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Tag: Abortion

  • Which states could have abortion on the ballot in 2024?

    Which states could have abortion on the ballot in 2024?

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    LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — Organizers of an effort to scale back Arkansas’ abortion ban face a Friday deadline to submit enough signatures to try to put their proposal before voters in November’s election.

    If they’re successful, Arkansas would be the sixth state where election officials are validating signatures on abortion measures. They are already on the ballot in another five, plus a proposed amendment in New York that would bar discrimination based on “pregnancy outcomes.”

    Supporters of other abortion measures in Arizona and Nebraska submitted petitions in their respective states on Wednesday.

    The fate of the measures could reshape or confirm the trendlines that have developed in the two years since the U.S. Supreme Court removed the nationwide right to abortion.

    Since the ruling, most Republican-controlled states have new abortion restrictions in effect, including 14 that ban it at every stage of pregnancy. Most Democratic-led states have laws or executive orders to protect access.

    Voters in all seven states that have had abortion questions before voters since 2022 have sided with abortion rights supporters, including California, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Montana, Ohio and Vermont.

    Here’s a look at the abortion measures that could be on ballots in November:

    COLORADO

    Colorado’s top election official confirmed in May that a measure to enshrine abortion protections in the state constitution, including requirements that Medicaid and private health insurers cover it, made the ballot for the fall election.

    Supporters said they gathered more than 225,000 signatures, nearly double the requirement of over 124,000 signatures. Amending the state constitution requires the support of 55% of voters.

    Those backing a dueling measure — a law to ban abortion — did not submit signatures and the measure will not go before voters.

    Abortion is legal at all stages of pregnancy in Colorado.

    FLORIDA

    The state Supreme Court ruled in April that a ballot measure to legalize abortion until fetal viability could go on the ballot despite a legal challenge from state Attorney General Ashley Moody, who argued there are differing views on the meaning of “viability” and that some key terms in the proposed measure are not properly defined.

    Advocates collected nearly a million signatures to put a state constitutional amendment to legalize abortion until viability on the ballot, surpassing the nearly 892,000 required.

    To take effect, the measure would need agreement from at least 60% of voters.

    Abortion is currently illegal in Florida after the first six weeks of pregnancy, before many women know they are pregnant, under a law that took effect May 1.

    MARYLAND

    Voters also will be asked this year to enshrine the right to abortion in Maryland’s constitution. The state already protects the right to abortion under state law and Democrats outnumber Republicans 2-1. Abortion is allowed in Maryland until viability.

    NEVADA

    The Nevada Secretary of State ‘s office announced in June that a ballot question to enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution has met all of the requirements to appear in front of voters in November.

    Under the amendment, abortion access for the first 24 weeks of pregnancy, or later to protect the health of the pregnant person, would be enshrined. Such access already is ensured under a 1990 law.

    To change the constitution, voters would need to approve it in both 2024 and 2026.

    SOUTH DAKOTA

    South Dakota voters will vote this fall on a measure to ban any restrictions on abortion in the first trimester of pregnancy. It would allow the state, in the second trimester, to “regulate the pregnant woman’s abortion decision and its effectuation only in ways that are reasonably related to the physical health of the pregnant woman.”

    An abortion ban would be allowed in the third trimester, as long as it included exceptions for the life and health of the woman.

    The state’s top election official announced May 16 that about 85% of the more than 55,000 signatures submitted in support of the ballot initiative are valid, exceeding the required 35,017 signatures.

    Opponents have sued to try to take the initiative off the ballot.

    ARIZONA

    Abortion rights supporters submitted more than 823,000 signatures on Wednesday to put an abortion access measure before voters in November. That’s more than twice as many as required.

    Election officials still need to verify the signatures.

    Under the measure, the state would not be able to ban abortion until the fetus is viable, with later abortions allowed to protect a woman’s physical or mental health.

    Abortion is currently legal for the first 15 weeks of pregnancy in the state. The Arizona Supreme Court ruled in April that enforcement could begin soon for a near-total ban already on the books. The governor has since signed a bill repealing that law. It is still expected to be in effect for a time, however.

    ARKANSAS

    Proponents of an amendment to allow abortion in many cases must gather nearly 91,000 signatures by Friday for the measure to get on the Nov. 5 ballot. They also must submit a minimum number of signatures from 50 of 75 counties.

    Supporters said on Wednesday they were about 5,800 short of the requirement with two days left to circulate petitions.

    The measure would bar laws banning abortion in the first 20 weeks of gestation and allow abortion later in pregnancy in cases of rape, incest, threats to the woman’s health or life, or if the fetus would be unlikely to survive birth.

    Because it allows abortion to be banned 20 weeks into pregnancy, the proposal does not have the support of Planned Parenthood Great Plains, which includes Arkansas. The state currently bans abortion at all stages of pregnancy, with narrow exceptions.

    Anti-abortion groups in the predominantly Republican state also have campaigned heavily against the measure, and one group published the names and hometowns of canvassers gathering signatures for the proposal.

    MISSOURI

    Missouri abortion rights advocates turned in more than 380,000 signatures, more than twice the required 171,000, for a measure asking voters to approve a constitutional amendment to guarantee abortion until viability. Local election officials have until July 30 to verify the signatures, then it’s up to the secretary of state to declare whether there were enough.

    A group of moderate Republicans have for this year abandoned efforts for an alternate amendment that would have allowed abortion up to 12 weeks, with limited exceptions after that time.

    Abortion is currently banned in Missouri at all stages of pregnancy, with limited exceptions.

    MONTANA

    Abortion rights proponents in Montana have proposed a constitutional amendment that would bar the government from denying the right to abortion before viability or when it’s necessary to protect the life or health of the pregnant person.

    After a legal battle over the ballot language, the Montana Supreme Court in April wrote its version of the language that would appear on the ballot if enough valid signatures are certified. Sponsors were required to submit about 60,000 by June 21. They turned in about 117,000, nearly twice the amount needed.

    Counties have until July 19 to verify the signatures and the secretary of state would have until Aug. 22 to determine whether the amendment goes on the ballot.

    Abortion is legal until viability in Montana under a 1999 Montana Supreme Court opinion.

    NEBRASKA

    Competing abortion measures could come before voters in November after supporters of each said Wednesday they turned in far more signatures than the 123,000 required for ballot access.

    One would enshrine the right to abortion in the state constitution until viability. Supporters said they submitted more than 207,000 signatures.

    The other would write into the constitution the current law which bars abortions after the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, with some exceptions. Its backers said they submitted more than 205,000 signatures.

    Organizers for a third effort did not submit petitions. It would have defined embryos as people, thus barring abortion at all stages of pregnancy.

    Some efforts that sought to restrict or ban abortion also have failed to reach ballots. In Wisconsin, the House approved a measure asking voters to ban abortion after 14 weeks, but the legislative session ended without a vote from the state Senate.

    Likewise, Iowa lawmakers ended their session without approving a measure asking voters to find there is no constitutional right to abortion. Pennsylvania lawmakers previously pursued a similar amendment, but it’s not expected to be added to the ballot this year.

    A Louisiana measure to enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution died in committee, one in Maine effectively died when it fell short of receiving the approval of two-thirds of the House and a Minnesota measure was not passed by lawmakers.

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  • Supreme Court Accidentally Leaks Its Opinion Apparently Overturning Idaho Emergency Abortion Ban

    Supreme Court Accidentally Leaks Its Opinion Apparently Overturning Idaho Emergency Abortion Ban

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    The U.S. Supreme Court Wednesday accidentally leaked its opinion in a case involving Idaho’s emergency abortion ban and it appears that the justices will be ruling against the state.

    In the drafted opinion on Moyle V. United States which appeared briefly on the high court’s website and was subsequently removed, the majority of justices sided with the decision to dismiss the case as “improvidently granted” or on the grounds that the court should not have taken it. They did not specify why.

    This determination would reinstate a lower court’s prior ruling that allowed hospitals in Idaho to perform emergency abortions despite the state’s near-total ban on the medical procedure. Per the opinion released on Wednesday, conservative justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch voted against dismissing the case.

    According to reports, a spokeswoman for the court confirmed that the opinion was published before the final decision. Pending its final release, it could be subject to change. There are two more opinion days in this Supreme Court term.

    This is not the first mishap of its kind. A draft of the decision to overturn Roe v. Wade—which reversed the constitutional right to an abortion—was leaked to the media in May 2022.

    The nation’s highest court heard oral arguments in late April in the case involving Idaho’s abortion ban that challenges whether a federal law that enforces emergency stabilizing care, including abortions, overrides the state mandate that only permits these procedures if, without them, a person would die.

    At the core of the challenge brought forth by the Biden Administration is the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act. First passed in 1986, EMTALA requires all hospitals enrolled in Medicare to provide stabilizing care to patients having a medical emergency.

    If these facilities fail to abide by this requirement, they risk losing the ability to participate in Medicare and other state health programs and could have their provider agreements terminated.

    Idaho Solicitor General Joshua Turner argued that the state was within its jurisdiction to decide how to practice medicine and that each emergent situation would be evaluated and handled on a case-by-case basis.

    Sotomayor and Kagan challenged Turner’s assertions, questioning what would occur in a series of hypothetical patient cases they presented to Turner. Justice Brett Kavanaugh and Thomas appeared to favor siding with Turner’s arguments in tandem with their conservative counterparts.

    Justice Amy Coney Barrett — who has notably been a voice in opposition to abortion — seemed to contradict her usual stance in her line of questioning to Turner. Barrett challenged why the high-risk examples were not exempted under Idaho’s ban if they posed the possibility of death.

    Sotomayor took issue with Turner’s point that there was no objective standard to determining what to do in each situation, only a subjective one based on the physician’s good-faith decision. U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar argued that the case was not about Idaho’s overall ban but the state’s ability to criminalize essential care.

    Hospitals serve primary and maternity care providers for many, especially those living in the growing number of maternal healthcare deserts across the nation. Texas residents, in particular, face this barrier to care, with roughly 50 percent of the state’s 254 counties classified as maternal health deserts without OB-GYNS or birthing facilities as of last year.

    The decision of the nation’s highest court could affect a similar case brought forth by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton against the BIdne Administration, which is currently pending in the courts. Paxton initiated the lawsuit, challenging the federal government’s ability to require hospitals to offer emergency abortions.

    Most recently, the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals sided with Texas. If the ruling is challenged and goes to the U.S. Supreme Court, it will likely be heard in October 2025.

    The final opinion on the Idaho case could come out Thursday or Friday. If the court upholds its decision from the version released on Wednesday, the matter is expected to return to lower courts.

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    Faith Bugenhagen

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  • REPORT: Supreme Court Poised To Allow Emergency Abortions In Idaho – KXL

    REPORT: Supreme Court Poised To Allow Emergency Abortions In Idaho – KXL

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    WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court appears poised to allow emergency abortions in Idaho when a pregnant patient’s health is at serious risk.

    That’s according to a Bloomberg News report.

    The outlet says a copy of the opinion was briefly posted Wednesday on the court’s website.

    Bloomberg says the document suggests the court will conclude that it shouldn’t have gotten involved in the case so quickly and will reinstate a court order that had allowed hospitals in the state to perform emergency abortions to protect a pregnant patient’s health.

    The document was quickly removed.

    The Supreme Court acknowledged that a document was inadvertently posted Wednesday.

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    Grant McHill

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  • Texas’s “Pro-Life” Abortion Law Has Literally Led to More Infant Deaths

    Texas’s “Pro-Life” Abortion Law Has Literally Led to More Infant Deaths

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    Antiabortion advocates talk a big game about protecting the “sanctity of life,” but in reality do not care about life at all—not the lives of mothers, whose rights they think nothing of taking away, or the babies they force pregnant people to carry to term. The most recent example of this hypocrisy? A new study showing that infant deaths increased in Texas in the wake of its near-total ban on abortions.

    On Monday, a study published in the JAMA Pediatrics journal revealed that in 2022, the year after Texas’s Heartbeat Act went into effect, the infant mortality rate went up by nearly 13%, versus an almost 2% increase in the rest of the US. Deaths as a result of birth defects increased in the state by 22.9%—compared to a nationwide decrease of about 3%—presumably because the Texas law bans abortion after six weeks, which is well before tests are done to detect fetal abnormalities. Alison Gemmill, who led the study, told USA Today, “It just points to some of the devastating consequences of abortion bans that maybe people weren’t thinking about when they passed these laws”—a statement that is definitely giving antiabortion lawmakers way too much credit. Wendy Davis, a senior adviser for Planned Parenthood Texas Votes, pointed out that since the study only looked at 2022—and not the years that followed the overturning of Roe v. Wade, when many more states enacted abortion bans—“the situation on the ground today is [likely] even more dire.”

    What do people who call themselves “pro-life” think of all this? Not much—and definitely not that they should rethink how their policies have had terrible consequences on countless real, live people.

    In a statement, a spokesperson for Texas governor Greg Abbott said the Heartbeat Act has led to “thousands of children have been given a chance at life.” Amy O’Donnell, a spokesperson for Texas Alliance for Life, told USA Today, “We don’t apologize for the fact that we don’t support discrimination against children facing disabilities or fatal diagnoses in or out of the womb. And that’s the line that we just believe should not be crossed.” She did not comment on the fact that the Texas law inflicts unimaginable trauma on people forced to give birth to children they know won’t survive, only to watch them die.

    The Donald Trump campaign—whose candidate regularly brags about killing Roe v. Wade—does not appear to have commented on the news. As a reminder, earlier this month, Trump told a group that wants abortion “eradicated entirely” that he knows “where you’re coming from” and pledged, “I’ll be with you, side by side.”

    A window into a second Trump term

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  • Georgia Democrats warn of additional abortion rights threats under second Trump term

    Georgia Democrats warn of additional abortion rights threats under second Trump term

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    On the second anniversary of the Dobbs decision, former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms, and IVF advocate Latorya Beasley joined Georgia State Representative Shea Roberts, Dr. Shawana Moore plus television host Padma Lakshmi to discuss the ramifications of a potential abortion ban in a second term under Donald J. Trump.

    As Thursday’s presidential debate quickly approaches here in Atlanta, Democrats along various political spectrums are centering their pushes for President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris around abortion rights.

    During her remarks, former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms discussed the effects of Georgia’s ban on abortions after six weeks. She says there are young women that are refusing to go to college in Georgia because they no longer have bodily autonomy. 

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    Itoro N. Umontuen

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  • What Trump, Biden might say at the debate, fact-checked

    What Trump, Biden might say at the debate, fact-checked

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    When former President Donald Trump talks about the cost of chicken and eggs, he has often been accurate. But Trump is also prone to exaggerating inflation’s wallop under President Joe Biden.

    Biden acknowledges inflation in his speeches, but he often says wages have outpaced inflation — which all depends on when you start.

    Many media outlets will cover the first presidential debate, hosted June 27 by CNN, by zeroing in on the best zingers. PolitiFact will focus on the substance, helping voters discover the truth, or lack thereof, in the candidates’ statements. 

    We monitor the appearances of Biden and Trump for new and repeated claims every day. So far this year, we have published about five dozen fact-checks of the candidates. (We also fact-check Robert F. Kennedy Jr, who is running as an independent; he did not qualify for the CNN debate.)

    Based on their patterns, we think we have a good idea of how Biden and Trump might answer questions on important voter topics, including the economy, immigration and health care. 

    On immigration, for instance, Trump makes baseless statements that provoke fear, including the Pants on Fire claim that immigrants are coming from other countries’ prisons and mental institutions. Biden plucks out decreases over a short time period that don’t tell the full story about record encounters during his presidency.

    Inoculate yourself from the spin of these talking points and more with this fact-checked guide.

    Economic claims: Listen for specific time frames, remember COVID-19 impacts

    A shopper browses the refrigerated cheese section of a Target store in Sheridan, Colo. (AP)

    Trump has said that under Biden the United States has had “record kinds of inflation.” 

    Inflation peaked around 9% in June 2022 before falling to its current level of about 3% — still higher than voters (and economists) would like, but below the 12% to 15% annual increases in the 1970s and early 1980s. Trump also places all the blame on Biden for rising gasoline prices, even though the price at the pump is beyond a president’s control.

    Biden has noted that inflation has dropped on his watch and adds that it has been exceeded by wage increases. That’s accurate for some time measurements but not others. Since Biden’s inauguration, inflation is outpacing wage growth by a few percentage points. However, wages have outpaced inflation over the past year, the past two years and compared with where they were prepandemic.

    Nevertheless, Biden has exaggerated some aspects of inflation. He has falsely said inflation “was 9% when I came into office.” When Biden was inaugurated, year-over-year inflation was about 1.4%. Overall, Biden makes a lot of Half True statements on the economy. 

    Biden said Trump is the first president since Herbert Hoover, who was president when the Great Depression began, to see a net loss in jobs. This is numerically accurate — but it disingenuously omits the COVID-19 pandemic’s economic impact during Trump’s fourth year.

    Here’s another example using numbers to tell a deceptive story: Biden said the Trump administration “added more to the national debt than any presidential term in American history.” This is accurate — but only until Biden’s own one-term debt total exceeds the amount accumulated under Trump. By the time he leaves office, Biden is projected to have overseen a debt increase larger than Trump’s. 

    Then there are taxes, which the candidates couldn’t see more differently. Trump often says, falsely, that Biden wants to “quadruple your taxes.” Biden proposed a tax increase of about 7% over the next decade, almost exclusively on the wealthiest Americans and corporations, not the 300% that Trump said.

    Biden has frequently said the average federal tax for billionaires is 8.3%, but that’s False. Under the current tax code, the richest Americans pay an effective tax rate of more than 20% on income the government counts. Biden’s 8% figure compares their tax payments with an amount that includes income that is not currently taxed under law, making it a theoretical figure.

    Immigration: What to know about Trump’s tactics, Biden’s metrics

    Former President Donald Trump talks with Maj. Gen. Thomas Suelzer, Texas’ adjutant general Feb. 29, 2024, at the U.S.-Mexico border in Eagle Pass, Texas. (AP)

    Immigration officials have stopped people trying to enter the U.S. illegally 9.5 million times under Biden’s administration, fueling attacks on the president’s immigration record and forcing him to act.

    Biden issued a directive June 4 to limit the number of migrants seeking asylum at the southern U.S. border. He took some credit for a recent decline in migrants.

    “Due to the arrangements that I’ve reached with (Mexican) President (Andrés Manuel López) Obrador, the number of migrants coming … to our shared border unlawfully in recent months has dropped dramatically,” Biden said.

    U.S. Border Patrol data shows immigrant encounters at the U.S.-Mexico border have dropped in recent months. Immigration officials encountered people illegally crossing the border about 128,900 times in April compared with about 250,000 in December. That’s a 48.4% decrease. The numbers of encounters at ports of entry have also dropped. But immigration experts said it’s difficult to pinpoint a single reason for any change in border crossing counts.

    Trump uses scare tactics when describing immigrants illegally crossing the U.S. border, telling Americans that immigrants will destroy Social Security benefits, take union jobs and sign up to vote. Those statements are various shades of wrong. 

    Trump’s statement about jobs of native-born Americans disappearing, for example, focused on one month, obscuring the overall trend under Biden, which showed an increase of 6.2 million jobs for native-born Americans between his inauguration in January 2021 and February 2023. 

    Only U.S. citizens can vote in federal elections. 

    Trump falsely and frequently says foreign countries including Venezuela and Congo are releasing immigrants from jails or prisons into the U.S. Local experts and experts on prisons say there is no evidence to back up Trump’s statements.

    Health care: Biden paints dire warnings about Trump’s approach to COVID-19 and Affordable Care Act

    Trump hasn’t spoken in detail about his health care plans, which has opened the door for Biden to attack his record. 

    Biden accused Trump of wanting to “terminate” the Affordable Care Act. Trump has floated replacing the Affordable Care Act for years, but Biden left out that Trump recently backtracked. 

    Trump promised in a Truth Social post to make the Affordable Care Act “much better, stronger, and far less expensive,” without explaining how. Trump’s inconsistency makes it hard to predict what actions he would take if elected. 

    Biden has spoken more accurately about his own administration’s health care policies, such as lowering prescription drug prices for Medicare beneficiaries. 

    If a CNN host asks about COVID-19, you might hear Biden bring up bleach. Biden frequently says that Trump told Americans to “inject bleach,” which we’ve rated Mostly False. Trump mused aloud with doctors in the room about the possibility during an April 2020 press conference about potential treatments for the disease; but he didn’t instruct Americans to do it. Trump and his press secretary tried to clarify his words amid criticism the next day. 

    Abortion: Trump distorts Democrats’ position on abortion while Biden cherry-picks Trump’s statements

    For years, Democrats have spotlighted Trump’s 2016 comment that “there has to be some form of punishment” for women who have abortions, which Trump retracted the same day; he said he meant that physicians should be held legally responsible.

    Trump’s abortion comments in Time magazine in April gave the Biden campaign more material, but Biden mischaracterized them in a May campaign speech. In the interview, Trump said states may decide to monitor women for legal compliance with abortion laws, and he didn’t share his opinion on whether that was a good idea. Biden told supporters Trump said states “should” monitor women’s pregnancies.

    Trump has said that Democrats support abortion measures that allow the “execution” of babies “after birth,” which is False. What Trump describes would be infanticide and is illegal. Situations resulting in a fetal death in the third trimester are rare and typically involve fetal anomalies or life-threatening medical emergencies affecting the pregnant woman.

    Israel and Gaza: Trump and Biden highlight their support for Israel

    After the Biden administration paused one shipment of 3,500 bombs to Israel, hoping to prevent a full-scale attack on Rafah, a city in Gaza, Trump said, “Biden wants to immediately stop all aid to Israel.” That’s False. 

    Biden signed legislation in April that provides billions of dollars in supplemental aid to Israel, on top of billions the U.S. already provides annually to Israel. Israel also continues to have access to the U.S.’ foreign military financing program.

    Trump may remind voters that he moved the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and that Israel and a few Arab countries in 2020 signed the Abraham Accords. But those accords did not address the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. 

    Trump’s legal battles: He blames Biden, Biden stayed mum during trial

    Biden largely avoided discussing the criminal and civil investigations involving the former president until after he was convicted. Trump has falsely said that Biden is leading investigations against him, including the Manhattan business records case that resulted in Trump’s felony convictions. 

    When Trump said Biden “directed” the Manhattan case, we rated that False. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg hired a former Justice Department prosecutor who investigated Trump when he worked for the New York attorney general. It’s not uncommon for seasoned prosecutors to move among federal, state and local offices, and it doesn’t prove Biden directed the investigation that began before his presidency. 

    Trump also falsely said he “cooperated far more” than Biden in the classified documents investigations. The special counsel in Biden’s classified documents case said Biden had been cooperative, but the special counsel in Trump’s case found Trump’s cooperation so poor that he sought and obtained indictments on multiple counts for obstructing the investigation.

    Biden reaches out to Black and Latino voters with statistics

    President Joe Biden speaks to graduating students May 19, 2024, at Morehouse College’s commencement in Atlanta. (AP)

    Biden tells Black voters that he remembers “who brung me to the dance” — a nod to Black voters who helped him win the 2020 nomination. Many of his statements about his own record highlight positive economic metrics about the Black community (and metrics for Latinos). 

    Biden has spoken accurately about cutting the 2021 Black child poverty rate, about Black employment and expanding health insurance coverage for Black Americans. But he’s on weaker ground when he says “the racial wealth gap is the smallest it’s been in 20 years,” given that it depends on the measurement used. 

    Biden and Trump have sparred over who has produced better results for Black Americans on employment. On this statistic, each has good news. The record low Black unemployment rate was set under Biden in April 2023, at 4.8%. It has risen modestly since then to 6.1% in May 2024, but that’s still lower than it was for much of the first two years under Trump. Still, when Biden set the record, the record he was breaking was Trump’s: 5.3% in August and September 2019.

    Crime: Understanding crime trends, and how COVID-19 factors in

    Police in Oakland, Calif., salute April 26, 2024, as pallbearers carry the casket of slain officer Jordan Wingate. (AP)

    Republican allies of Trump have argued that Biden is responsible for high levels of crime. Biden counters that violent crime has fallen on his watch.

    Putting aside the question of a president’s influence on crime trends, Biden has a point that “violent crime is near a record 50-year low,” as he said in May. The FBI’s violent crime rate for 2022, the last year with available data, was 370 per 100,000 population. Since 1972, only two years have had lower violent crime rates: 2014 and 2019.

    Biden left out important context when he said that the Trump administration “oversaw the largest increase in murders ever recorded.” The increase in the number of murders from 2019 to 2020 was the largest one-year increase since data was systematically recorded in the early 1960s, but this was largely beyond Trump’s control; experts say the spike stemmed from a confluence of the coronavirus pandemic and the societal upheaval after George Floyd’s murder that year.

    Trump has urged voters not to trust data showing falling violent crime because he says the analyses don’t include 30% of cities. This is False: The FBI did struggle with data collection in 2021, but coverage has been back to normal since 2022.

    Voting: Here’s what Trump might say about the transition of power

    Thousands of people gathered Jan. 6, 2021, at a rally near the White House to support President Donald Trump and his baseless claims of election fraud. (AP)

    CNN hosts Jake Tapper or Dana Bash may challenge Trump about his recurring Pants on Fire denials about the 2020 election results, his efforts to lean on officials in Georgia (where the debate is taking place), or his actions to downplay the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack. 

    If Trump doubles down on his election claims, know that elections are administered in thousands of local areas nationwide, each with safeguards, making any attempt to “rig” a national election all but impossible. 

    Trump has also said that Democrats “used COVID to cheat.” Many states made voting by mail easier during the pandemic, and it was available to all voters — not just Democrats — and is not cheating. 

    Trump has repeatedly called the Jan. 6 defendants “hostages” or “warriors” and he promised to pardon defendants who stormed the Capitol. He later suggested that he would “consider” doing it. More than 1,457 defendants have been charged in the storming of the U.S. Capitol, including about 500 people who were charged with assaulting, resisting or impeding officers or employees.

    PolitiFact Staff Writers Samantha Putterman and Maria Ramirez Uribe contributed to this article.

    RELATED: What PolitiFact learned in 1,000 fact-checks of Donald Trump

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  • The anti-abortion movement is making a big play to thwart citizen initiatives on reproductive rights

    The anti-abortion movement is making a big play to thwart citizen initiatives on reproductive rights

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    CHICAGO — Reeling from a string of defeats, anti-abortion groups and their Republican allies in state governments are using an array of strategies to counter proposed ballot initiatives intended to protect reproductive rights or prevent voters from having a say in the fall elections.

    The tactics include attempts to get signatures removed from initiative petitions, legislative pushes for competing ballot measures that could confuse voters and monthslong delays caused by lawsuits over ballot initiative language. Abortion rights advocates say many of the strategies build off ones tested last year in Ohio, where voters eventually passed a constitutional amendment affirming reproductive rights.

    The strategies are being used in one form or another in at least seven states where initiatives aimed at codifying abortion and reproductive rights are proposed for the November ballot. The fights over planned statewide ballot initiatives are the latest sign of the deep divisions created by the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision two years ago to end a constitutional right to abortion.

    This past week, the court issued a ruling in another major abortion case, unanimously upholding access to a drug used in the majority of U.S. abortions, although fights over mifepristone remain active in many states.

    The stakes for the proposed ballot initiatives are high for both sides.

    Where Republicans control the legislature and enact strict abortion limits, a statewide citizens initiative is often the only avenue for protecting access to abortion and other reproductive rights. Voters have either enshrined abortion rights or turned back attempts to restrict it in all seven states where the question has been on the ballot since 2022.

    In South Dakota, lawmakers passed a bill allowing residents to withdraw their signatures on citizen-led petitions. This launched a comprehensive effort by anti-abortion groups to invalidate a proposed abortion rights ballot measure by encouraging endorsers to withdraw signatures.

    The South Dakota secretary of state in May labeled as a “scam” hundreds of phone calls from an anti-abortion group the office accused of “impersonating” government officials.

    “It appears that the calls are trying to pressure voters into asking that their name be removed from the Abortion Rights petitions,” the office said in a statement.

    Adam Weiland, co-founder of Dakotans for Health, the organization behind the proposed measure, said this is part of “an orchestrated, organized effort across states.”

    “The people want to vote on this issue, and they don’t want that to happen,” he said of anti-abortion groups. “They’re using everything they can to prevent a vote on this issue.”

    An Arkansas “Decline to Sign” campaign escalated this month after a conservative advocacy group published the names of the paid canvassers for an abortion rights ballot measure effort. Arkansans for Limited Government, the group behind the ballot measure effort, denounced the move as an intimidation tactic.

    In Missouri, Republicans and anti-abortion groups have opposed efforts to restore abortion rights through a constitutional amendment at every step in the process.

    Republican Attorney General Andrew Bailey stonewalled the abortion-rights campaign for months last year. Then the secretary of state, Republican Jay Ashcroft, tried to describe the proposal to voters as allowing “dangerous and unregulated abortions until live birth.” A state appeals court last year ruled that Ashcroft’s wording was politically partisan and tossed it.

    But Ashcroft’s actions and the legal battle cost the abortion-rights campaign several months, blocking its supporters from collecting thousands of voter signatures needed to put the amendment on the ballot.

    Once the legal battles were settled, abortion opponents launched a “decline to sign” campaign aimed at thwarting the abortion-rights campaigns’ signature-collecting efforts. At one point, voters were sent texts falsely accusing petitioners of trying to steal people’s personal data.

    Republican lawmakers sought to advance another ballot measure to raise the threshold for amending the Missouri Constitution, partly in hopes of making it harder to enact the abortion-rights proposal.

    Both anti-abortion efforts failed, and the abortion-rights campaign in May turned in more than double the required number of voter signatures. Now it’ i up to Ashcroft’s office to verify the signatures and qualify it for the ballot.

    Meanwhile, opposition groups in Arizona, Colorado, Florida and Nebraska have tried to create their own ballot amendments to codify existing abortion restrictions, though these efforts failed to gather enough signatures in Florida and Colorado.

    Jessie Hill, a law professor at Case Western Reserve University School of Law in Cleveland who served as a consultant to the Issue 1 campaign that codified abortion rights in Ohio, said she had warned about the possibility of competing ballot measures that could confuse voters.

    While attempts to keep abortion off the ballot follow a similar blueprint to what she saw in Ohio last year, Hill said she is closely watching new efforts across the country.

    “The anti-abortion side is still trying to figure out what the formula is to defeat these ballot measures,” Hill said.

    A strategy document leaked last month shows Arizona Republicans considering several competing measures to enshrine abortion restrictions into the state constitution. Possible petition names include the “Protecting Pregnant Women and Safe Abortions Act,” the “Arizona Abortion and Reproductive Care Act” or the “Arizona Abortion Protection Act.”

    The document explicitly details how the alternative measures could undercut a proposal from reproductive rights groups aiming to codify abortion rights through viability, usually around 23 weeks to 24 weeks into pregnancy.

    “This leaked document showed a plan to confuse voters through one or multiple competing ballot measures with similar titles,” said Cheryl Bruce, campaign manager for Arizona for Abortion Access.

    In Nebraska, anti-abortion groups are countering a planned ballot initiative to protect reproductive rights with two of their own.

    Allie Berry, campaign manager of the Nebraska Protect Our Rights campaign, which is intended to protect reproductive rights, said the competing measures are designed to deceive and confuse voters. She said the campaign is working to educate voters on the differences between each of the initiatives.

    “If you’re having to resort to deception and confusion, it shows that they realize that most Nebraskans want to protect abortion rights,” she said.

    One counter initiative launched by anti-abortion activists in May seeks to ban abortion at all stages of pregnancy. Called “Now Choose Life,” the petition would grant embryos “personhood.”

    Another launched in March would not go that far but instead seeks to codify the state’s existing 12-week abortion ban into the state constitution while giving lawmakers the ability to pass further restrictions in the future.

    The petition, called Protect Women and Children, has been endorsed by the national anti-abortion group Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America and others in the state.

    Sandy Danek, executive director of Nebraska Right to Life, called the petition a “reasonable alternative measure.” She said as “as time goes on and we continue to educate,” the organization will aim to restrict abortion further.

    “I see this as an incremental process that we’ve been working on for 50 years,” she said.

    ___

    Associated Press writer Summer Ballentine in Jefferson City, Missouri, contributed to this report.

    ___

    The Associated Press receives support from several private foundations to enhance its explanatory coverage of elections and democracy. See more about AP’s democracy initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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  • New campaign targets anti-abortion clinics

    New campaign targets anti-abortion clinics

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    BOSTON — Beacon Hill leaders have rolled out a new public education campaign taking aim at pregnancy crisis centers, which have emerged as the latest battleground in abortion access following the Supreme Court’s 2022 ruling overturning federal protections.

    The state Department of Public Health said Monday that it has partnered with the advocacy group Reproductive Equity Now Foundation on a new campaign to educate the public about the “dangers and potential harm” of anti-abortion centers that advocates say are providing misleading information to women.

    The campaign, which is funded by $1 million carved out in a fiscal 2023 supplemental budget, will appear on social media platforms, billboards, radio and transit, officials said.

    Gov. Maura Healey, who approved the funding, said the goal is to help protect access to “safe and legal” abortions. She said crisis pregnancy centers outnumber women’s reproductive health clinics by more than 2-1 and use “deceptive and dangerous tactics.”

    “This campaign is an important way to provide accurate information so residents can make informed decisions about reproductive care that are right for them,” Healey said in remarks Monday.

    The centers, which advertise free services and counseling for women struggling with unplanned pregnancies, have proliferated in the wake of the high court’s 2022 decision overturning the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling.

    But women’s reproductive rights groups argue the facilities are funded by anti-abortion groups with the sole intention of blocking women from getting abortions.

    Some communities have moved to limit or ban the centers amid complaints that they are using deceptive advertising and providing misinformation.

    “Information is power, and today, Massachusetts is putting power in the hands of our communities by alerting them to the dangers of deceptive anti-abortion centers,” Rebecca Hart Holder, the foundation’s president, said in a statement. “Together, we can combat anti-abortion centers’ predatory practices and ensure every person in Massachusetts has access to the health care they want and need, without deception or delay.”

    Despite the claims by Healey and other state leaders, anti-abortion groups say the centers are providing options to women other than abortions and being unfairly targeted by a “smear campaign” by proponents of the procedure.

    The conservative Massachusetts Family institute says it has documented acts of vandalism and intimidation at pregnancy centers across the state.

    The Pregnancy Care Alliance of Massachusetts said the network of pregnancy care centers in the state “provides millions of dollars in no-cost support and care for thousands of women annually who face planned and unplanned pregnancies, with services ranging from pregnancy confirmation services, parenting education, and community referrals to material goods like diapers and formula.”

    The group accused Healey and other state leaders of “furthering their extreme abortion agenda by using a taxpayer-funded campaign to discredit our centers.”

    “This politically motivated campaign will negatively impact women the most, specifically the many women who want to parent and rely on the free assistance we provide,” the group said in a statement.

    Abortion is legal in Massachusetts under a 2020 law, but advocates say the state has become a destination for women coming from other states that banned the procedure or tightened their laws following the Supreme Court’s ruling.

    State leaders took steps to shield providers and patients from potential lawsuits filed by groups of other states where abortion is now restricted.

    But advocates are pressuring the state to intervene to prevent crisis pregnancy centers from proliferating as more women come to Massachusetts seeking abortions. They’ve been pushing for funding for the public education campaign for several years.

    In 2022, then-Gov. Charlie Baker vetoed $1 million for the campaign from the economic development bill shortly before he left office. Baker said the spending was unnecessary because the state already posts public information about legitimate family planning services operating in the state.

    His rejection of the proposal prompted terse statements from women’s reproductive advocacy groups, which accused the pro-choice Republican of being “wildly out of touch” with his constituents, while it was praised by anti-abortion groups, which say the pregnancy centers are being unfairly targeted.

    Christian M. Wade covers the Massachusetts Statehouse for North of Boston Media Group’s newspapers and websites. Email him at cwade@cnhinews.com.

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  • NC governor’s race: Where Robinson stands on abortion and what the GOP Senate leader says

    NC governor’s race: Where Robinson stands on abortion and what the GOP Senate leader says

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    Senate Leader Phil Berger, left, talks with Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson during a press conference in this 2021 file photo.

    Senate Leader Phil Berger, left, talks with Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson during a press conference in this 2021 file photo.


    Ethan Hyman

    ehyman@newsobserver.com

    RALEIGH

    Welcome to the governor’s race edition of our Under the Dome politics newsletter. I’m Dawn Vaughan, The News & Observer’s state Capitol bureau chief.

    The first million-dollar ad buy is out in the governor’s race between Democratic Attorney General Josh Stein and Republican Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson.

    Stein’s ad, which came out on Tuesday morning and cost more than $1 million to air across statewide television and digital markets, shows a variety of clips of Robinson talking about abortion.

    Robinson, who chose with his now-wife to end her pregnancy in abortion in 1989, is adamantly anti-abortion now.

    He said on state Rep. Jeff McNeely’s radio show that if he won the election he would sign a “heartbeat” bill, which would ban abortion after cardiac activity is detected around six weeks into gestation. The ad showed a clip from that show, and also played a clip of a newly revealed Facebook Live video Robinson did in 2019, saying that women should “keep your skirt down.”

    I watched the entire Robinson Facebook Live, most of which is about abortion, and wrote about what else he said on that video. More details in that story.

    What the most powerful Republican senator says about abortion

    While Robinson wants to sign a “heartbeat” abortion bill into law, the only way he gets one is if the General Assembly, which is currently completely controlled by Republicans, sends him one.

    The abortion bill that became law in 2023, Senate Bill 20, was a deal brokered among Republicans. They agreed on a 12-week ban, with multiple exceptions, after the first trimester of pregnancy.

    Early in that intraparty debate, Senate President Pro Tempore Phil Berger, an Eden Republican, told reporters where he stood on abortion legislation, which was pretty much where the final law landed.

    So I asked him this past week what he thinks legislation from Republicans about abortion could look like next year, if Robinson wins the governor’s race. Berger said he prefers not to change the current abortion law next year. He also said, as he has before, that he doesn’t want abortion legislation passed this legislative session (the House doesn’t, either).

    But there are a few unknowns out there, including the results of the election not just for governor, but for all 170 seats in the General Assembly, as they’re on November ballots, too.

    “I personally would not be in favor of making any changes next year. We will see what happens as far as the election, and what the majorities look like in both the House and the Senate next year. And we’ll just see what happens. I can just speak to where I am,” he said, noting that other senators may think differently.

    Berger said that there are Republican lawmakers who support “heartbeat” legislation. But he also pointed out what polling shows, as he mentioned ahead of the 2023 law as well.

    “One of the things that I’ve looked at is where the vast majority of people in the state of North Carolina are. And I’ve yet to see any polling that shows that prohibiting abortions, or having a six- or eight-week time frame, is something that enjoys support of a majority of people in the state of North Carolina — or a majority of voters in the state of North Carolina. And it’s, I mean, it’s not even close,” Berger said.

    Stein, like other Democrats, opposed North Carolina’s recent change to abortion law as well as the U.S. Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade.

    Democratic Attorney General Josh Stein, left, and Republican Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, right, will move on to North Carolina’s general election for governor in 2024.
    Democratic Attorney General Josh Stein, left, and Republican Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, right, will move on to North Carolina’s general election for governor in 2024.

    Stay informed about #ncpol

    Don’t forget to follow our Under the Dome tweets and listen to our Under the Dome podcast to stay up to date. Our new episode posts Monday morning, I’m joined by my legislative politics team colleagues Kyle Ingram and Avi Bajpai. We talk about the Senate Democrats walking out before a vote on a surprise mask/campaign finance bill on Thursday, and how that may play out this week when the bill is in the House. Plus the latest on an abortion lawsuit and early voting.

    You can sign up to receive the Under the Dome newsletter at newsobserver.com/newsletters. Want your friends to get our email, too? Forward them this newsletter so they can sign up.

    Related stories from Raleigh News & Observer

    Dawn Baumgartner Vaughan is the Capitol Bureau Chief for The News & Observer, leading coverage of the legislative and executive branches in North Carolina with a focus on the governor, General Assembly leadership and state budget. She has received the McClatchy President’s Award, N.C. Open Government Coalition Sunshine Award and several North Carolina Press Association awards, including for politics and investigative reporting.

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    Dawn Baumgartner Vaughan

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  • Republicans Proudly Declare They’re Against Making Contraception a Federal Right

    Republicans Proudly Declare They’re Against Making Contraception a Federal Right

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    Republicans get very huffy when people accuse them of hating women and wanting to control pregnant people’s bodies—yet instead of proving that neither of those things are true, they do stuff like:

    Most recently not helping their cause? Refusing to make contraception a federal right, which they insist is totally unnecessary despite all of the above. On Wednesday, Senate Republicans rejected the Right to Contraception Act, a Democratic bill that would stop the federal government and states from passing laws limiting access to birth control. Speaking to The Washington Post, Senator Joni Ernst called the bill “fear-mongering,” and introduced one that does not protect access to the morning-after pill. Senator John Cornyn claimed Democrats are holding a “phony vote because contraception to my knowledge is not illegal. It’s not unavailable. To suggest that it’s somehow in jeopardy should be embarrassing, but it’s hard to embarrass some people around here.”

    Of course, what people like Cornyn don’t note is that that’s the exact argument Republicans used to make about abortion, before the federal right to the medical procedure was summarily scrapped. Referring to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas’s 2022 declaration that the court “should reconsider” some of its past decisions, including the one protecting access to contraception, Senator Mazie Hirono told ABC News: “Whenever a Supreme Court justice, especially in the MAGA far right, says he wants to revisit a case, you can bet that he’s looking to overturn.” In a speech on the Senate floor on Wednesday, Minority Leader Chuck Schumer warned: “A few years ago it was Roe. A few years from now it could be something else. We are kidding ourselves if we think the hard right is done with their attacks on reproductive rights.”

    Last month, Donald Trump was asked in an interview, “Do you support any restrictions on a person’s right to contraception?” And rather than saying a simple “no,” he responded: “We’re looking at that, and I’m gonna have a policy on that very shortly, and I think it’s something that you’ll find interesting. And it’s another issue that’s very interesting, but you will find it, I think, very smart; I think it’s a smart decision. But we’ll be releasing it very soon.”

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  • Washington Senator Murray Leads Debate on Reproductive Rights – KXL

    Washington Senator Murray Leads Debate on Reproductive Rights – KXL

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    WASHINGTON, D.C. — Washington state U.S. Senator Patty Murray says, since the Supreme Court overturned the right to an abortion,  “In America, more than a third of women of reproductive age live in states where they essentially do not have the choice to end a pregnancy.”   That’s meant, “Children can’t get abortion care after being raped. Some kids may be able to get across state lines to get the care they need. Other children have been forced into motherhood.  One teenager delivered a baby while clutching a teddy bear.”

    Republican Louisiana, Senator and Dr. Bill Cassidy argued, “Scientifically and morally, there is no difference in the value of a child whether she is in her mother’s arms or whether she is in her mother’s womb.”

    Others testified, including an abortion survivor.  “I am Melissa Oden, the survivor of a failed saline infusion abortion.”

    A woman who had to leave her state. “I was shocked. I couldn’t get an abortion in Texas. No one could see me.”

    And doctors. “Our job as physicians is to take all of the information that a patient provides us and give them the option to decide what is best for themselves and for their bodies. “

    More about:

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    Annette Newell

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  • Southwest Airlines back in court over firing of flight attendant

    Southwest Airlines back in court over firing of flight attendant

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    NEW ORLEANS — Southwest Airlines is set to return to federal court Monday in hopes of reversing an $800,000 award to a flight attendant who said she was fired for her anti-abortion views and a judge’s related order that the airlines’ lawyers take religious liberty training from a conservative Christian legal group.

    Southwest argues flight attendant Charlene Carter was fired because she violated company rules requiring civility in the workplace by sending “hostile and graphic” anti-abortion messages to a fellow employee, who also was president of the local union.

    Carter called the union leader “despicable” for attending the 2017 Women’s March in Washington, D.C., where participants protested the inauguration of then-President Donald Trump and called for protecting abortion rights.

    Carter’s attorneys argue in briefs that she made clear to management she sent the material “because she was a pro-life Christian, and as a Christian she believes she must get the word out to anyone who touches the issue of abortion.”

    They argued firing her violated federal law shielding employees from religious-based discrimination and that Southwest management and the union, which complained about Carr’s messages, should be held liable for her firing.

    After the trial, U.S. District Judge Brantley Starr, a Trump nominee who joined the bench in 2019, ordered the airline to tell flight attendants that under federal law, it “may not discriminate against Southwest flight attendants for their religious practices and beliefs.”

    Instead, the Dallas-based airline told employees that it “does not discriminate,” and told flight attendants to follow the airline policy that it cited in firing Carter.

    Starr found Southwest in contempt in August for the way it explained the case to flight attendants. He ordered Southwest to pay Carter’s most recent legal costs and he dictated a statement for Southwest to relay to employees.

    He also ordered three Southwest lawyers to complete at least eight hours of religious liberty training from the Alliance Defending Freedom, which offers training on compliance with federal law prohibiting religious discrimination in the workplace.

    The conservative group has played a high-profile role in multiple legal fights. They include defending a baker and a website designer who didn’t want to work on same-sex marriage projects, efforts to limit transgender rights and a challenge to longstanding federal approval of a medication used in the most common way to end a pregnancy.

    Lawyers for Carter said in briefs that the type of training ordered “is a commonplace civil contempt sanction” and denied that it impinges on the airline’s free speech rights.

    The initial monetary award against Southwest and the union was $5.1 million, the bulk to be paid by Southwest. The judge, citing federal limits on punitive damages, later reduced it to about $800,000, including $450,000 in damages and back pay from Southwest, $300,000 in damages from the union and about $60,000 in interest.

    ___

    The story has been updated to correct the amount of the award to $800,000, from $8 million.

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  • Texas Supreme Court Strikes Down Abortion Ban Challenge With ‘Deeply Offensive’ Ruling

    Texas Supreme Court Strikes Down Abortion Ban Challenge With ‘Deeply Offensive’ Ruling

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    The Texas Supreme Court unanimously rejected a challenge to the state’s restrictive abortion ban on Friday, ruling against 20 women, including some from North Texas, who allege state laws prevented them from receiving medical care after experiencing severe complications with their pregnancies. The lead plaintiff in the case, Zurawski v. Texas, was Amanda Zurawski who, while pregnant, “was forced to wait until she was septic to receive abortion care, causing one of her fallopian tubes to become permanently closed,” according to a complaint filed over a year ago…

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    Emma Ruby

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  • Tennessee governor signs ‘abortion trafficking’ bill for minors into law

    Tennessee governor signs ‘abortion trafficking’ bill for minors into law

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    Tennessee Republican Gov. Bill Lee on Tuesday signed a bill into law that criminalizes “abortion trafficking of a minor,” the latest GOP-led state to reduce access to abortion following the reversal of Roe v. Wade.The new law is aimed at preventing assistance to minors seeking to obtain an abortion. It does not apply to the parents or legal guardian of the minor.Under the measure, a person who helps a minor obtain an abortion, or abortion-inducing drugs, without consent from the minor’s parent, could be sued for money damages by the minor, by the minor’s parents, or by the biological father.Tennessee joins a number of Republican-led states that have restrictions on abortion either taking effect or enacted for the first time following the Supreme Court’s decision in 2022 that overturned the federal right to an abortion. While abortion is already banned in Tennessee – with no exceptions for rape or incest – the new law creates a new layer of punishment for those seeking to help minors obtain an abortion.The law, which takes effect July 1, applies regardless of whether the pregnant minor “consented to the actions that led to the offense,” according to the law, which is a Class A misdemeanor offense and carries a sentence of 11 months and 29 days in prison. Before the measure was signed into law, Bryan Davidson, policy director at the ACLU of Tennessee, said it “harms young people’s ability to access the support of those they trust when they need it most and is an unprecedented attack on the First Amendment right to free speech and expression.”“It is absurd and cruel to force a pregnant young person to navigate laws and systems that are designed to deprive them of their own bodily autonomy, while simultaneously removing the ability for trusted adults to provide guidance and support when they need it most,” Davidson wrote in a letter to Lee last month.CNN has reached out to Lee’s office for comment.The new law is similar to an Idaho “abortion trafficking” measure that GOP Gov. Brad Little signed last year. That law made it illegal for adults in the state to assist a minor with obtaining an abortion without parental consent, though it was later blocked by a judge over constitutionality concerns.

    NASHVILLE, Tenn. —

    Tennessee Republican Gov. Bill Lee on Tuesday signed a bill into law that criminalizes “abortion trafficking of a minor,” the latest GOP-led state to reduce access to abortion following the reversal of Roe v. Wade.

    The new law is aimed at preventing assistance to minors seeking to obtain an abortion. It does not apply to the parents or legal guardian of the minor.

    Under the measure, a person who helps a minor obtain an abortion, or abortion-inducing drugs, without consent from the minor’s parent, could be sued for money damages by the minor, by the minor’s parents, or by the biological father.

    Tennessee joins a number of Republican-led states that have restrictions on abortion either taking effect or enacted for the first time following the Supreme Court’s decision in 2022 that overturned the federal right to an abortion. While abortion is already banned in Tennessee – with no exceptions for rape or incest – the new law creates a new layer of punishment for those seeking to help minors obtain an abortion.

    The law, which takes effect July 1, applies regardless of whether the pregnant minor “consented to the actions that led to the offense,” according to the law, which is a Class A misdemeanor offense and carries a sentence of 11 months and 29 days in prison. Before the measure was signed into law, Bryan Davidson, policy director at the ACLU of Tennessee, said it “harms young people’s ability to access the support of those they trust when they need it most and is an unprecedented attack on the First Amendment right to free speech and expression.”

    “It is absurd and cruel to force a pregnant young person to navigate laws and systems that are designed to deprive them of their own bodily autonomy, while simultaneously removing the ability for trusted adults to provide guidance and support when they need it most,” Davidson wrote in a letter to Lee last month.

    CNN has reached out to Lee’s office for comment.

    The new law is similar to an Idaho “abortion trafficking” measure that GOP Gov. Brad Little signed last year. That law made it illegal for adults in the state to assist a minor with obtaining an abortion without parental consent, though it was later blocked by a judge over constitutionality concerns.

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  • Hogan makes abortion-rights stand in Senate race – WTOP News

    Hogan makes abortion-rights stand in Senate race – WTOP News

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    Former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan has proclaimed himself an abortion rights advocate in his race for Senate against Democrat Angela Alsobrooks.

    In his first campaign ad, a week after securing the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate in the Maryland primary, former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan has proclaimed himself an abortion-rights advocate.

    “Today, with Roe overturned, many have asked what I will do in the United States Senate. I’ll support legislation that makes Roe the law of land in every state, so every woman can make her own choice,” Hogan said in the 30-second ad.

    Since the Supreme Court overturned the federal right to abortion by overturning Roe vs. Wade in 2022, Democrats nationwide have successfully campaigned on the promise of restoring Roe through congressional legislation. Hogan’s embrace of abortion rights could reduce the effectiveness of the campaign issue for his Democratic challenger, Angela Alsobrooks.

    “Governor Hogan had to make an ad like this. In pro-choice Maryland, being a Republican in a time when Roe vs. Wade has been overturned is very difficult in a statewide election,” said Stephen Farnsworth, a political-science professor at the University of Mary Washington.

    Emphasizing his abortion-rights stand, Hogan ended his first campaign ad saying: “No one should come between a woman and her doctor.”

    “The problem for Hogan is this may not be enough. The reality of a Republican majority in Congress would scare a lot of pro-choice Democrats who might have supported Hogan in the past when he was running as governor of Maryland. In the very partisan national-political environment, though, Hogan has a much more challenging environment, particularly given what Republicans have said and done relating to the abortion question,” Farnsworth said.

    The former governor staking out this position immediately drew criticism from his opponent.

    “Larry Hogan has already shown us and told us he is not going to protect abortion rights. And the Republicans he’d be joining in the Senate have made their agenda to pass a national abortion ban crystal clear,” said Alsobrooks in a written statement.

    “What Hogan wants to do is eliminate abortion as a central issue in this campaign. But that’s going to be difficult given what Donald Trump has done as president, appointing three Supreme Court justices that were part of that decision to reverse Roe vs. Wade, and what Republicans all around the country are saying,” Farnsworth said.

    “In these highly partisan times, it’s very difficult for a candidate, even a popular one, to step away from the party mainstream in a presidential election year. Larry Hogan, no doubt about it, is saying what he needs to say to be competitive in Maryland. The question is: Will Maryland voters overlook what the Republican Party stands for outside of Maryland?” he added.

    Alsobrooks, joined by other Maryland Democratic women who support abortion rights, scheduled a Wednesday morning press conference at the American Visionary Art Museum in Baltimore to address the issue in the campaign.

    Get breaking news and daily headlines delivered to your email inbox by signing up here.

    © 2024 WTOP. All Rights Reserved. This website is not intended for users located within the European Economic Area.

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    Dick Uliano

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  • Don’t Be Fooled by Trump’s Triangulation on Abortion

    Don’t Be Fooled by Trump’s Triangulation on Abortion

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    Trump can’t evade his promises to the anti-abortion movement.
    Photo: Olivier Douliery/AFP via Getty Images

    Democrats are understandably frantic to make abortion policy a key issue in the 2024 elections. But they aren’t entirely on the same page about how to deal with Donald Trump’s latest tactics on the subject. The former president, who enabled the end of Roe v. Wade, is pretty clearly trying to take the issue off the table by foreswearing any interest in a federal abortion ban and depicting himself as largely indifferent to what states decide to do. Some critics hope to drive a wedge between Trump and one of his party’s most important constituency groups by suggesting that he has thrown the anti-abortion lobby “under the bus,” discarding them now that they are making very unpopular demands. Others accuse Trump of lying about his plans for abortion policy once he’s back in the White House. And still others suggest that this supremely transactional man can’t be trusted to take a principled position on much of anything that doesn’t touch on his personal power and his lust for vengeance against his many enemies.

    All of these perspectives have merit. But from a coldly political point of view, Democrats should recognize a tactic that one of their own presidents perfected to the befuddlement of allies and opponents alike: triangulation.

    Bill Clinton was masterful at addressing issues that were bedeviling his party in ways that neutralized their salience and strengthened the impression he was “a different kind of Democrat.” This did not mean simply adopting Republican positions, as intraparty critics often complained (as did conservative politicians, who whined that Clinton was “stealing our ideas”). It meant, as the 42nd president’s one-time Svengali Dick Morris put it, to “use your party’s solutions to solve the other side’s problems. Use your tools to fix their car.” For example, instead of refusing to talk about crime because it was a “Republican issue,” Clinton promoted community policing and putting more cops on the street instead of the GOP’s preferred policies of tougher sentencing and sanctioned violence against criminal suspects. More controversially, he responded to the popular craving for welfare reform not by cutting off public assistance but by focusing it on transitional support aiming at immediate employment. Whatever you think of those policies (and they didn’t age very well), at the time, they helped insulate Democrats from attacks while driving Republicans nuts.

    Trump seems to be trying something similar on abortion: He’s distancing himself from the anti-abortion extremists, who have been perhaps his staunchest allies, without becoming pro-choice. Trump’s “It’s a state issue” stance conveniently allows him to deny reproductive rights will even be an issue for him as president, without embracing abortion rights in any way, shape, or form. He’s embellished his evasive stance by selectively and vaguely criticizing total state abortion bans as “too harsh,” and undergirded his faux-centrist posture by falsely claiming “legal experts on both sides” wanted to reverse Roe v. Wade and make abortion a state issue. Meanwhile, anti-abortion militants understand that there’s not going to be any federal abortion ban until (a) Republicans have a governing trifecta and (b) they decide it’s safe to kill the Senate filibuster. So they’ll tolerate Trump’s disrespectful rhetoric, much as many old-school Democrats backed Clinton even though they were deeply annoyed by his “third way” stylings.

    The simplest way for Democrats to deal with Trumpian triangulation on abortion is to remind voters again and again of the explicit promises to the anti-abortion movement that he has made and delivered upon, bringing them closer to their goal of eliminating legal abortion and even some forms of contraception. Because Trump won, abortion rights suffered and, in much of the country, died. Voters don’t need an in-depth education on constitutional law or how the federal judiciary works to understand that, and it’s an argument and a challenge Trump cannot evade.


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  • Louisiana passes bill to make abortion pills a controlled dangerous substance

    Louisiana passes bill to make abortion pills a controlled dangerous substance

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    Louisiana lawmakers on Tuesday approved a bill that would add two medications commonly used to induce an abortion to the state’s list of controlled dangerous substances, making possession of the drugs without a valid prescription a crime punishable by a fine, jail time or both.

    The measure, which has drawn support from anti-abortion groups and alarm from medical professionals and reproductive rights advocates, would add the medications mifepristone and misoprostol to Schedule IV of the state’s Uniform Controlled Dangerous Substances Law. Abortion — both medical and surgical — is illegal in Louisiana, so it is already illegal to prescribe the medications to terminate a pregnancy, except in very limited circumstances.

    Medication abortions accounted for 63% of all abortions in 2023, according to the reproductive rights think tank the Guttmacher Institute.

    The bill passed Tuesday in a vote in the state’s GOP-controlled House of Representatives, 64-29.

    The measure will now go back to the Senate, and if approved, will then be sent to the governor to sign into law.

    The legislation would make possession of the medications without a valid prescription or an order from a medical professional punishable by up to five years in prison. Pregnant people who obtain the medications for their own consumption would not be subject to prosecution, according to the legislation.

    President Joe Biden called on Congress to pass abortion rights legislation on Monday, the 51st anniversary of the Supreme Court’s decision on Roe v. Wade.

    Medical professionals have spoken out against the measure, saying the medications have critical uses outside of abortion care, including aiding in labor and delivery, miscarriage treatment, and the prevention of gastrointestinal ulcers.

    Schedule IV substances include some narcotics; medications within the category of depressants, such as Xanax and Valium; muscle relaxants; sleep aids; and stimulants that can be used to treat ADHD and weight loss.

    The bill, Senate Bill 276, would also criminalize “coerced criminal abortion by means of fraud,” which would prohibit someone from knowingly using the medications to cause or attempt to cause an abortion without the consent of the pregnant person. That would be punishable by up to 10 years, or up to 20 years if the pregnant person was three months or more into a pregnancy. 

    Republican state Sen. Thomas Pressly, who introduced the bill, has said the issue is personal to him and his sister, Catherine Herring. Herring’s estranged husband was accused of slipping abortion medication into her drinks when she was pregnant with their third child. Mason Herring pleaded guilty to the allegations in February and was sentenced to 180 days in jail. 

    But doctors and reproductive rights advocates have expressed alarm at the bill, which would make Louisiana the only state to categorize the two medications as controlled dangerous substances. 

    “They are safe and effective and they are not dangerous drugs of abuse to be on a schedule of a controlled dangerous substance list,” Dr. Jennifer Avegno, an emergency medicine physician and the director of the New Orleans Health Department, told NBC News on Tuesday. “From a medical standpoint, healthcare providers think this is bad science, and not well informed.” 

    “This is not about abortion. This is about using these drugs, routinely for many, many other things. Mainly, number one to facilitate safe childbirth, number two miscarriage management,” she said.

    Avegno is one of more than 250 doctors who wrote in a letter to Pressly that reclassifying the medications would create “the false perception that these are dangerous drugs that require additional regulation” and said that the proposal was “not scientifically based.”

    “Given its historically poor maternal health outcomes, Louisiana should prioritize safe and evidence-based care for pregnant women,” the doctors said.

    Pressly told NBC News on Tuesday that the goal of the bill “certainly is to not provide an additional challenge to our medical providers, but it is to ensure that these drugs are being used appropriately and effectively for legitimate medical reasons which are outside of abortion. As stated previously, abortion is already illegal in Louisiana.”

    After it was introduced in the House Tuesday afternoon, State Rep. Mandie Landry, a Democrat, called for a motion to recommit the bill to the legislature’s Health and Welfare Committee because of the amendment that would recategorize the medications as controlled dangerous substances.

    “This amendment is about rescheduling drugs that are used every single day to induce labor, to manage miscarriages, to manage post-hemorrhage issues with a pregnancy,” she said.

    Landry said the recategorization would require certain storage facilities to store the drugs, which could potentially hurt the ability of rural clinics to access them and provide them to patients.

    “I think it’s horrible how this good bill was hijacked by outsiders who are not doctors, and aren’t even legislators,” she said. 

    Landry’s motion was voted down, 66-30.

    Rep. Julie Emerson, a Republican who introduced the bill for the House vote, said that the amendment “does not mean the doctors cannot prescribe this and administer this. This doesn’t mean they can’t prescribe it, and that people can’t go pick it up and still use this medication.”

    Abortion is banned in Louisiana with limited exceptions, which include to save a pregnant person’s life, to prevent “serious risk” to their health and if the fetus is not expected to survive pregnancy. Earlier this month, a Louisiana legislative committee rejected a bill that would have added cases of rape and incest to the exceptions. 

    This story first appeared on NBCNews.com. More from NBC News:

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  • Abortion activist sentenced under 1994 clinic access law

    Abortion activist sentenced under 1994 clinic access law

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    An anti-abortion activist convicted for her role in the October 2020 invasion and blockade of a Washington, D.C.-area abortion clinic was sentenced May 14 to 57 months in prison.

    Lauren Handy, the activism and mutual aid director for the group Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising, was convicted in August 2023 of violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, a 1994 law that prohibits obstructing entrances to reproductive health clinics. She was also found guilty on a felony civil rights charge. 

    Lila Rose, the founder of the anti-abortion group Live Action, said on social media that Handy’s sentence was too severe for her actions.

    “30-year-old pro-life activist Lauren Handy has just been sentenced to 57 months in federal prison for handing roses and resources to women at an abortion facility,” Rose wrote in a May 14 Instagram post. “Meanwhile, abortionists who dismember and kill children walk free. A grave injustice!”

    The post was flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.)

    Rose’s claim, however, misstates the reason for Handy’s conviction. After PolitiFact contacted Rose, Live Action spokesperson Noah Brandt referred us to Rose’s May 15 X post that clarified her claim. She made the same clarification on her Instagram post. Here is the original archived version.

    “CLARIFICATION: While Lauren has passed out roses and offered counseling and resources at many abortion facilities, Lauren and fellow defendants were convicted of violating the FACE Act — a law that has primarily been used to penalize pro-life activism — for their participation in a non-violent sit-in at Cesare Santangelo’s Washington, D.C. late-term abortion facility,” she wrote, in a post that went on to criticize the conviction and sentence as unjust.

    Prosecutors, in their sentencing memorandum, said Handy and her co-defendants planned a “lock-and-block” invasion of the Washington Surgi-Clinic, “during which they used force and physical obstructions to interfere with access to the clinic.”

    Handy planned, organized and directed the protest, which lasted for several hours on Oct. 22, 2020, prosecutors said. Co-defendant Jonathan Darnel, who livestreamed the event, also co-organized the event. He was sentenced May 15 to 34 months in prison.

    Eight other activists were also convicted or pleaded guilty in the case on similar charges. Handy’s sentence is the longest in the case, so far; two other people await sentencing.

    Handy identified herself to police officers as a “blockade organizer,” and admitted her role in social media posts, prosecutors said. She also used a fake name to schedule an appointment to gain access to the clinic. She identified herself using the fake name to a clinic worker as her co-defendants, one of whom had a bag of chains, locks and ropes, hid in the building’s stairwell, prosecutors said.

    Prosecutors said a nurse injured her ankle when another protester, Jay Smith, pushed her as he forcibly entered the clinic. Other defendants were accused of pushing or shoving clinic workers. Prosecutors said the obstruction Handy planned was “especially traumatic” for two clinic patients who testified at trial, one of whom was forced to climb through a window to receive care and another who collapsed in pain while being blocked from the clinic.

    Facebook livestream videos of the protest show some protesters holding literature to pass out. Handy appears several times in the video, speaking with protesters and police officers. She also spoke with Darnel, who was narrating the livestream, and she described allowing a man in to join his partner after he promised to give her anti-abortion literature, but she said “under no circumstances” would a doctor who worked at the clinic be allowed to enter. The videos don’t show her handing out roses, although the videos  total more than two and a half hours and Handy is not on screen the entire time.

    Handy’s online bio says she has helped lead the “Red Rose Movement,” an anti-abortion group that goes to abortion clinics and offers patients “red roses as a sign of life, peace and love.” 

    Darnel, in the first video, described the protest as “historic” and said that he knew he and other protesters were breaking the law.

    “These people are not just counseling inside of an abortion clinic, which is illegal. They are physically preventing women from going in to kill their children,” he said. “This could mean severe criminal penalties for them. But it’s worth it.”

    U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, when handing down her sentence, told Handy that “there may be nothing more American” than protests for and against abortion access, but the law doesn’t allow “violence or obstructive conduct,” The Washington Post reported.

    “That’s what you’re being punished for, not your views on abortion nor your very American commitment to peaceful protest,” Kollar-Kotelly said.

    Rose’s claim that Handy was arrested for “handing out roses and resources” at an abortion protest understates what Handy was accused and convicted of doing. Protesters forcibly invaded a clinic and prevented patients from accessing care, prosecutors said. Rose issued a clarification after PolitiFact contacted her, correctly describing why Handy was convicted. Her original statement is False.

    PolitiFact Researcher Caryn Baird contributed to this fact-check.

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  • Hogan needed to make ‘pro-choice’ pledge in US Senate race, political expert says – WTOP News

    Hogan needed to make ‘pro-choice’ pledge in US Senate race, political expert says – WTOP News

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    Former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, a Republican running for U.S. Senate, is leaning into the issue of abortion more than he ever has in his political career.

    Former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, a Republican running for the open U.S. Senate seat in the state, is leaning into the issue of abortion more than he ever has in his political career.

    In an interview with the New York Times, Hogan described himself as “pro-choice” and said that he supports legislation to codify abortion rights into federal law.

    Hogan also said that he, as a Marylander, would vote to enshrine abortion rights in the state’s constitution, a measure that will be on the ballot in November.

    “Seeing ballot initiatives regarding abortion do so well, even in red states, it does not surprise me at all,” said Todd Eberly, a political science professor at St. Mary’s College of Maryland. “In a blue state like Maryland, that’s just the reality of where that issue is right now.”

    Hogan historically has shied away from talking about abortion. But that has changed in a big way.

    “Hogan, for the most part, has done everything he could to try to avoid the issue,” Eberly said. “He was able to do that when he was running for governor because it was already settled in Maryland law.”

    After securing the Republican nomination in the Senate race Tuesday, Hogan even talked about abortion during his victory speech.

    “Let me, once again, set the record straight,” Hogan said. “To the women of Maryland: You have my word that I will continue to protect your right to make your own reproductive health decisions.”

    That hasn’t stopped Democrats from saying Hogan would vote for federal abortion limits in the Senate. In a post on social media on Thursday, the Maryland Democratic Party called Hogan a “wolf in sheep’s clothing.”

    “Larry Hogan has been against reproductive freedom his entire life,” the party said in its post.

    Prince George’s County Executive Angela Alsobrooks, Hogan’s Democratic opponent in the race, made a similar statement earlier this week.

    “Larry Hogan has said he’s a lifelong Republican, and if he’s elected, he will give Republicans the majority that they need to pass a national abortion ban,” Alsobrooks said.

    Hogan and Alsobrooks are running to succeed retiring Sen. Ben Cardin.

    If Hogan were to win, he’d be the first Republican in more than 40 years to win a Senate seat in the blue state of Maryland, where Democrats outnumber Republicans by a 2:1 ratio statewide.

    “He knows that no matter what, he can’t win without Democratic votes,” Eberly said. “He wasn’t going to secure those votes without making this pledge.”

    Get breaking news and daily headlines delivered to your email inbox by signing up here.

    © 2024 WTOP. All Rights Reserved. This website is not intended for users located within the European Economic Area.

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  • Would Sen. Britt’s bill create a pregnant women ‘registry’?

    Would Sen. Britt’s bill create a pregnant women ‘registry’?

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    Sen. Katie Britt, R-Ala., recently introduced a bill that would establish a federal website with resources for pregnant women and mothers. But critics are raising alarm over the legislation, which they say has dangerous implications for women.

    Democrats and other blue check users on X said Britt’s bill would “create a national registry” or “federal database” of pregnant women. Some news outlets, including The Guardian, Salon and Raw Story, ran headlines that made similar claims about the bill.

    “So (Britt) creates a database of pregnant women so Trump then knows who to prosecute if any of those women get an abortion,” Democratic National Committee Chair Jaime Harrison said on X.

    Kentucky Democrat Amy McGrath, who unsuccessfully ran to unseat Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., in 2020, said on X, “According to the GOP, America needs a national registry for pregnant women.”

    The bill text doesn’t mention the words “registry” or “database.” Britt’s spokesperson, Sean Ross, told PolitiFact that “these social media posts are intentionally, flagrantly false.”

    The measure says that if website users consent to provide their contact information, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services may call or email them to share additional resources. The bill neither defines other ways users’ contact information might be used, nor says who would, or would not, have access to the data beyond the department’s secretary.

    Critics say the bill’s ambiguity poses data privacy concerns for the site’s users. The bill has also been criticized for excluding from the website’s resource list any information from organizations that offer abortions.

    What would Britt’s bill do?

    The bill, titled the More Opportunities for Moms to Succeed (MOMS) Act, says it would establish the government website pregnancy.gov as “a clearinghouse of relevant resources available for pregnant and postpartum women, and women parenting young children.”

    The bill says the website would include “a series of questions” users could answer to generate a list of “relevant resources” within a ZIP code. The website would show online resources and organizations that provide services within 100 miles of that ZIP code.

    The website’s resources would include public and private entities that provide mentorship opportunities; health and well-being services; financial assistance; material or legal support; mental health services; child care, adoption or foster care services; and information on abortion risks or alternatives to abortion, according to the bill.

    The bill says pregnancy.gov would also contain an “assessment” through which users could “provide consent to use the user’s contact information, which the (Department of Health and Human Services) Secretary may use to conduct outreach via phone or email to follow up with users on additional resources that would be helpful for the users to review.”

    The bill prohibits information from organizations, including any affiliates, subsidiaries, successors and clinics, that “perform, induce, refer for, or counsel in favor of abortions, or provide financial support to any other organization that conducts such activities.”

    People using pregnancy.gov would not be required to disclose personally identifiable information, Ross said, nor does the bill say that the website would ask users about their pregnancy status. Although the bill does not specifically address this, Ross said no login or registration would be required to use the site.

    Ross said the “assessment” would ask users about the website’s accessibility and helpfulness, and enable them to opt in with a phone number or email address; the Department of Health and Human Services may then contact these users with additional resources. Ross said Britt envisions this outreach to be a one-time occurrence.

    Receiving this outreach is voluntary, Ross said, and people could use a “burner” email address or pseudonym to remain anonymous. The additional resources provided would vary by person and be largely up to the department’s discretion, he said, although they would exclude entities that provide abortions.

    Another bill provision would provide grants to nonprofit organizations that “support, encourage and assist women to carry their pregnancies to term and to care for themselves and their babies after birth.” Entities providing abortions would be excluded from these grants.

    Because Democrats have a slim majority in the Senate, Britt’s bill is unlikely to pass if it is brought to a vote.

    We contacted the Department of Health and Human Services with questions about the potential impact of the legislation but did not hear back.

    Critics say the bill poses data privacy concerns

    Dr. Rob Davidson, a west Michigan-based emergency physician, shared in a series of X posts his concerns about Britt’s bill, including that it would “create a database of pregnant women in the U.S.” Davidson is also the executive director of the Committee to Protect Health Care, a national organization advocating for expanding health care access, lowering medical costs and protecting reproductive rights.

    Although Davidson acknowledged users would have to voluntarily provide contact information and consent to receive outreach on the proposed website, he told PolitiFact that many people don’t read the fine print to know what that information sharing entails.

    Davidson said it’s “very concerning to me” that this bill would have “women who are pregnant, who are considering their options, hand over their information and just the fact that they are pregnant to a government database. Where does that information go?”

    Shannon Watts, founder of the gun violence prevention advocacy group Moms Demand Action, also criticized the bill on social media, saying it would “create a federal database of pregnant women.”

    “The website would create a ‘database’ of user contact information that could be used for ‘outreach via phone or email,’” Watts told PolitiFact. “The public has no guarantee (or reason to trust) how that information would actually be used.”

    The bill doesn’t have provisions about the dissemination or destruction of the data the website collects, said Mary Ziegler, an abortion historian and law professor at the University of California, Davis.

    “So, I think it’s fair for people reading the bill to ask questions and be concerned about how the information would be used,” Ziegler said.

    Because of the limitations on what kind of resources the website would offer, critics said people seeking information would be directed only to crisis pregnancy centers, or facilities that dissuade or prevent people from seeking abortions.

    “The law doesn’t require the creation of a registry at all. It’s not mandatorily requiring anyone to give information or interact with the website at all,” Ziegler said. “So, in that sense, it doesn’t create a registry or mandate compliance with a registry, but it’s certainly setting up the information people will receive and the information that people will use in a way that’s designed to help the antiabortion movement.”

    Our ruling

    Social media users claimed Britt introduced a bill “to create a national registry of pregnant women.”

    The bill would create pregnancy.gov, a website designed as a clearinghouse of information and resources for pregnant women. It would bar information from organizations that provide abortions.

    The legislation does not mention the words “registry” or “database.” It says that if website users choose to take an “assessment” available through the website, they can consent to share their contact information and may receive additional resources from the Department of Health and Human Services. Britt’s spokesperson said the bill would not require a login or registration to access, although the bill doesn’t specify this.

    Critics counter that the bill is vague about how collected data would be handled or who would have access to it.

    But to describe this as a “national registry” of pregnant women is inaccurate. We rate that claim False.

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