Dear John,
If you’re dizzy from trying to keep up with the status of abortion access and rights in the U.S. these days, you’re not the only one. We’re going to try to make sense of it for you—here’s what happened this past week.
It was just one week ago that a federal district court in Texas ruled to suspend the FDA’s approval of mifepristone, one of two medications used in over 50 percent of all abortions. The Department of Justice immediately appealed, and late this past Wednesday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled in a divided opinion that mifepristone could remain available for use throughout the United States—but with significant limitations that would greatly restrict access.
On Friday morning, the Biden administration’s Justice Department asked the Supreme Court in an emergency application to restore full access to mifepristone under the FDA’s current regulations, and stay all parts of the Texas judge’s ruling. In response, Justice Alito issued an administrative stay of the Fifth Circuit’s ruling until midnight Wednesday, April 19 to give the Court time to review the petitions—meaning that no parts of the ruling will go into effect, yet. The issue is likely to go before the full court which could result in a decision next week.
At the same time, a federal district court judge in Washington state issued a decision last Friday that directly contradicts the Texas ruling: an injunction that blocks the FDA from limiting mifepristone’s availability in 17 plaintiff states and the District of Columbia. And Thursday night, the same judge issued a clarification that the FDA must follow his order “irrespective” of any Fifth Circuit appeals court ruling.
And on Thursday, Florida’s Republican-dominated legislature voted to ban most abortions after six weeks, with exceptions for rape and incest up to 15 weeks (existing law already includes exceptions for the health and life of the woman within the first 15 weeks). Governor Ron DeSantis promptly signed the bill into law Friday. The ban—which restricts abortions at a moment in pregnancy when most women don’t even know they’re pregnant—closes off a state that has been a vital lifeline for abortion services in the South post-Dobbs.
In the face of these attacks on reproductive autonomy, the need for the Equal Rights Amendment becomes all the more urgent. The amendment—which has yet to be officially recognized in the Constitution, despite meeting the threshold for ratification by three-quarters of the states—would provide a legal basis to challenge these discriminatory abortion bans.
“How do we, as women, as feminists, actually make a shift that will stand the test of time when it comes to women’s rights?” asks constitutional law scholar and Boston University professor Aziza Ahmed in the Spring issue of Ms. “I think this speaks to the importance of an Equal Rights Amendment. We have to make it harder for conservative judges and politicians to say that [women’s rights aren’t] the will of the American people.”
The ERA would also help secure stronger laws to enable survivors to hold their sexual abusers accountable—protections that, as we mark Sexual Abuse Awareness Month this April, we know to be long overdue.
Let’s take a moment to review the numbers. According to a PRRI survey:
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72 percent—nearly three-quarters—of Americans oppose “laws that make it illegal to use or receive through the mail FDA-approved drugs for a medical abortion.”
- 63 percent oppose laws that ban abortions after six weeks, like the Florida ban.
- 52 percent—over half—oppose 15-week bans.
What’s more, we might add that 83 percent of the American public supports the inclusion of the ERA in the constitution.
I think the numbers speak for themselves—but are the Supreme Court and lawmakers paying attention?
Onward,
