Missouri Republican Introduces Federal Abortion Ban in the House

Rep. Eric Burlison (R-Miss.) has introduced a new bill in the House, the so-called “Life at Conception Act” (HR 722), which would ban abortion across the nation.

According to a press release from Burlison’s office on Jan. 24, “This landmark legislation declares that unborn children are ‘persons’ under the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution, allowing their right to life to be legally recognized and protected.”

A quote from Burlison reads: “Every life is a sacred gift from God, deserving of dignity and protection from the moment of conception. The Life at Conception Act uses Congress’ constitutional authority to define personhood, fulfilling our moral and legal obligation to safeguard the lives of the unborn.”

Burlison is attempting to use the 14th Amendment—which grants citizenship to all people born in the United States—to extend personhood to fetuses and embryos. Ironically, Republicans are also currently trying to undermine the right to citizenship that the 14th Amendment grants to people born in the U.S., with President Trump signing an unconstitutional executive order last week attempting to block birthright citizenship for children born to undocumented immigrants in the U.S.

Antiabortion groups Students for Life, National Pro-Life Alliance and Catholic Vote, among others, have already endorsed the bill, along with 68 co-sponsors in the House. If it were to pass, the bill would need a majority of votes (218 out of 435) in the House before moving onto the Senate.

Feminist author, Jessica Valenti, wrote that the bill, although unlikely to pass, “invokes and centers ‘equal protection’—a term that’s become Republican code for charging abortion patients with murder.” She also connected the bill to “the mainstreaming of so-called abortion ‘abolitionists’ who want the law to treat abortion patients as murderers”—just a few weeks after four states, South Dakota, Oklahoma, North Dakota and Indiana, introduced bills that would reclassify abortion as homicide and prosecute abortion patients as murderers, which could mean the death penalty.

The Feminist Newswire will continue tracking bill HR 722 as Burlison attempts to move it through the House.

Louisiana Indicts New York Abortion Provider For Mailing Abortion Pills To Louisiana Patient

In the first case of its kind since the fall of Roe v. Wade, a Louisiana grand jury has indicted Dr. Maggie Carpenter, the New York OB-GYN whom Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton also sued for prescribing telehealth abortion pills to a Texas woman.

On Jan. 31, Louisiana indicted Dr. Carpenter and issued an arrest warrant on charges of “criminal abortion by means of abortion-inducing drugs,” a felony punishable in the state by up to 15 years in prison, $200,000 of fines and the loss of a doctor’s medical license.

New York, Dr. Carpenter’s home state, has shield laws in place to protect telehealth abortion providers who send medication abortion to out-of-state patients. According to a statement from Letitia James, New York’s attorney general, “The criminalization of abortion care is a direct and brazen attack on Americans’ bodily autonomy and their right to reproductive freedom. This cowardly attempt out of Louisiana to weaponize the law against out-of-state providers is unjust and un-American. We will not allow bad actors to undermine our providers’ ability to deliver critical care.”

The Louisiana jury indicted Dr. Carpenter for mailing medication abortion to a teenage girl in Port Allen, La. District attorney Tony Clayton has claimed that the girl’s mother “coerced” her into the abortion, even though the indictment includes no mention of “coerced abortion,” Clayton—who went on a talk show to publicize the case—said that the mother has been taken into custody at West Baton Rouge Parish Jail.

Since Dobbs, Louisiana has had a near-total abortion ban with no restrictions for rape or incest. State Attorney General Liz Murrill stated on social media: “It is illegal to send abortion pills into this State and it’s illegal to coerce another into having an abortion,” she said. “I have said it before and I will say it again: We will hold individuals accountable for breaking the law.” Clayton also said, “We expect Dr. Carpenter to come to Louisiana and answer to these charges.”

New York is one of six states with shield laws in place for telehealth providers. Shield-state clinicians provide FDA-approved abortion pills by mail to about 12,000 patients every month in states with abortion bans, over 13 percent of abortions in the country. Even though telehealth abortion comes with some drawbacks, especially for low-income patients as many abortion funds won’t cover the cost of telehealth abortion for people living in ban states, telehealth has become a lifeline for many women living in states with hostile antiabortion legislation.

Dr. Carpenter is one of the founders of the Abortion Coalition for Telemedicine (ACT). In a statement to the Louisiana Illuminator, ACT said, “The case out of Louisiana against a licensed New York doctor is the latest in a series of threats that jeopardizes women’s access to reproductive healthcare throughout this country. Make no mistake, since Roe v. Wade was overturned, we’ve witnessed a disturbing pattern of interference with women’s rights. It’s no secret the United States has a history of violence and harassment against abortion providers, and this state-sponsored effort to prosecute a doctor providing safe and effective care should alarm everyone.”

Trump’s Pardons of 23 Antiabortion Extremists Endanger Providers and Patients

Capitol Police prepare to arrest Lauren Handy, third from left, of Anti-Choice Project D.C., and other antiabortion demonstrators, who participated in a “pray-in” outside the office of then-Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) to protest a canceled House vote that would ban abortions after 20 weeks on March 25, 2015. (Tom Williams / CQ Roll Call)

*adapted from Ms. Magazine*

Twenty-three antiabortion extremists convicted of violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act (FACE Act) were pardoned by President Donald Trump on Thursday. The pardons place extremists responsible for invading and blockading reproductive healthcare clinics in dozens of states back on the street, inviting more violence and chaos against patients and abortion providers.

On Friday, the day of the antiabortion March for Life rally in D.C., Trump’s new Justice Department also issued an order stopping prosecutions of people blocking access to reproductive healthcare facilities. According to Justice Department chief of staff Chad Mizelle, prosecutions and civil actions under the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act or FACE Act will now be allowed only in “extraordinary circumstances.” Mizelle also ordered the dismissal of three ongoing FACE Act cases related to attacks on clinics in Tennessee, Pennsylvania and Ohio in 2021 where antiabortion protestors threatened patients and blocked their access to the clinics.

While right-wing extremists refer to these criminal defendants as “peaceful pro-life Americans … deserving of full and unconditional pardons,” abortion advocates know them for their history as leaders of campaigns of terror and for orchestrating dangerous invasions of healthcare clinics in dozens of states. The 23 individuals whom Trump pardoned on Thursday had previously been convicted in historic federal prosecutions.

The pardons benefit defendants of dangerous clinic invasions, such as that at the 2020 Washington, D.C., Surgi-Clinic. Unlike the propaganda delivered by right-wing media outlets of the defendants as “peaceful protestors,” duVergne Gaines, director of the Feminist Majority Foundation’s National Clinic Access Project, says that footage of the 2020 clinic invasion “depicted women desperate for care and in medically fragile situations, including fainting in the hallway, being terrorized and traumatized by extremists.”

The anticipated move is a symbol of Trump’s genuflecting to the right, and right-wing antiabortion groups are continuing to beat the drum for Congress to abolish the FACE Act. The federal law, enacted in 1994, ”prohibits violent, threatening, damaging and obstructive conduct intended to injure, intimidate, or interfere with the right to seek, obtain or provide reproductive health services.”

The latest efforts to repeal the law are led by Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) and Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), who reintroduced a bill to repeal the FACE Act on Tuesday, saying it has been used to weaponize the Department of Justice. On Thursday, Trump also put a freeze on all cases within the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division.

The pardons—which came three days into the Trump administration and just one day before the March for Life—fulfill a campaign promise Trump made to antiabortion groups during a speech to the Faith and Freedom Coalition on the campaign trail in June. Several antiabortion groups, including Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, Students for Life, the Thomas More Society and Americans United for Life, have been lobbying Trump to issue the pardons in public and through private channels.

The Thomas More Society is a well-funded Chicago conservative Roman Catholic public interest law firm engaged in culture war issues, including opposing gay marriage and the 2020 election results. Lawyers from the conservative organization sent a letter earlier this month congratulating the president on his election and asking for the release of “peaceful pro-life Americans, some of whom were unjustly imprisoned … by the Biden Administration.”

Trump called it “a great honor” to pardon people who “should not have been prosecuted.” Many of the defendants were serving lengthy prison sentences for orchestrating and carrying out clinic invasions that injured a nurse and terrorized both patients and healthcare providers.

Trump made an appearance on video at Friday’s March for Life, stating “We will again stand proudly for families and for life,” in a prerecorded address. JD Vance attended the march in person and celebrated Thursday’s pardons for FACE Act violators. He also called Trump “the most pro-life American president of our lifetimes.” At the march, members of the extremist groups Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising (PAAU) and Survivors of the Abortion Holocaust, chanted, “We are clinic invaders and yours is next.”

This Tuesday, Trump shut down the HHS informational website on abortion access and reproductive rights. With the pardons, Trump appeased his antiabortion supporters, who were becoming increasingly frustrated in recent days that he did not issue the pardons on Day 1.

Judge Temporarily Blocks Trump From Ending Birthright Citizenship

Photo by Nitish Meena on Unsplash

On Thursday, January 23, a federal judge temporarily blocked Trump’s executive order ending birthright citizenship, or automatic American citizenship for all babies born in the United States.

The executive order—called Protecting the Meaning and Value of American Citizenship—was part of the flurry of anti-immigrant EOs Trump signed on his first day in office. Ending birthright citizenship would be essentially rewriting the Constitution. Citizenship for all people born in the U.S. became precedent with Section 1 of the 14th Amendment, which states that “all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States.”

In a hearing held on Thursday, three days after Trump’s executive order, Federal District Court judge John C. Coughenour signed a restraining order that temporarily blocks Trump’s EO from going into effect for fourteen days. “This is a blatantly unconstitutional order,” he said. “Where were the lawyers when this decision was being made?” He continued, “Frankly, I have difficulty understanding how a member of the bar would state unequivocally that this is a constitutional order. It just boggles my mind.”

Coughenour sided with the four states—Washington, Arizona, Illinois and Oregon—who sued the Trump administration in response to the executive order. Twenty-two states as well as groups like the ACLU have since sued to have Trump’s order recalled.

The order (which Trump has told reporters that he would appeal to reinstate) would declare that children born to undocumented immigrants in the U.S. after Feb. 19, 2025 would not be considered citizens. The change would also affect visa holders who are in the country legally but temporarily, meaning that the children of tourists and students with visas, for example, could not be considered citizens if born in the U.S. if their parents are noncitizens. 

Protecting the Meaning and Value of American Citizenship is one of several blatantly anti-immigrant executive orders that Trump signed on Day One, and advocates worry that EOs like the one ending birthright citizenship would allow for very fast deportations with very minimal due process.

Joseph W. Mead, an attorney at Georgetown Law School’s Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection, who represents four pregnant mothers, said, “Mothers today now have to fear that their children will not be given the U.S. citizenship that they’re entitled to.”

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