In this episode of Boom! Lawyered, Jess and Imani lay waste to the claim that protesting an abortion clinic during a global pandemic is an "essential service" and discuss whether the courts will look the other way, anyway.
Abortion clinics protesters are fighting stay-at-home orders and putting pregnant people—who are immunosuppressed by virtue of being pregnant—at risk of contracting COVID-19.
"We are health-care providers; we’re not being seen or treated as health-care providers by our legislators, by people in these positions of power. And yet we’re putting ourselves at the same risk as people are in hospitals."
It's now impossible to get a legal abortion in Texas, thanks to the Fifth Circuit's latest ruling. The long-term consequences could be even more devastating.
When Texas officials declared abortions "nonessential" amid the COVID-19 pandemic, one woman's abortion plans were derailed. She went on a five-day journey to legally get one.
It’s asymptomatic people who may hold the most urgent lessons for a maternal care system that is scrambling to reinvent itself during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Republicans have stacked the federal courts with ideologues willing to entrain any bad faith argument designed to overturn Roe—even the COVID-19 pandemic.
![[Photo: A clinic protester peers their head into a car of someone outside of an abortion clinic.]](https://rewirenewsgroup.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/protest-antichoice-800x533.jpg)
![[Photo: A slightly open door shows an abortion provider sitting at a desk.]](https://rewirenewsgroup.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/abortion-provider-800x533.jpg)
![[Photo: Judge Kyle Duncan speaks during a hearing.]](https://rewirenewsgroup.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/duncan_2-800x533.jpg)
![[Photo: A pregnant person holds their belly as they speak to a doctor who holds a clipboard.]](https://rewirenewsgroup.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/pregnant-800x533.jpg)
![[Photo: A black and white photo of the silhouette of a woman holding her head as she sits on a bed in front of a window.]](https://rewirenewsgroup.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/hotel_5-800x533.jpg)
![[Photo: A worried woman wearing a face mask looks out the window of a bus.]](https://rewirenewsgroup.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/bus_1-800x533.jpg)
![[Photo: A nurse helping a mother of color during labor.]](https://rewirenewsgroup.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/labor-800x533.jpg)
![[Photo: An illustration of an abortion provider arm wrestling with a virus.]](https://rewirenewsgroup.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/covid-abortion-clinic-01_2-800x533.jpg)
![[Photo: An illustration of virus cells colliding with pillars that read 'Roe vs. Wade.']](https://rewirenewsgroup.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/roevwade-01-800x533.jpg)