The Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade was a culture-altering event in the United States, ending nearly five decades of precedent that allowed people across the country the right to abortion. But the ruling will affect people in drastically different ways, depending on where they live. Because the high court did not ban the procedure outright, all abortion-related policies will be left to individual states, creating a heterogeneous regional legal system that ranges from total access to outright bans with few, if any, exceptions. that there is any
There is nothing uniform about the resulting map. Instead, large swaths of the country (the South, Midwest, and Mountain West) have already enacted restrictions or are about to do so, while other regional groups (the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, and West Coast) are buffer zones. where abortion is prohibited. it is expected to remain legal.
As the focus shifts to states, activism follows. Both sides have been reinvigorated by the court’s ruling. For anti-abortion activists, that means using the momentum of their recent victory to fight for an outright ban on the procedure in every state.
“Honestly, the movement has just started,” said AJ Hurley, director of Survivors of the Abortion Holocaust. “The fight now is at the local level.”
Meanwhile, abortion rights advocates are looking for ways to maximize access to abortion services, including a push for President Biden to act unilaterally, particularly in those states where they are recently illegal. As part of that effort, pro-choice states are already considering strategies to welcome back people from states that ban the procedure.
“We’re going to have to fight at all levels to make sure we’re protecting people,” said Rep. Sara Jacobs (D-Calif.), “and in particular low-income people and people of color who will be the most affected. for this decision.”
If that wasn’t confusing enough, the legal landscape is also clouded by new lawsuits challenging some of the state restrictions that have been put in place since Roe was struck down. On Monday, for example, a Louisiana judge blocked the state’s newly installed abortion ban, which was triggered by the court’s ruling just three days earlier. And advocates have already sued for similar restrictions in Utah, Idaho, Kentucky and Mississippi.
After the monumental ruling, here is a playbook outlining what states have done, or are expected to do, on abortion access.
‘trigger’ states
Thirteen conservative-leaning states had adopted abortion restrictions before Friday’s ruling with the idea that they would go into effect when Roe was repealed, or soon after: Arkansas, Idaho, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, and Wyoming.
Restrictions within those states vary by degree, from blanket bans beginning at fertilization to bans beginning a certain number of weeks after conception. Five of those states have exceptions for rape and incest, while the others do not.
The time the new restrictions are released also varies by location. In three states — Kentucky, South Dakota and Louisiana — the ban was immediate and went into effect when Roe was repealed on Friday, according to researchers at the Guttmacher Institute, which supports abortion rights.
In three others, Texas, Idaho and Tennessee, the ban will automatically go into effect 30 days after the court ruling. An additional state, Oklahoma, had installed a ban in May, even with Roe still in place. And several other conservative strongholds, including Florida, Montana, Nebraska and Indiana, are expected to adopt bans, according to Guttmacher.
General prohibitions
Several states have, or soon will have, blanket bans on abortion, with exceptions when the life of the mother is at risk, but not in cases of rape or incest. These include Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, and Texas.
South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem (R) defended the fact that rape and incest victims are now prohibited from terminating their unwanted pregnancies, arguing that “all life is precious.”
“I’ve just never believed that having a tragedy or a tragic situation happen to someone is a reason for another tragedy to happen,” Noem said Sunday on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”
Prohibitions with exceptions
Several states that are about to adopt abortion bans are expected to make exceptions, usually in cases of rape or incest. That list includes Idaho, Mississippi, North Dakota, Utah and Wyoming.
In Idaho, victims of rape or incest who wish to have an abortion must file a police report and send a copy to the doctor before the procedure takes place.
Other states have adopted bans but allow a brief period for legal abortions before they take effect. Montana and North Carolina, for example, have passed bans after 20 weeks. Arizona and Florida have passed 15-week bans. Ohio and South Carolina have put the figure at six weeks. And Georgia and Iowa also enacted six-week bans, but hit a wall in court, where a judge blocked them.
Elsewhere, Republican lawmakers are pushing for new restrictions, though they are unlikely to be enacted any time soon due to Democratic opposition in their respective state governments.
In Virginia, for example, Governor Glenn Youngkin (R) has proposed a 15-week ban, which is almost certain to fail as long as Democrats control the state Senate. Similarly, Wisconsin has a longstanding abortion ban on the books that the state’s Democratic governor vows not to enforce.
States in favor of the right to abortion
As the Midwest contemplates tough new restrictions on a post-Roe America, more liberal coastal states are rushing in the other direction, promising to install new protections that not only codify abortion rights into law, but also create new tools to help. people in states that ban the procedure access abortion services across borders.
“We have grants to help them come to New York,” Rep. Carolyn Maloney (DN.Y.) said. “We are opening our homes, our clinics, everything to help everyone during this period of crisis.”
On the West Coast, abortion services will continue to be available in California, Oregon, Washington, Alaska and Nevada. Democratic Governors Gavin Newsom, Kate Brown and Jay Inslee, who lead California, Oregon and Washington, respectively, signed a multistate pledge on Friday pledging to uphold access to abortion, contraceptives and other reproductive health services.
The same is true along the northeast coast, where Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Rhode Island, Maryland and Virginia are poised to retain or strengthen abortion services.
As outliers in the Midwest, Minnesota, Illinois and Colorado are also fighting to protect services previously guaranteed by Roe.
State efforts will be crucial to preserving abortion services in the aftermath of the Supreme Court decision, as Democratic supporters of abortion rights in Congress don’t have the numbers to enact new federal protections.
It’s a dynamic they know all too well.
“It is clear that the way forward will depend on the outcome of the upcoming midterm elections,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) wrote to fellow Democrats on Friday.
Reference-thehill.com