Author: Feminist Majority Foundation Blog

On Thursday, Senator Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) introduced a bill that would extend insurance coverage for abortion in cases of rape or incest to Peace Corps volunteers. Currently only paid Peace Corps staff have this coverage, forcing Peace Corps volunteers who are assaulted to pay for abortion procedures out of pocket. The bill, titled the “Peace Corps Equity Act” is co-sponsored by U.S. Senators Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Patty Murray (D-WA), and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA). Currently there is no sponsor in the House.

In a press release, Lautenberg said “We must not stand idly by while Peace Corps volunteers continue to be subjected to this gross inequity in their health care coverage. Peace Corps volunteers choose to provide a valuable public service despite inherent risks to their safety, including sexual assault, and it is unacceptable that their own country restricts their access to care. My legislation would ensure that Peace Corps volunteers don’t have to forfeit their rights or jeopardize their health when they volunteer to help underserved populations throughout the world.”

A spokesperson for the Peace Corps, Shira Kramer, said in a statement that the corps supports the bill to create changes that “provides female volunteers with the same rights and protections as many of their female colleagues.”

Late last night, Congress approved the nomination of Jenny Yang as a commissioner to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

In her role as partner in the class action law firm Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll, Yang was responsible for some of the biggest sex discrimination cases in recent years. Yang was one of the lawyers representing 1.6 million women in the class action case Wal-Mart Stores Inc. v. Dukes. In 2011, the case was dismissed by the Supreme Court. The case was the largest sex-discrimination class-action suit in history. Yang was also part of the class action Beck v. Boening Company in Washington. The case was settled for $72 million in 2004.

Wade Henderson, the president of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, applauded the decision in a press statement. He said, “Throughout her career, Jenny Yang has shown dedication to using the law to ensure equal opportunity in employment for all Americans. Her work at the Department of Justice, as a federal judicial law clerk, in private practice, and at the National Employment Law Project make an EEOC appointment a natural fit for her abilities… We are confident in Yang’s ability to serve our nation well through thoughtful and deliberate enforcement of employment discrimination protections and equal employment opportunity programs.”

Eden Foods, a popular supplier of organic food items, has filed a lawsuit against the Obama administration over contraceptive coverage under the Affordable Care Act. The Michigan-based company says that the contraception clause of the Affordable Care Act violates religious freedom. In the words of Eden’s lawsuit, the clause “attacks and desecrates a foremost tenet of the Catholic Church” where the use of contraception is sinful. In the words of Michael Potter, the CEO of the company, “The government is just walking on the rights of companies and individuals who are trying to exercise their lives consistent with their conscience.” Potter wrote to the Huffington Post to say he did not intend to block health care access for his employees.

The lawsuit is inspiring activity on social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, with many former fans vowing to boycott Eden’s products and encouraging their friends and followers to do the same. Some grocery stores that carry Eden Foods products are considering canceling their orders. Potter said the amount of negative feedback was “certainly alarming.” Although the majority of reactions have been negative, some customers have contacted the company to voice their support of the lawsuit.

Eden Foods joins a long list of companies suing the administration over the mandate. Other companies that have sued include Dominoes, Hobby Lobby, and more. Other companies, such as Universal Orlando, have said they will drop insurance coverage for their part-time employees so they do not have to comply with Obamacare.

Both the House and the Senate are expected to reintroduce The Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) this Thursday. In the House, ENDA will be introduced by Representative Jared Polis (D-CO), an openly gay member of the House. Senator Jeff Merkley (D-OR) will be introducing the Senate version of ENDA. The Employment Non-Discrimination Act would ban discrimination by employers based on sexual orientation or gender identity.

While the number of co-sponsors in the House is yet to be determined, the Senate version has five original sponsors: Senator Merkley, Senator Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), Senator Mark Kirk (R-IL), Senator Susan Collins (R-ME); and Tom Harkin (D-IA), the Chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.

ENDA legislation has been introduced in every Congressional session since 1994 except one. According to the Center for American Progress, only 21 states and the District of Columbia prohibit employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, and only 16 and the District prohibit discrimination on the basis of gender identity.

“The bottom line is no worker in America should be fired or denied a job based on who they are. Discrimination is wrong. Period. And I think the Senate is ready to take that stand,” said Senator Merkley (D).

On Friday, Kansas Governor Sam Brownback (R) signed an anti-abortion bill into law that defines life as beginning at fertilization.

The measure requires that abortion providers supply women with a list of organizations that provide abortion alternatives, prevents any abortion facility from receiving state funding or tax credits, and requires doctors to provide patients with medically inaccurate information. In addition, it will define life as beginning at the moment of fertilization in the state-s constitution. The bill passed in the state legislature earlier this month by a wide margin in both chambers.

Before signing the bill into law, Governor Brownback wrote “JESUS + Mary” in his notes as captured in an Associated Press photograph. Brownback continued in his notes and in his oral statements that this bill would create a “culture of life’ in Kansas.

The Boy Scouts of America have proposed to partially lift the ban that excludes gay members from service. The proposal would admit gay youth, but would still continue to bar adult troop leaders. It is a revision to a BSA proposal made in January that would have allowed local troops to decide whether to accept gay members. Unveiled last Friday, the new proposal must go before roughly 1,400 voting members of the BSA’s National Council. The council will vote over the week of May 20th during its annual meeting in Texas.

Gay-rights advocacy groups are criticizing the current proposal as incomplete. Chad Griffin, president of the Human Rights Campaign asked “What message does this resolution send to the gay Eagle Scout who, as an adult, wants to continue a lifetime of Scouting by becoming a troop leader?”

Some conservative groups went on the defensive saying that the ban should remain in its entirety. “The policy is incoherent,” said Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council. “The proposal says, in essence, that homosexuality is morally acceptable until a boy turns 18 – then, when he comes of age, he’s removed from the Scouts.”

The BSA anticipates backlash from many long-term members of the organization and estimate that between 100,000 and 350,000 members would leave the organization should the proposal pass.

The Florida House of Representatives passed an abortion measure last Thursday that would outlaw abortion based on the sex or race of the fetus. HB 845, “Termination of Pregnancy Based on Sex or Race of Unborn Child,” passed on what anti-choice activists have declared “Right to Life” day on a vote of 71 to 44.

The bill’s sponsor, Representative Charles Van Zant (R) from Keystone Heights, who is white, stated that abortion groups target black women. “In America alone – without the Nazi Holocaust, without the Ku Klux Klan – Planned Parenthood and other abortionists have reduced our black population by more than 25 percent since 1973,” Van Zant told the House.

Despite Van Zant’s assertion that the legislation was to prevent what he called “discriminatory targeting,” many black Representatives were offended during the debate and a few even left the proceedings. Representative Barbara Watson (D) of Miami chose to leave. She later told the Huffington Post, “I don’t appreciate anyone trying to explain what any other ethnic group’s lifestyle is and what they do, when you really don’t have any authority to interpret it. I think the women and people of color in that chamber deserve an apology from him, but I don’t know that it would actually change his point of view.”

A North Dakota Judge has overturned a 2011 law that restricted drug-induced abortions yesterday, citing it as unconstitutional. East Central Judicial District Judge Wickham Corwin stated that, “I remain convinced that a woman’s reproductive rights must be protected under the state constitution and must be recognized as fundamental,” at the end of the three day civil trial.

The legislation, House Bill 1297, outlawed the use of medication for the intent of ending a pregnancy, despite this being a safe and common alternative to surgical abortions. The case was originally brought to court in July of 2011 by the Center for Reproductive Rights (CRR), representing the Red River Women’s clinic, the only women’s clinic in North Dakota currently providing abortion services.

Nancy Northrup, the president and CEO of The Center for Reproductive Rights (CRR), said of the ban, “These efforts to keep North Dakota women from the best available medical care and deny them their right to make their own decisions about their pregnancies, their families, and their futures are not only disingenuous, but wholly unconstitutional.”

On Wednesday, the Louisiana state Senate Health and Welfare Committee approved a bill that would prohibit the use of telemedicine for abortion care. The bill now goes before the Senate.

Senate Bill 90 would require a physician to be physically present in the room with a woman who is seeking a medical abortion when she takes the medication. This often significantly reduces the availability for women to have access to medical abortion in rural areas where the nearest abortion clinic is hundreds of miles away. The bill’s sponsor, Senator Fred Mills (R-Breaux Bridge), says the bill is meant to be a preventative measure and is unaware of any telemedicine abortions being performing in Louisiana.

The Texas Senate Health and Human Services Committee passed new legislation yesterday that would require doctors who perform abortions to have admitting privileges to a local hospital within thirty miles. The bill was proposed by Senator Larry Taylor (R) of Galveston.

“Requiring hospitals to credential and grant privileges to doctors who provide outpatient services is time consuming and expensive for the hospital,” said Stacy Wilson, a representative of the Texas Hospital Association. A potential issue with the legislature is that many hospitals have a religious affiliation and would not grant admitting privileges to doctors who perform abortions.

Similar TRAP (Targeted Regulations of Abortion Providers) laws requiring hospital admitting privileges have been passed in Mississippi and Alabama. The bill in Alabama was signed into law by Alabama Governor Robert Bentley last week. In Mississippi, the sole abortion clinic in the state has been trying to gain admitting privileges at local area hospitals to comply with a 2012 law, but has been denied by every hospital within a 30 mile radius. The state was trying to close the clinic when a federal judge extended a temporary injunction that prevents the state from closing the clinic until the constitutionality of the law can be determined in a current pending lawsuit against the state of Mississippi.

New Hampshire State Rep. Peter Hansen (R) is being critized for an e-mail he sent to fellow representative Steve Vaillancourt (R) in which he used the word “vaginas” to refer to women. In an email conversation among the state legislators about a controversial “Stand Your Ground” law, Vaillancourt had been advocating retreating when a physical threat is posed, and resorting to deadly force only when pursued after that point. Hansen countered his argument by saying “What could possibly be missing from those factual tales of successful retreat in VT, Germany, and the bowels of Amsterdam? Why children and vagina’s of course. While the tales relate the actions of a solitary male the outcome cannot relate to similar situations where children and women and mothers are the potential victims,” emphasis added.

Multiple representatives who viewed the e-mail responded angrily, admonishing Hansen for his terminology. State Rep. Rick Watrous(D-Concord) replied “Are you really using ‘vaginas’ as a crude catch-all for women? Really? Please think before you send out such offensive language on the legislative listserve.”

A speaker from NARAL Pro-Choice New Hampshire made the comment “[Women] are daughters, sisters, mothers, students, professionals, and community leaders. We deserve more than being referenced by our body parts.”

Hansen’s initially defended his wording: “Having a fairly well educated mind I do not need self appointed wardens to A: try to put words in my mouth for political gain and B: Turn a well founded strategy in communication into an insulting accusation, and finally if you find the noun vagina insulting or in some way offensive then perhaps a better exercise might be for you to re-examine your psyche.” He later issued an apology “to those who took offense.”

Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the last abortion clinic in Mississippi, won a temporary injunction yesterday against a 2012 law that threatened to shut its doors.

On Monday, U.S. District Judge Daniel P. Jordan III extended a temporary injunction that prevents the state from closing the clinic as it tries to come into compliance with a 2012 law requiring all doctors who perform abortions at the clinic to have admitting privileges at local hospitals. The injunction was extended until the constitutionality of the law can be determined in a current pending lawsuit against the state. So far, no hospital within 30 miles of the clinic has granted admitting privileges to any of the doctors.

In his opinion, Judge Jordan wrote “Closing its doors would – as the state seems to concede in this argument – force Mississippi women to leave Mississippi to obtain a legal abortion… [This] would result in a patchwork system where constitutional rights are available in some states but not others.”