As millions were stripped of abortion rights, mainstream outlets uplifted these five anti-choice leaders behind Roe’s reversal

WRITTEN BY JASMINE GEONZON
PUBLISHED 01/09/23

2022 marked an unprecedented assault on abortion rights, as the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June and multiple states quickly moved to restrict or outright ban abortion and other reproductive care. While millions of Americans navigated under these new harsh abortion restrictions, the largest newsrooms in the country gave their platforms to the leading figures behind the effort to reverse Roe and demonize abortion care.

Marjorie Dannenfelser (Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America)
As the president of anti-abortion group Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, Marjorie Dannenfelser has been key in backing anti-choice political candidates and supporting the passage of legal restrictions against reproductive rights. Late last year, for example, Dannenfelser stood alongside Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) when he introduced legislation to implement a 15-week national abortion ban.

Continued; https://www.mediamatters.org/health-care/millions-were-stripped-abortion-rights-mainstream-outlets-uplifted-these-five-anti


Anti-abortion groups don’t think they lost the midterms

The major reflections, arguments, and spin.

By Rachel M. Cohen
Nov 17, 2022

When he was campaigning for governor of Minnesota, Scott Jensen first said he’d ban abortions with no exceptions for rape and incest. Later, he said the governor couldn’t do anything about abortion anyway, given Minnesota’s constitutional protections. Last weekend, in a 22-minute Facebook Live video reflecting on his bruising loss, he made a new argument.

“This election was not about inflation, and crime and education...for so many Americans across the country this election was about an intrusion into a person’s autonomy,” he said, referring to abortion. “In the future I think the lesson is clear — at least it should be to Republicans. If you infringe on someone’s freedom, you may well lose. You’ll probably lose.”

Continued: https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2022/11/17/23462040/abortion-groups-midterms-dobbs-reproductive-rights


USA – After wins at the ballot, abortion rights groups want to ‘put this to the people’

November 11, 2022
Sarah McCammon

Abortion rights supporters had a successful run of ballot measures this year. In every state where voters were asked to weigh in directly on abortion rights, they supported measures that protect those rights and rejected initiatives that could threaten them.

Those victories have abortion rights advocates looking at where they can next take the fight directly to voters.

Contiuned: https://www.npr.org/2022/11/10/1135757008/after-wins-at-the-ballot-abortion-rights-groups-want-to-put-this-to-the-people


Revealed: Ginni Thomas’s links to anti-abortion groups who lobbied to overturn Roe

Analysis of ‘amicus briefs’ shows how closely Clarence Thomas’s wife was entwined with rightwing effort to reverse 1973 ruling

Ed Pilkington in New York
Fri 9 Sep 2022

Ginni Thomas, the self-styled “culture warrior” and extreme rightwing activist, has links to more than half of the anti-abortion groups and individuals who lobbied her husband Clarence Thomas and his fellow US supreme court justices ahead of their historic decision to eradicate a woman’s right to terminate a pregnancy.

A new analysis of the written legal arguments, or “amicus briefs”, used to lobby the justices as they deliberated over abortion underlines the extent to which Clarence Thomas’s wife was intertwined with this vast pressure campaign.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/sep/09/ginni-thomas-abortion-roe-v-wade-supreme-court


A 49-year crusade: Inside the movement to overturn Roe v. Wade

Antiabortion activists and their Republican allies are on the cusp of reaching a goal they have sought for decades in tossing out the 1973 Supreme Court ruling legalizing abortion.

By Michael Scherer, Josh Dawsey, Caroline Kitchener and Rachel Roubein, Washington Post
May 7, 2022

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell still remembers the shock he felt when Donald Trump won the 2016 election. He also recalls what happened next.

“The first thing that came to my mind was the Supreme Court,” McConnell said in an interview this past week, remembering his reaction that night as he watched results from a basement office at the National Republican Senatorial Committee. He soon called Donald McGahn, campaign counsel to the president-elect, who was slated to become the top White House lawyer.

Continued: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/05/07/abortion-movement-roe-wade/


USA – The next frontier for the antiabortion movement: A nationwide ban

Advocates and some GOP lawmakers have started mobilizing around potential federal legislation to outlaw abortion after six weeks of pregnancy

By Caroline Kitchener
May 2, 2022

Leading antiabortion groups and their allies in Congress have been meeting behind the scenes to plan a national strategy that would kick in if the Supreme Court rolls back abortion rights this summer, including a push for a strict nationwide ban on the procedure if Republicans retake power in Washington.

The effort, activists say, is designed to bring a fight that has been playing out largely in the courts and state legislatures to the national political stage — rallying conservatives around the issue in the midterms and pressuring potential 2024 GOP presidential candidates to take a stand.

Continued: https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/05/02/abortion-ban-roe-supreme-court-mississippi/


USA – Abortion advocates’ strategy depends on pills. An information gap threatens their efforts.

With SCOTUS decision looming, confusion and fear hinder post-Roe plans.

By ALICE MIRANDA OLLSTEIN and MEGAN MESSERLY
04/24/2022

Mail-order abortion pills could help millions of people discretely terminate their pregnancies should the Supreme Court strike down Roe v. Wade in the coming months, providing a way to circumvent mounting state-imposed restrictions.

But the majority of patients and many doctors remain in the dark or misinformed about the pills, how to obtain them, where to seek follow-up care and how to avoid landing in legal jeopardy, according to medical groups, abortion-rights advocates and national polls.

Continued; https://www.politico.com/news/2022/04/24/abortion-advocates-strategy-depends-on-pills-an-information-gap-threatens-their-efforts-00027309


As red states push strident abortion bans, other restrictions suddenly look less extreme

519 abortion restriction bills were introduced in 41 states in just three months

By JULIE ROVNER
PUBLISHED APRIL 2, 2022

What is the ultimate goal of the anti-abortion movement? It might be surprising. To the casual observer, the obvious answer is that abortion opponents want to overturn Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court ruling that legalized abortion nationwide. Before Roe, states decided whether and when abortion should be legal.

It's possible opponents of abortion will see that wish granted. Based on comments made by six conservative justices during arguments, the high court this year is expected to either weaken significantly or throw out the nearly 50-year-old precedent of Roe by upholding a Mississippi law banning the procedure after 15 weeks of pregnancy.

Continued: https://www.salon.com/2022/04/02/as-red-states-push-strident-abortion-bans-other-restrictions-suddenly-look-less-extreme_partner/


Americans are divided on abortion. The Supreme Court may not wait for minds to change

January 21, 2022

JULIE ROVNER

When he was running for president in 1999, George W. Bush, then governor of
Texas, famously fended off the strong anti-abortion wing of his party by
suggesting the country ought not consider banning abortion until public opinion
shifted further in that direction. "Laws are changed as minds are
persuaded," he said.

Bush was no moderate on the abortion issue. As
president he signed several pieces of anti-abortion legislation, including the
first federal ban on a specific abortion procedure, and used his authority to
severely limit federally funded research on embryonic stem cells.

Continued: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2022/01/21/1074605184/abortion-roe-v-wade-supreme-court


Supreme Court thwarts bid to block SB8 on ‘dark day’ for Texas abortion rights

The justices ruled more than 3 months after allowing SB8 to go ahead.

By Devin Dwyer
10 December 2021

The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday said a narrowly tailored challenge to Texas' near-total ban on abortions, SB8, could proceed in federal courts but declined for a second time to put the law on hold.

The decision, authored by Justice Neil Gorsuch, all but foreclosed hope for a sweeping federal court order halting SB8 enforcement in Texas, abortion rights advocates said.

Continued: https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/supreme-court-acts-texas-abortion-law-sb8/story?id=80973461