Today marks a historic day in the fight to protect abortion access. The US Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, a case that will determine whether Texas can shut down nearly all abortion providers and turn back the clock on a woman’s right to access abortion care. The fight for abortion access started in Texas — with the landmark Supreme Court case Roe v. Wade in 1973 — and continues today. Texas is ground zero in the most important Supreme Court abortion case in decades.
Activists from across the state and country are rallying at the Court today. Be part of this historic day in the fight for abortion access:
- Watch the livestream here from 7AM-11AM CST
- Join the digital rally by posting messages of support on social media using #FightBackTX and #StopTheSham
- Change your social media avatar to show you're part of the fight to protect abortion access
Since the law — House Bill 2 — passed, more than half of Texas abortion clinics have closed. As a result, today, only 7 of the 254 counties in Texas have an abortion provider. This lack of access forces women to take time off work, find childcare, arrange for lodging, and travel long distances, ultimately delaying or pushing abortion care entirely out of reach. These barriers to access have a disproportionate impact on low-income women, young women, and women of color.
If the law were fully implemented only 5 Texas counties would have an abortion provider. Meaning fewer than 10 clinics would be available to serve the more than 5 million woman of reproductive age living in Texas today.
Leading medical groups like the American Medical Association and the American Congress of Obsetrics and Gynocologists filed a brief in the case asserting that these restrictions are medically unnecessary, and in fact do the opposite of protecting women’s health and safety. Rather, medical professionals say that these laws jeopardize the health and safety of Texas women, as abortion is already one of the safest medical procedures out there.
Regardless of what happens at the Supreme Court, it’s important to remember that this law didn’t pass in a vacuum. Texas lawmakers didn’t start and have not stopped since passing House Bill 2. In the four decades since Roe, Texas lawmakers have enacted more than 18 anti-abortions measures, all aimed at rolling back the clock on a woman’s constitutional right to abortion. Watch this video to see just how far they've gone to limit this right:
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