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Abortion

How Indigenous Women Repealed New Mexico’s Longstanding Abortion Ban

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Via Bustle, By Jennifer Gerson

When Terrelene Massey watched New Mexico’s bill to repeal the state’s abortion ban die in the state House in 2019, she was struck by what she calls a “convenient argument” made by some legislators: that they couldn’t vote in favor of the bill because their Native and Indigenous constituents were opposed to it. These legislators — by and large non-native — said their constituents’ cultural practices and spiritual beliefs were at odds with the pro-abortion measure.

Massey, the executive director of the Southwest Women’s Law Center, knew this couldn’t be true. From her own lived experience as a Navajo woman, and her professional experiences as an advocate for Indigenous women in the Southwest,she’d seen firsthand how her peers value body sovereignty as part of their spiritual traditions, and how Indigenous people throughout the region had longstanding, ancestral practices for delivering abortion care.

“Maybe it’s because I am Native American, I am more attuned to seeing what’s missing when we’re not at the table and people trying to fill in our voices for us — and filling that space with inaccuracies and myths,” Massey, who had advocated for the 2019 bill’s passage, tells Bustle.

Jennifer Gerson, Author, Bustle.com

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SB 10 – We are almost there!

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We can see the light at the end of the tunnel. The finish line is in our sight. We are on the last leg of our journey. The repeal of New Mexico’s unconstitutional abortion ban is within our grasp. We are this close to completing this nearly fifty-year journey of removing the 1969 abortion ban from New Mexico’s criminal code.

The abortion ban repeal was passed on the Senate floor and sailed out of its five committee hearings with one technical amendment, which does not change the substance of the bill, meaning the repeal bill has not been changed, added to, or watered down. The next stop is the floor of both the New Mexico House and then to the Governor’s desk. This is clearly the most dangerous part of the journey.

The SWLC is so grateful for all the support you have provided in this process. Without the support of the abortion rights warriors in New Mexico, we could not have gotten this far in this righteous journey and we appreciate each and every one of you and thank you for getting us to this historic place. However, we have arrived at the pinnacle of this fight and we need you to stay strong. The anti-abortion rights supporters are bombarding our House and Senate members with unfounded and unbelievable claims about what repealing and removing the abortion ban from the books will do. The majority of these calls and emails are from outside their districts some even from outside the state, but they are still receiving an enormous amount of pressure from the other side.

Now is the time to contact your House members and help them to stay strong against the supporters of anti-abortion rights. Demand they vote “Yes!” to repeal the abortion ban statute and also let your legislators know that you support them in this fight, too. Tell them that you have stood beside them (virtually of course!) at every step in this journey and are there to sustain them, to give them the strength they will need to keep fighting, to bring this bill to the floor and vote to repeal the ban!

At this moment, we are on the precipice of history. What happens in the next few days will determine New Mexico’s place in this country. Will it be a state that robs pregnant people of their bodily autonomy or will New Mexico be a state that supports a pregnant person’s right to follow their own values when it comes to healthcare decisions, including abortion care? Know that you do have a say in this.

Please contact your representative. Let them know that you support SB10, the Respect Women and Families Act, which repeals the abortion ban in its entirety. Let your representatives know that you support them as well. They need to hear this.

You can find who your legislators are at:
https://www.nmlegis.gov/Members/Find_My_Legislator

Thank you for your support

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NM Political Report: Advocates for abortion ban repeal start off a first full week of New Mexico Legislature

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Via Susan Dunlap, NM Political Report

Unlike 2019 when the New Mexico State Senate blocked repealing the 1969 abortion ban, more than half of the 2021 state Senate have signed on to cosponsor SB 10, this year’s effort.

SB 10, sponsored by state Sen. Linda Lopez, D-Albuquerque, is a bill that will run parallel to HB 7, sponsored by state House Rep. Micaela Lara Cadena, D-Mesilla. Co-sponsor and Senate Majority Leader Peter Wirth, D- Santa Fe, said during a press conference Monday morning held by Respect New Mexico Women, a coalition of nonprofit organizations, that 25 state senators have signed onto the bill for the 2021 Legislature. 

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Abortion Care is Always Essential

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As 2020 finally comes to an end (thank goodness!) and we prepare to celebrate the December holidays in safe and thoughtful ways, we at the Southwest Women’s Law Center turn our attention to the upcoming legislative session, which begins at the end of January. While it is still unclear how the 2021 legislative session will proceed vis a vis Covid-19, one thing is certain, this will be a consequential legislative session.

The SWLC is involved in several pieces of legislation: the Paid Family Medical Leave Act which supports New Mexico workers who experience a serious medical condition, have or adopt a child, or need to care for someone experiencing a serious medical condition and a bill that temporarily expands Unemployment Insurance due to a public health emergency, such as COVID-19. The SWLC also supports a Paid Sick Leave bill to support workers so they do not have to go to work while they are ill and of course, legislation to repeal New Mexico’s dormant Abortion Ban.

The Abortion Ban passed in 1969 and was found for the most part to be unconstitutional in 1973 as a result of Roe v. Wade. The Abortion Ban is described as “dormant” because only two provisions of the law remain in effect, a religious refusal provision and a provision requiring licensed physicians to perform abortion procedures. The problem is that the Abortion Ban is still on the books in its entirety, including those provisions that were found unconstitutional in 1973. A complete and total repeal of the Abortion Ban is more important now than ever before.

The most devasting thing the outgoing Trump administration was able to achieve during the last four years was to stack the federal courts with ultra-right-wing attorneys in judicial positions in federal district, appellate and the United States Supreme Court. The Supreme Court now sits with a 6-3 conservative majority. The effects of stacking the federal bench will be felt for decades.

Roe v. Wade, decided by the Supreme Court in 1973, established the right to abortion care and is the only thing that stands between New Mexico in 2020, where decisions about when and if to parent are made freely, without interference by the state and New Mexico in 1969, where a panel of strangers will decide if you receive abortion care under a very limited set of circumstances and where medical providers could be criminally prosecuted for providing abortion care. Given the new conservative majority in the Supreme Court, it is a near certainty that they will take the first opportunity to overturn Roe. At the very moment Roe v. Wade is overturned, New Mexico will be thrown back to 1969 and the landscape relating to the provision of abortion care in New Mexico will be turned on its head. That is why it is so important to repeal the Abortion Ban in its entirety this upcoming legislative session. Time is literally running out.

We must remain vigilant. In addition to the overall threat to abortion rights in New Mexico due to the near-certain overturning of Roe v Wade, there are those opportunists who would attempt to capitalize on the COVID-19 pandemic and claim that abortion care is not “essential” and thus abortion care providers should be shut down during the pendency of the pandemic. This is of course nonsense. What could be more essential when it comes to the consequences of being denied abortion care? Yet there are also those who are so desperate and hateful that they argue healthcare workers in New Mexico who bravely and tirelessly stand up to COVID -19 every day should not be called heroes because they work in a facility where abortion care is provided. That type of reasoning can only be called twisted. Where does it end?

The SWLC urges New Mexicans to throw their support behind legislation to repeal the Abortion Ban in its entirety during this upcoming legislative session. You can find your legislator at Find My Legislator. It has to be done this legislative session. If Roe is overturned before the repeal of New Mexico’s Abortion Ban, at the risk of sounding dramatic, life as we know it will change. Please contact your legislators and make sure that you are heard during this very dangerous time in New Mexico. We are counting on you.

To donate to our efforts to repeal New Mexico’s dormant abortion ban, please visit our donation page.

WELL+GOOD: How Americans Really Feel About Abortion Rights in the Year 2020

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via WELL + GOOD, Jessie Van Amburg

Understanding abortion sentiment among Indigenous communities is a bit more complex, as there are hundreds of different tribes in the U.S. with different cultural practices and perspectives. But case studies (and the above data from PRRI) give us a sense that, in general, there is support for abortion rights and access among various different Indigenous groups. A small survey commissioned by the Southwest Women’s Law Center in 2020 found that 81 percent of Native Americans in New Mexico (the population and area studied) agreed with the statement that women and families deserve to make their own health-care decisions without government interference. Additionally, only 25 percent of those surveyed said they would support laws that would make it a criminal offense for doctors to perform abortions.

Terrelene Massey, 44, who is a member of the Navajo Nation and lives in New Mexico, says that, in her experience, Navajo culture deeply shapes how people in her community feel about abortion and other issues. “Traditionally, we are a matrilineal society and women organize, they administer, they manage the household,” she says. From her perspective, she says women in her community are empowered to make their own decisions to manage their families—which extends to their choices about abortion care.

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New Mexico-based “Crisis Pregnancy Centers” are Promoting Unethical Medical Experimentation on Pregnant People

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New Investigation Reveals 19% of New Mexico-based CPCs Promote Renegade Practice Known as “Abortion Pill Reversal”

(New Mexico, September 15, 2020) – A new investigation shows that nineteen percent of “crisis pregnancy centers” based in New Mexico promote an unethical experimental practice on pregnant people called “abortion pill reversal.”

“Claims regarding abortion ‘reversal’ treatment are not based on science and do not meet clinical standards,” according to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG). “So-called abortion ‘reversal’ procedures are unproven and unethical.”

This practice is not limited to New Mexico. The investigation focused on eight other states in addition to New Mexico, including, California, Pennsylvania, and Minnesota. Despite warnings from medical experts, the anti-abortion movement is focused on pushing “abortion pill reversal” from the fringes of anti-science activism into mainstream awareness through crisis pregnancy centers and laws mandating doctors mislead patients by claiming they can “reverse” a medical abortion. Like CPC websites, such laws “essentially encourage women to participate in an unmonitored research experiment,” according to an analysis in the New England Journal of Medicine.

During a medical abortion, a patient takes two drugs—first mifepristone, then misoprostol. Studies show it is a safe and effective method with no reports of long-term risks.

The renegade practice of “abortion pill reversal” is based on a theory developed by an anti-choice activist physician who conducted experiments on seven pregnant women in a study not supervised by an institutional review board or ethical review committee. The practice involves administering high doses of progesterone to pregnant people who have taken mifepristone, the first of two drugs used for a medical abortion, and discouraging consumption of the second drug, misoprostol.

The FDA has not approved of dispensing mifepristone without misoprostol, or this use of progesterone. The health effects on the patient and embryo are unknown.

“Anti-abortion activists are openly promoting medical experimentation with unknown health effects on pregnant Pennsylvanians,” says Susan J. Frietsche, director of the Western Pennsylvania office of the Women’s Law Project. “It’s unethical, dangerous, and echoes the darkest days of American history when brown and Black bodies were grotesquely exploited for medical experimentation. Does the state even know if Real Alternatives, the umbrella organization of CPCs that has so far received more than $100 million in taxpayer money, is participating in or promoting this abusive practice?” Forty percent of CPCs in Pennsylvania promote “abortion pill reversal”.

A systematic review conducted in the wake of the seven-person experiment found no evidence that pregnancy continuation was more likely after treatment with progesterone as compared with expectant management among women who had taken mifepristone.

“Crisis pregnancy centers target vulnerable people experiencing unplanned pregnancies. Many people who wind up at a CPC would not necessarily know they were being misled about their reproductive choices,” says Amal Bass, WLP director of policy and advocacy. “Beyond the obvious danger of experimentally dispensing powerful medicine to pregnant people, I worry about the person who might start a medical abortion even if they aren’t sure it’s the right decision for them because they were misled to believe they can just change their mind. This undermines informed consent in a particularly cruel way.”

The anti-abortion movement’s new emphasis on promoting abortion pill reversal coincides with the crisis pregnancy center movement’s increased efforts to target Black and brown clients.

“We are just beginning to reckon with our country’s long, shameful history of racist and sexist medical abuse,” says WLP attorney Christine Castro, “And now we’re seeing a coordinated effort to promote a new form of racist and sexist experimentation on pregnant people.”

Last year, the American Medical Association filed a federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of a North Dakota bill that attempted to force doctors to mislead patients by telling them about abortion pill reversal. The AMA said such laws “forc[ed] physicians …to act as mouthpieces for politically motivated messages that are misleading and could lead to patient harm.” In September, a judge blocked the law, stating it was “devoid of scientific support, misleading, and untrue.”

This March, a watchdog group called Campaign for Accountability asked the FDA to seize websites promoting this practice.

The Southwest Women’s Law Center and its partners in The Alliance, a collaboration of regional law centers working to ensure equitable access to evidence-based reproductive healthcare, conducted this investigation into crisis pregnancy centers promoting “abortion reversal” as part of a larger project. The Alliance law centers – Gender Justice, Legal Voice, Southwest Women’s Law Center, and Women’s Law Project – are working with California Women’s Law Center and reproductive epidemiologist Dr. Laura Dodge to conduct a systematic review of crisis pregnancy centers operations in Alaska, California, Idaho, Minnesota, Montana, New Mexico, Oregon, Pennsylvania, and Washington State.

Of the nine states included in this investigation, Washington state has the highest rate of promoting “abortion pill reversal” at 49 percent.

If you need more information or to request an interview with an attorney, please contact either Terrelene Massey, or Wendy Lee Basgall.

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