USA – More “navigators” are helping women travel to have abortions

By Lillian Mongeau Hughes
January 30, 2024

Chloe Bell is a case manager at the National Abortion Federation. She spends her days helping people cover the cost of an abortion and, increasingly, the interstate travel many of them need to get the procedure.

"What price did they quote you?" Bell asked a woman from New Jersey who had called the organization's hotline seeking money to pay for an abortion. Her appointment was the next day.

Continued: https://www.cbsnews.com/sacramento/news/abortion-travel-navigators/


Abortion funds run short of money as demand soars and donations fall

Olivia Goldhill
Jan. 23, 2024

The head of the Abortion Fund of Ohio had a sinking feeling as she looked at its end-of-year finances last month. The fund had paid out $1.5 million in 2023 to help close to 4,400 patients get abortions — up from 1,175 the year before — and the pace wasn’t sustainable. If the fund didn’t take a pause for a few weeks, she feared it would run out of money and have to close for good.

The nonprofit stopped taking calls on Dec. 19, and made the “very very difficult decision” to suspend operations until Feb. 1, said Taren Holliman, the organization’s program manager. It’s among a handful of abortion funds that have had to temporarily halt operations as demand outstripped donations. Both the Utah Abortion Fund and Indigenous Women Rising paused for a month last summer after exceeding their budgets, and many more are reevaluating their funding policies and tightening purses.

Continued: https://www.statnews.com/2024/01/23/abortion-fund-warning-demand-up-donations-down/


Ending Roe v. Wade May Have Had the Opposite Effect That Conservatives Had Hoped For

BY DAVID S. COHEN AND CAROLE JOFFE
NOV 07, 2023

On Tuesday, Ohio voters passed a ballot measure enshrining the right to an abortion in the state constitution, joining several states where voters have responded to the end of Roe v. Wade by protecting reproductive rights via popular referendum. We recently learned, however, that even without these votes, reproductive rights might be safer than many expected following the end of Roe in 2022.

When the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the conventional wisdom was that there would be a steep drop in the number of abortions in the United States. As it turns out, though, conventional wisdom was wrong. To many observers’ surprise, two recent studies reveal that national abortion numbers have actually slightly increased since the Supreme Court ended Roe. Based on everything we know about abortion seekers and providers, however, that abortion numbers would go up in the face of Supreme Court retrenchment should have been exactly what was predicted.

Continued: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2023/11/ohio-vote-abortion-access-is-growing.html


USA _ A Weekend at Abortion Camp Offers a Glimpse Into the Future of Abortion Access

In the year after Dobbs, the movement has been operating in triage mode, and Abortion Camp was conceived as a conclave where activists could come together to have honest conversations about their work and what they needed from each other.

REBECCA GRANT
Oct 26, 2023

On the wall in the gym at Abortion Camp hung a massive, colorful map of the United States festooned with index cards. Each card had the name, age, pronouns, astrological sign, and affiliation of each of the 50-or-so people who had traveled from across the country, and a few from overseas, to attend the event. As a kickoff activity, the campers had broken into small groups to fill out the cards and then placed them on the map to show where they were from.

Abortion Camp was held in early September at a hotel in the Pacific Northwest. The campers ranged in age from 19 to one woman in her 80s, and spanned professions and geographies. They were doctors, midwives, abortion fund workers, community organizers, nonprofit leaders, poets, digital security specialists, lawyers, clinic escorts, doulas, and researchers. Some attendees had known each other for years, while others were meeting for the first time. What they all shared was a commitment to keeping abortion accessible in the wake of the Dobbs decision.

Continued: https://www.thenation.com/article/society/abortion-camp-activism-dobbs/


‘Feels horrible to say no’: abortion funds run out of money as US demand surges

A lifeline for many in states with abortion restrictions, abortion funds are being pushed to the brink due to rising costs and a drop in donations

Carter Sherman
Fri 22 Sep 2023

Laurie Bertram Roberts never expected Americans to keep forking over money to pay for other people’s abortions. But the abortion fund director didn’t think it would get this dire.

When the US supreme court overturned Roe v Wade last year, people donated tens of thousands of dollars to Roberts’ organization, the Mississippi Reproductive Freedom Fund, which is dedicated to helping people afford abortions and the many costs that come with it. But, in August, Mississippi Reproductive Freedom Fund had to stop funding abortions. It’s now closed until January 2024.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/sep/22/us-abortion-funds-run-out-of-money-demand-surges


‘Rage giving’ prompted by the end of Roe has dropped off, abortion access groups say

The windfall of donations that abortion access groups received following the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade one year ago hasn't lasted

By THALIA BEATY and GLENN GAMBOA, Associated Press
June 24, 2023

The “ rage giving ” did not last. Abortion access groups who received a windfall of donations following the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade one year ago say those emergency grants have ended and individual and foundation giving has dropped off.

After the Dobbs decision, some major funders of abortion access also have ended or shifted funding from organizations working in states where abortion is now banned, said Naa Amissah-Hammond, senior director of grantmaking with Groundswell Fund, which funds grassroots groups organizing for reproductive justice.

Continued: https://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/rage-giving-prompted-end-roe-dropped-off-abortion-100352292


Texas – These abortion funds and practical support groups are bridging the gap for patients

Without these organizations, low-income and marginalized communities would not be able to access the abortion care they need.

By Rebekah Sager
June 15, 2023

Even before the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022, people sought out abortion funds and practical support groups as stopgap measures to receive abortion care. Today, these groups are essential, particularly for low-income and marginalized pregnant people, covering everything from travel expenses to child care and even the procedure itself.

The Brigid Alliance
Five years ago, the Brigid Alliance, a practical support organization that provides assistance to people who are forced to travel outside of their home states for abortion care, opened its doors when clinics in Texas began to close with the passage of S.B. 8.

Continued: https://americanindependent.com/abortion-funds-texas-practical-support-groups/


USA – Abortion Funds Face Slowdown in Giving a Year After Supreme Court Ruling

By  Eden Stiffman
JUNE 12, 2023

On the evening of May 2, 2022, a draft opinion of the Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization leaked, signaling the imminent reversal of Roe v. Wade, the landmark case that established the constitutional right to abortion. That same day, the National Network of Abortion Funds had tapped Oriaku Njoku as its new executive director.

As a co-founder of Access Reproductive Care-Southeast, the South’s largest abortion fund, Njoku was clear-eyed about what would come next.

Continued: https://www.philanthropy.com/article/abortion-funds-face-slowdown-in-giving-a-year-after-supreme-court-ruling


If Your Partner Has to Travel For an Abortion, You Should Probably Pay for the Plane Ticket

And 13 other rules for men having sex in the post-Roe era.

By Sophia Benoit
May 4, 2023

It has been almost a year since abortion access in the United States was kneecapped by the Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade. States are now free to outlaw the procedure, and 14 states have done so so far. Living and having sex under these conditions is fraught for everyone, but especially for people who can get pregnant. So if you’re someone, on the other hand, who can get someone pregnant—and we’re mostly talking to cis men here—this is a guide for what you need to do to not be a dick.

Continued: https://www.gq.com/story/post-roe-sex-etiquette


Texas abortion funds likely safe from prosecution, federal judge rules

by Eleanor Klibanoff, The Texas Tribune
February 24, 2023

A federal judge issued a favorable ruling for Texas abortion funds, indicating they likely cannot be criminally charged for helping people travel out of state to terminate their pregnancies.

U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman temporarily blocked prosecutors in eight counties from pursuing charges against anyone who helps someone get an abortion outside of Texas. But his ruling indicated he believes the laws he has enjoined them from enforcing may not actually be in effect at all.

Continued: https://sanantonioreport.org/texas-abortion-funds-prosecution-paxton/