USA – Don’t Just Defend Abortion Rights. Play Offense Over Them.

Abortion rights has proven time and again to be a winning issue for Democrats

Ilyse Hogue
February 8, 2024

President Joe Biden is staking his reelection and the future of this country on an American love for democracy. Marking the third anniversary of the January 6 insurrection near the Revolutionary War encampment at Valley Forge, he cautioned his audience, “We’re living in an era where a determined minority is doing everything in its power to try to destroy our democracy for their own agenda.”

When we think of democracy, what most often pops to mind are structural elements like voting rights, equal representation, and effective checks and balances. And certainly, Democrats should pound away on those crucial elements of a functional system. But it’s also the case that they have no better proof point for the president’s claim than the Republican obsession with eliminating legal abortion in twenty-first-century America.

Continued: https://newrepublic.com/article/178436/abortion-rights-defend-choice-play-offense


USA – More activists who have had abortions are saying so out loud. Here’s why

November 2, 2021
Danielle Kurtzleben

In 1992, an estimated half a million people gathered on the National Mall for a rally for abortion rights.

The speakers made many of the same arguments that abortion-rights advocates have made for decades, arguing that government shouldn't limit people's ability to make decisions about their own bodies.

Continued: https://www.npr.org/2021/11/02/1050653918/more-activists-who-have-had-abortions-are-saying-so-out-loud-heres-why


Ilyse Hogue, Influential Abortion Rights Advocate, Will Step Down as NARAL Chief

In an interview, Ms. Hogue discussed a tumultuous era for abortion rights and the future of Roe v. Wade.

By Lisa Lerer
Feb. 8, 2021

For Ilyse Hogue, who announced on Monday that she was stepping down as the head of NARAL Pro-Choice America after eight years, abortion rights are at something of a crossroads, with Democrats facing the choice of whether to try to deliver on their promise of codifying Roe v. Wade.

When she assumed the role of president of the abortion rights group in 2013, the Democratic Party controlled the Senate and the White House and had a reliable liberal majority on the Supreme Court. Eight years later, Democrats are back in power but abortion rights face a precarious future.

Continued: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/08/us/politics/ilyse-hogue-naral.html


NARAL President Ilyse Hogue says the organization is ‘certainly preparing’ for the end of Roe v. Wade

John L. Dorman
Jan 3, 2021

NARAL Pro-Choice America president Ilyse Hogue said in a recent Daily Beast podcast interview that the organization is working to protect women's reproductive rights in the wake of a sharply conservative Supreme Court that came to fruition during President Donald Trump's tenure.

During an episode of "The New Abnormal" featuring editor-at-large Molly Jong-Fast, the discussion about women's healthcare landed on Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion in the US and afforded women a constitutional right to the procedure. For decades, conservatives have sought to overturn the ruling, but lacked a lopsided majority on the Supreme Court, one that they now possess with the installation of Judges Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett to the court.

Continued: https://www.businessinsider.com/naral-president-ilyse-hogue-roe-vs-wade-women-reproductive-rights-2021-01


What the Overturning of Roe v. Wade in the U.S. Could Mean For Canada

Do Canadians need to worry about their reproductive rights?

By Corrina Allen
October 22, 2020

As if we weren’t already living through a pandemic-induced dystopian nightmare this year, Republicans south of the border are attempting to push through the confirmation of an anti-choice Supreme Court justice candidate who once served as a “handmaid” in a hierarchical male-dominated religious community and, in 2006, signed a public letter in favour of overturning “barbaric” Roe v. Wade, the legal foundation for access to reproductive healthcare rights in the U.S.

The appointment of Judge Amy Coney Barrett to Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg’s seat on the highest court in the United States would tip the scales in favour of anti-choice organizations that have been chipping away at abortion rights for decades. Already, 90% of American counties lack their own clinic and 21 states stand poised to severely limit or outright ban abortions should Roe be struck down by a reconstituted, conservative-dominated court. American women are and should be scared that their access to safe abortion could largely disappear.

Continued: https://www.flare.com/news/politics-of-abortion-in-canada/


USA – Why the Left Is Losing on Abortion

The volatile issue is front and centre in Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination to the Supreme Court. An abortion rights leader tells us how we got to this point.

Oct. 12, 2020
37-minute podcast

Most Americans say that abortion should be legal with some restrictions, but President Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court, Amy Coney Barrett, signed a statement in a 2006 newspaper advertisement opposing “abortion on demand.” Her accession would bolster a conservative majority among the justices.

How did that happen? According to Ilyse Hogue, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, abortion rights advocates have for too long taken Roe v. Wade for granted.

Continued: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/12/podcasts/the-daily/abortion-rights-amy-coney-barrett.html


USA – Both sides on abortion certain Barrett would restrict, if not overturn, landmark court decision

By Seung Min Kim
Oct. 8, 2020

Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett heads into her confirmation hearings next week with a detailed record that has led many liberals and conservatives to believe she would support restricting, if not outright overturning, the landmark decision that guarantees a woman’s right to an abortion.

But as her nomination fight unfurls in an increasingly heated election season, top Republicans — from President Trump to individual senators — appear to be playing down the impact Barrett’s confirmation would have on the fate of abortion rights in the United States.

Continued: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/senate-court-trump-barrett/2020/10/08/a82f4ace-0973-11eb-a166-dc429b380d10_story.html


Abortion Was Back-Burnered in the Presidential Race. Not Anymore.

The battle over the Supreme Court brings back a volatile issue with political risks for both sides, even as it energizes parts of their bases.

By Lisa Lerer and Elizabeth Dias
Sept. 20, 2020

For Joshua Hon, the prospect of another open seat on the Supreme Court was the moment he’s been waiting for since voting for President Trump four years ago.

“I would not say that I love Trump, but I do believe that abortion is killing babies,” said Mr. Hon, 35, who lives in Durham County in North Carolina.

Continued: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/20/us/abortion-supreme-court-trump-biden.html


Pence makes pitch to anti-abortion voters in battleground states

By Caroline Kelly, CNN
Sat September 5, 2020

(CNN) Vice President Mike Pence is making a strong pitch to a potentially crucial base of swing-state anti-abortion voters heading into the last two months of the presidential campaign.

On a visit to North Carolina this week, he attacked Democratic nominee Joe Biden on abortion and reminded people of President Donald Trump's record appointing conservative judges.

Continued: https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/05/politics/mike-pence-abortion-battleground-states/index.html


With Biden, advocates sense momentum for lifting abortion funding ban

By Jessie Hellmann
08/17/20

Abortion rights advocates are pinning their hopes on presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden to help end a longstanding ban on the use of federal funds for abortion — a policy he supported for more than 40 years.

Biden reversed his position by denouncing the so-called Hyde amendment last year, but its future doesn’t just depend on who wins the White House. Democrats will also need to make major gains in the Senate, keep control of the House and gain the support of more moderate Democratic lawmakers on a divisive issue.

Continued: https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/abortion/512038-with-biden-advocates-sense-momentum-for-lifting-abortion-funding