“Part of what Carafem wanted to do was to speak openly and unapologetically about abortion in the same way that other providers speak about their services,” said Melissa Grant, Carafem's vice president of health-care services. “This feels like a First Amendment issue .... It feels wrong.”
"If there are women in these highly restrictive states who want abortions but can't get them because there aren't any clinics that they can get to, and that's why abortion's going down, that's not a good thing," said Rachel Jones, senior research associate at Guttmacher and lead author of the study.
If Congress prohibits Planned Parenthood from receiving federal funding, it will not only strip Medicaid enrollees of their preferred provider, but also will leave many enrollees with nowhere else to receive quality reproductive and sexual health services.
“We do not accept any federal, state or local rollbacks, cuts or restrictions on our ability to access quality reproductive healthcare services, birth control, HIV/AIDS care and prevention, or medically accurate sexuality education,” the Women’s March on Washington platform says.
Rep. Steve King (R-IA) introduced copycat legislation that failed last year in Ohio. King's anti-choice bill would amount to a total ban on abortion care nationwide.
"We don't want to commit people's taxpayer dollars to effectively funding something that they believe is morally unconscionable," said Paul Ryan (R-WI) at a CNN town hall event on Thursday.
"Over the years we have seen abortion bans, but not ones that specifically equate abortion with homicide," Elizabeth Nash of the Guttmacher Institute said in an email to Rewire.
One Alabama doctor finds it hard to believe that the anti-choice Sessions will protect his rights as an abortion provider when the congressman becomes attorney general.
“[A]t at time when much of the country is taking more seriously the need for criminal justice reform, the prosecution of Anna Yocca indicates a larger trend in the punishment and incarceration of women in Tennessee,” said Nancy Rosenbloom, NAPW’s director of legal advocacy.
