USA – Abortion clinics are closing, even in states that have become key access points

There are about a dozen fewer brick-and-mortar abortion clinics in the US than there were two years ago, according to a new report

By Deidre McPhillips
Feb 18, 2026

Dozens of abortion clinics closed in the US after the Supreme Court Dobbs decision revoked the federal right to an abortion in June 2022 — mostly in states that enacted bans. But the churn has continued, leaving even states with some of the most protective abortion policies to do more with less.

There were 753 brick-and-mortar abortion clinics in the US at the end of 2025, according to a new report by the Guttmacher Institute — 54 fewer than in 2020, including a net loss of 12 abortion clinics since March 2024.

Continued: https://www.cnn.com/2026/02/18/health/abortion-clinic-closures-guttmacher

It Is Sacred Work’: Abortion Clinics Are Stepping Up After the Fall of Roe

Organizations across the country are ensuring people continue to have access to reproductive care.

by Eleanor J. Bader
November 25, 2025

In the first 100 days after the June 2022 Supreme Court Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision, which overturned Roe v. Wade, sixty-six health clinics in fifteen states stopped providing surgical abortions, and fourteen states enacted near-total bans on the procedure.

But then something unexpected happened. By 2024, twenty-one new facilities had opened in states where abortion was not completely banned, according to the Guttmacher Institute. Moreover, KFF (formerly the Kaiser Family Foundation) reports that by 2023, 226 virtual providers—including online pharmacies, feminist health centers, and help lines—had set up shop to counsel people seeking abortion services and provide abortion medication through the mail.

Continued: https://progressive.org/latest/it-is-sacred-work-abortion-clinics-are-stepping-up-after-the-fall-of-roe-bader-20251125/

The Long Shadow of Dr. George Tiller: Abortion Providers Under Attack

9/17/2025
by Jodi Enda, Ms. Magazine.

Julie Burkhart’s clinic was torched.

Burkhart, like Ruth Richardson, has been working in abortion facilities for years. And, like Richardson, CEO of Planned Parenthood North Central States, she is no stranger to threats or violence. In 1991, Burkhart was a young clinic worker in Wichita, Kan., when abortion opponents poured into town to participate in the so-called Summer of Mercy, a six-week protest organized by Operation Rescue (slogan: “If you believe abortion is murder, then act like it’s murder!”). They conducted blockades at the city’s three abortion clinics and threw themselves in front of cars to keep drivers from entering the clinics’ parking lots.

In 2009, Burkhart’s mentor, Dr. George Tiller, was shot in the head and killed as he was ushering at his Wichita church. The murder came 16 years after Tiller, one of the few doctors in the nation who performed abortions later in pregnancy, was shot in both arms by an extremist, and 23 years after his clinic was bombed.

Continued: https://msmagazine.com/2025/09/17/george-tiller-abortion-providers-attack/

USA – The Resilient Provider Who’s Survived Arson, Death Threats and Supreme Court Rulings

Before Julie Burkhart could even open Wyoming’s only full-service abortion clinic, an extremist tried to burn it down. That hasn’t stopped her. Neither has the Dobbs ruling.

June 20, 2025
By Colleen DeBaise

I figured Julie Burkhart – an abortion care provider whose Wyoming clinic was torched a few years ago – would be tough as nails. What I didn’t expect, as we spoke over Zoom recently, was that I’d be complimenting Burkhart on her actual nails. Turns out, her daughter got married recently, and “I got these done for the wedding,” Burkhart told me, twisting both hands in front of the camera to show off her ballet-slipper manicure.

That Burkhart, named to Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People of 2025 list, can enjoy moments of lightness speaks to the resilience she’s honed amid a career marred by violence, death threats and vicious harassment. A longtime fighter for women’s reproductive freedom, she has been called a hero by abortion-rights supporters and “Julie Darkheart” (and much worse) by detractors.

Continued: https://thestoryexchange.org/abortion-provider-julie-burkhart/

Trump’s DOJ Has Put Reproductive Health Clinics Under Threat

With the administration’s refusal to enforce a key law for protecting clinics, abortion providers are bracing for increased disruptions.

Grace Segers
May 29, 2025

Calla Hayes, the executive director of A Preferred Women’s Health Center in Charlotte, North Carolina, is used to protesters. The clinic sees thousands of anti-abortion demonstrators outside of its doors each year; the same group of faces greets her each day.

But in the months since President Donald Trump returned to the White House, she’s seen a change in their behavior. Hayes believes that turnover in the White House, along with the Supreme Court decision nullifying Roe v. Wade in 2022, has emboldened the activists outside her clinic’s doors to start “pushing boundaries.”

Continued: https://newrepublic.com/article/195810/abortion-providers-threats-trump-administration

Three Years Post-Dobbs, Abortion Providers Experience High Levels of Violence & Disruption

April 23, 2025

NATIONAL—Today, the National Abortion Federation (NAF) released its Violence & Disruption report with data from 2023 and 2024. The report shows there has been sustained and consistent harassment and violence against abortion providers, even as clinics closed and abortion became harder to access in some regions.

This year’s interactive report compares the violence and disruption that NAF members reported in 2023 & 2024 to the total data NAF has tracked since 1977. The report features “heat maps” that demonstrate the states where providers reported experiencing the highest levels of obstruction, protesters, threats, and trespassing. Finally, the report includes an audio storyteller map where viewers can click through and hear directly from providers at clinics across the country about their experiences with violence and disruption.

Continued: https://prochoice.org/three-years-post-dobbs-abortion-providers-experience-high-levels-of-violence-disruption/

Abortion Providers Feel Like ‘Sitting Ducks’ After Trump Rolls Back Clinic Protections

The president has limited enforcement of the FACE Act — created to safeguard abortion providers and patients — and pardoned 23 people who were convicted of the federal charge.

By Alanna Vagianos
Feb 22, 2025

Julie Burkhart’s career in abortion care started when she was a college student working at a clinic in Wichita, Kansas, during the infamous Summer of Mercy in 1991. Thousands of protesters swarmed the city to rally against abortion clinics — lying on sidewalks to block clinic entrances, throwing their bodies in front of patients’ cars and screaming threats at anyone entering the three targeted clinics. Since then, she has lived through the assassination of her former boss and mentor, Dr. George Tiller, death threats on her own life, stalkers and protesters coming to her home and, most recently, the firebombing of her Wyoming abortion clinic.

Still, this moment stands out among the rest, she told HuffPost.

Continued: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/abortion-clinics-face-act-trump_n_67b8df3de4b075fafcec2f5e

Wyoming Banned Abortion. She Opened an Abortion Clinic Anyway.

The only abortion clinic left in the state has been protested and set on fire, rebuilt and opened as Wyoming grapples with what it means to be conservative in a post-Roe nation.

By Kate Zernike, NYT
March 10, 2024

It was not such an implausible idea, back in 2020, when a philanthropist emailed Julie Burkhart to ask if she would consider opening an abortion clinic in Wyoming, one of the nation’s most conservative states and the one that had twice given Donald Trump his biggest margin of victory.

In fact, Ms. Burkhart had the same idea more than a decade earlier, after an anti-abortion extremist killed her boss and mentor, George Tiller, in Wichita, Kan., where he ran one of the nation’s few clinics that provided abortion late in pregnancy.

Continued: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/10/us/wyoming-abortion-clinic-julie-burkhart.html

18 Months After “Dobbs,” Here’s How Abortion Providers and Activists See Things

Abortion funds and logistical support groups are enabling people to travel out of state to obtain abortion care.

By Eleanor J. Bader , TRUTHOUT
December 28, 2023

After the Supreme Court’s June 2022 Dobbs decision eviscerated the already limited federal right to abortion, 14 states — Alabama, Arkansas, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas and West Virginia — banned the procedure.

In some of these states, clinics closed. According to The Guardian, 42 U.S. clinics shuttered in 2022, plus 23 more in 2023. But as disturbing as this is, it is not the full story. Despite financial, legal and political obstacles, many clinics in states that have banned abortion have pivoted, continuing to provide essential reproductive health services such as contraceptives, STI testing and treatment, and routine gynecological exams, with some expanding to deliver prenatal and gender-affirming care. In addition, new clinics have opened in states like Wyoming and Maryland where abortion remains legal.

Continued: https://truthout.org/articles/18-months-after-dobbs-heres-how-abortion-providers-and-activists-see-things/

‘It’s Not Just the Fringe Who Are Committing These Violent Acts’

By Sarah Jones, senior writer for Intelligencer
June 11, 2023

In April, abortion provider Julie Burkhart opened her newest clinic, Wellspring Health Access, in Casper, Wyoming. Wellspring is the only clinic to provide surgical abortions in the state, and its opening had been delayed for months because an anti-abortion activist allegedly set fire to it while it was under construction. As a former employee of Dr. George Tiller, who was assassinated in 2009, Burkhart has seen the anti-abortion movement at its most violent and remains determined to provide abortion care. Though the future for abortion rights in Wyoming looks uncertain, Wellspring is taking appointments and providing a full range of reproductive-health services to people in Casper and the surrounding area. While the clinic provides care, it also fights to keep abortion legal in Wyoming. Attorneys for Wellspring have joined a group of plaintiffs challenging two recent anti-abortion laws in Wyoming: One would ban medication abortion and is set to take effect in July, and the other is a near-total abortion ban, which is on hold as litigation proceeds.

I spoke with Burkhart about her work, the future of Wellspring, and the importance of providing abortion care in rural areas and Republican-led states like Wyoming. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Continued: https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2023/06/people-of-all-walks-need-access-to-abortion-care.html

11.06.2023