Dear John,
It’s increasingly clear that the anti-abortion movement isn’t stopping at abortion—they’re coming after birth control.
Republican leadership in Congress this week put forward a budget proposal that would, in addition to raising the retirement age for Social Security, endorse a bill that would codify the idea that life begins at conception. The Life at Conception Act establishes legal protections “at all stages of life, including the moment of fertilization,” that if passed, would amount to a nationwide abortion ban that would also endanger many of the most popular forms of birth control. And in Arizona, Republicans in the state legislature staunchly opposed efforts to safeguard access to contraception, unanimously voting to block the Right to Contraception Act last week.
The Arizona GOP’s contempt and disregard for women could not be any more apparent. “Like I said, Bayer Company invented aspirin. Put it between your knees,” said Republican Senate Majority Leader Sonny Borrelli, just days before the vote, when he was asked if he would oppose efforts to restrict birth control access.
The views held by Borrelli and his Republican peers both in Arizona and in Congress do not align with the views of the vast majority of Americans—according to recent polling, voters across demographics and parties believe that contraception is at risk, and believe in protecting it.
In good news this week, courts across the country are increasingly affirming that attacks on abortion and contraception access are sex discrimination. In Minnesota, an Appeals court found a pharmacist guilty of sex discrimination for refusing to dispense emergency contraception due to his own religious beliefs. And in Nevada, a district court ruled that its state Equal Rights Amendment safeguards Medicaid funding for abortions. Similarly, in a recent ruling, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court found that abortion providers can challenge the state’s ban on Medicaid funding for abortions on the basis of sex discrimination, and that the ban is presumptively unconstitutional under Pennsylvania's state ERA.
The Nevada and Pennsylvania rulings highlight the role that the federal ERA could play in securing abortion rights nationwide—and fuel the renewed push for the ERA to be finally included in the Constitution.
This could not be more timely—especially with a case before the Supreme Court that many are saying could be the next Dobbs. Ms. contributing editor Carrie Baker delves into the case, which seeks to roll back the FDA’s approval of the abortion medication mifepristone, in the Spring issue of Ms. Regardless of the case’s outcome, “the Supreme Court’s majority will no doubt continue to look for ways to restrict abortion access, and women will continue to share abortion pills and information—no matter what happens,” she writes.
The Court is set to hear the case, Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v. U.S. Food and Drug Administration, this coming Tuesday—you can tune in live to listen to the hearing here. And you can count on Ms. to keep you informed and up to date as it progresses.
Onward,
