolition of Abortion in Missouri Act.”
This is what Republicans want. They want our already overcrowded prisons filled with people who have had or assisted someone in having an abortion. Those who said they didn’t want to punish women for having abortions were always, always lying — that is exactly what they want.
Kentucky Woman Suing For Her Right To An Abortion Learns Her Embryo Has No Cardiac Activity
A woman who filed a lawsuit against the state of Kentucky to be allowed to have an abortion — based on her right to privacy and self-determination under the state constitution — learned this week from doctors that her eight-week-old embryo does not have any cardiac activity — which one would imagine does not bode well for its survival.
While it’s not clear how this will affect the lawsuit, lawyers from the ACLU representing the woman, identified as Jane Doe, say they plan to continue the case.
Via Washington Post:
The lawsuit challenges two laws in Kentucky: one that allows abortion only in the case of medical emergency or life endangerment, and a ban on abortions after six weeks of pregnancy.
“The bans and the irreparable harms they inflict are an affront to the health and dignity of all Kentuckians,” the lawsuit states. “Everyone who can become pregnant has a right to determine their own future and to make decisions about their relationships and life opportunities without government interference that puts their health and well-being at risk.”
That really should be obvious.
Ohio Woman Who Miscarried To Be Charged With ‘Abuse Of A Corpse’
Britney Watts, 33, of Trumbull County, Ohio, is being charged with felony '“abuse of a corpse” following a miscarriage this past September. Watts was 22 weeks pregnant when she miscarried while going to the bathroom and the fetus fell into the water. She attempted to flush it but it clogged up her toilet.
A forensic pathologist has determined that the fetus was dead before it hit the water.
“This fetus was going to be non-viable. It was going to be non-viable because she had premature ruptured membranes — her water had broken early — and the fetus was too young to be delivered,” Dr. George Sterbenz explained. But county prosecutors don’t care.
“The issue isn’t how the child died, when the child died — it’s the fact that the baby was put into a toilet, large enough to clog up a toilet, left in that toilet and she went on [with] her day,” said Warren assistant prosecutor Lewis Guarnieri.
First of all, what was she supposed to do? Perform CPR? Call 911? Hold a funeral? Also the baby wasn’t “put into a toilet,” she miscarried while on the toilet. It’s not like she said “Oh, I know, I’ll put my miscarried fetus in the toilet.” It was probably a horrifying experience and she didn’t know what to do. Who would? What would be the protocol for that, exactly? Because I sure as hell don’t know.
I would imagine that a whole lot of people thought we were overstating things when we said these laws would result in sending women to prison over miscarriages. Clearly we were not.
And some more …
An anti-abortion group that offered to pay women thousands of dollars not to have abortions never actually paid them that money — and has now been ordered by a court to do so.
The anti-abortion stuff is failing so hard that Kellyanne Conway and some other Republican strategists now have a plan to teach other Republicans how to sound like they at least support contraception.
Floridians trying to get abortion on the ballot are inching closer to their goal, and bringing some Republicans along with them.
Arizona’s state supreme court is hearing a case this week on the state’s 1864 abortion ban, which bans all abortion except to save the life of the mother. Right now the state bans the procedure after 15 weeks, which is also pretty bad.
A judge may soon rule on Wyoming’s abortion ban, which includes an explicit ban on medication abortion.
I miscarried twice, on the toilet. I literally flushed it away, because, y'know, big fucking mess in the toilet, and was then hysterical bc I'd lost my babies. My doctor never even asked me what I did with the fetal material because this is literally what literally everyone in this situation does.
>>“The issue isn’t how the child died, when the child died — it’s the fact that the baby was put into a toilet, large enough to clog up a toilet, left in that toilet and she went on [with] her day,” said Warren assistant prosecutor Lewis Guarnieri.<<
This was a fetus, NOT A CHILD. Quit calling it a child, you goddamn ghouls.