Florida—a state with the third largest population in the U.S. and the second largest abortion provider in the U.S.—has recently allowed a state Supreme Court decision that will ban abortion after six weeks gestation. Lauren Brenzel, Campaign Director with Floridians Protecting Freedom sits down to talk with us about the inner workings of this case and how it will further impact abortion access for those in the state and across the country. 

After this policy goes into effect on May 1st, 2024, patients in Florida (who can) will likely have to travel as far as New York and Illinois to receive abortion care. Florida’s Supreme Court decision follows up years of challenging legislative sessions that have dismantled public education, banned sex education, and prevented the expansion of Medicaid. A ballot initiative has been introduced that may remove the Supreme Court ruling in November. If you’d like to learn more about reproductive justice and voting rights, check out our past podcast episode here.

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April 11-17, 2024, marks Black Maternal Health week. Dr. Monica McLemore, Professor of Child, Family, and Population Health Nursing at the University of Washington and Director of the Manning Price Spratlen Center for Anti-Racism and Equity in Nursing sits down to talk with us about the state of maternal morbidity and mortality in the U.S., the upcoming Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA) Supreme Court case, and achieving comprehensive reproductive justice. 

Black women are three times more likely to die from a pregnancy related case than white women, with the CDC noting that 80% of pregnancy related deaths are preventable. As the Supreme Court gets ready to hear the EMTALA case, which could allow medical professionals to turn those in urgent or emergency need of an abortion away due to “conscience” concerns, maternal mortality and morbidity may increase as abortion becomes increasingly more difficult to access. As the wealthiest nation with the worst maternal health outcomes, the United States has the capacity to recognize the human right to choose if, when, and how to have children, access resources to plan one’s family, parent children in safe and sustainable communities, experience bodily autonomy and sexual pleasure, and provide holistic health care through a reproductive justice lens. 

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Pregnancy criminalization—often rooted in fetal personhood laws and anti-drug sentiment—has a long history and applies criminal suspicions to those who have pregnancies resulting in miscarriages or stillbirths. Lourdes Rivera, President of Pregnancy Justice and Dr. Dorothy Roberts, professor of Africana Studies, Law, and Sociology at the University of Pennsylvania and author of Torn Apart: How the Child Welfare System Destroys Black Families—and How Abolition Can Build a Safer World, sit down to talk with us about pregnancy criminalization, the child welfare system, and how Roe’s overturning further impacts rates of criminalization.   

Themes of compelling people to give birth, the separation of families, and the criminalization of pregnancy reaches back to the United States’ slavery era. Pregnancy criminalization heavily unfolded during the U.S.’ crack cocaine epidemic in the 1980s, disproportionately targeting Black women and turning a public health matter into a criminal one. These reproductive liberties, which have been consistently attacked throughout U.S. history, are further constrained with the repeal of Roe. Mandatory reporters within the current child welfare system are much more likely to report Black women to child protection authorities, as well as impoverished patients. 

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The Comstock Act, a 150-year-old law named after “anti-vice” crusader Anthony Comstock, passed in 1873. It allowed enforcement power to investigate the U.S. mail for items of an “illicit,” “lewd,” or “immoral” purpose, including items related to abortion. Greer Donley, Associate Professor and Reproductive Justice Scholar at University of Pittsburgh Law School, sits down to talk with us about the Comstock Act—what is it, what it means, and how anti-abortion activists are working to revive it. 

Today, the courts are packed with extreme conservative judges and Trump-appointees who maintain a vested interest in maintaining the act as a strategy to ban abortion pills and procedural items sent through the mail. To combat the Comstock Act and its ability to further decimate reproductive health and rights, Comstock must be completely repealed, and a presidential administration that doesn’t enforce Comstock is necessary. The president, who also has the power of pardoning, can pre-pardon anyone later convicted within the 5-year statutory period of a Comstock-related crime before leaving office. 

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California, a self-dubbed “reproductive freedom state,” scored an A+ on rePROs Fight Back’s forthcoming 50-state report card on reproductive health and rights. However, numerous barriers to abortion– a form of basic healthcare– persist in every state, California included. Jessica Pinckney Gil, Executive Director at ACCESS REPRODUCTIVE JUSTICE, California's statewide abortion fund, sits down to talk with us about the fragmentary landscape of abortion access in the state through a reproductive justice lens and progress made in bridging gaps to care.

Abortion is not accessible for many Californians, particularly low-income individuals and those living in rural areas, and fewer than two-thirds of counties in California have abortion clinics, leaving some residents hundreds of miles away from care. Transportation, childcare, unreliable internet access, and taking time off work can present insurmountable obstacles for many. Still, grassroots efforts and legislative initiatives are making strides toward improving abortion access in the state. The California Future of Abortion Council, a group of reproductive justice activists, researchers, providers, and patients, produced two reports featuring recommendations to improve and safeguard abortion access in the state. These recommendations have led to the introduction of 28 pro-abortion bills in the 2022 and 2023 legislative sessions and secured over $200 million in funding to expand abortion access in California. 

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Particularly after the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision, reproductive health, rights, and justice can feel very doom-and-gloom. Yet, states around the country are continuing to undertake progressive and opportunistic legislative advancement. Jennifer Driver, Senior Director of Reproductive Rights with the State Innovation Exchange, sits down to talk with us about exciting state-level movement, how to successfully work with legislators, and what wins we may expect to see in the near future. 

Increasing contraceptive access, the removal of funding for crisis pregnancy centers, and the introduction of constitutional protections are just some examples of progressive state legislature that may expand and support sexual and reproductive health and rights. In addition, some bills focused around maternal health, doulas, and midwifery are sources of hopeful change. While it can often feel like SRHRJ is impacted by one bad policy after the next, let’s take a moment to celebrate the encouraging push for access across the country. 

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In a recent decision, the Alabama Supreme Court declared frozen embryos the same status as people. The decision, which is not grounded in law, references theology and the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case as a citation. Jessica Mason Pieklo, Senior Vice President and Executive Editor at Rewire News Group and cohost of Boom! Lawyered, sits down to talk with us about the recent Alabama Supreme Court ruling, in vitro fertilization, and the concept of fetal personhood.

This ruling stems from a legal situation in which an in vitro fertilization (IVF) clinic worker dropped some embryo dishes, accidentally destroying them. This court case ruling has effectively shut down IVF therapy across the state, which will undoubtedly cause a ripple effect and disproportionately impact those who depend upon IVF for family planning. This ruling may also have implications for contraception—if life, according to Alabama, truly “begins at conception,” then IUDs, which purposefully interferes with implantation, may be at risk.

 Another upcoming Supreme Court case, Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v. FDA, will prove threatening to medication abortion and telehealth generally. You can learn more here.

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Per year in the U.S., there are around 4 million births, between 850,000 - 1,000,0000 abortions, and 18,000 - 22,000 private domestic infant adoptions. Gretchen Sisson, Sociologist in Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health (ANSIRH) at the University of San Francisco and author of Relinquished: The Politics of Adoption and the Privilege of American Motherhood, sits down to talk to us about the history of American domestic adoption, busts some adoption myths, and underlines how adoption and reproductive health and rights intertwine.  

Adoption is the U.S. has a long, complicated, and often painful history. In the modern day, adoption is often presented as an alternative to abortion, but Gretchen’s research showed that study participants rarely weighed an abortion vs. adoption; most often, people who couldn’t get an abortion then turned to adoption relinquishment as an option. There is no telling what the overturning of Roe will mean for the future of abortion and adoption in the U.S.—data on adoptions pre-Roe is still sparse. 

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For decades, abortion funds have worked tirelessly to bridge the gaps in access for people who needed abortion care. Their very existence highlights the fact that Roe failed to protect and address the needs of many communities marginalized by systems of oppression. Lexis Dotson-Dufault, Executive Director of the Abortion Fund of Ohio (AFO), sits down to talk with us about her first abortion, the importance of reproductive justice, and why Roe was never enough.

Having grown up in a conservative environment, Lexis initially did not see abortion as an option when she discovered she was experiencing an unwanted pregnancy. Open and de-stigmatized  conversations about abortion empowered Lexis to get the care that she needed. Now an abortion storyteller and champion herself, Lexis’s abortion story exemplifies that abortion storytelling changes and saves lives. As Executive Director of AFO—an organization grounded in reproductive justice—Lexis has borne first-hand witness to the profound impact of the Dobbs decision. In the journey towards collective liberation, it is imperative that we center the visionary leadership of Black reproductive justice activists and organizations and transform sexual and reproductive health, rights, and justice in the United States.

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As Valentine’s Day approaches, we’re talking about the ultimate sexual and reproductive health and rights topic-- pleasure! Having researched how Black women experience and internalize pleasure, Lorraine Lacroix-Williamson, public health researcher, sits down to talk with us about sexual pleasure, how it fits into the sexual and reproductive health and rights umbrella, and how it relates to public health.

Stigma, purity culture, mis- and dis-information and limited sex education act as barriers to honest feelings and conversations about sexual pleasure. These barriers disproportionately impact women; a 2018 study looking at national data found a huge discrepancy in orgasm experience. Heterosexual men experienced an orgasm 95% of the time they engaged in sexual activity, followed by gay men at 89% of the time and bisexual men at 88%. Lesbian women experienced orgasm 86% of the time, followed by bisexual women at 66%, and heterosexual women at 65%. The good news? There’s plenty of resources to use, things to learn, and ideas to explore to define what pleasure means to you.

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