A Tennessee woman, Kei’choura Cathey, is suing for $1.5 million dollars, claiming she was denied an abortion while in a county jail. She claims Maury County Sheriff Bucky Rowland refused to transport her to an abortion clinic unless the abortion was medically necessary or due to rape or incest. Cathey gave birth in April.
Pregnant inmates face a number of health risks. Many states still shackle pregnant inmates, even when they’re in labor, posing numerous dangers to inmates and their babies.
The Supreme Court has previously ruled in favor of women seeking abortions while incarcerated. In 2008, the Court let a lower court’s ruling that incarcerated women have a right to abortion stand.
Women seeking abortions in Tennessee face a number of obstacles even when they’re not incarcerated. A Tennessee woman who attempted a self-abortion at 24 weeks was charged with “attempted procurement of miscarriage” and sentenced to a year.
Though women—even incarcerated women—generally have a right to an abortion, states have ramped up their attack on abortion rights in anticipation of a Trump presidency. A shift in the Supreme Court could constrain abortion rights, or even reverse Roe vs. Wade. So it doesn’t matter if denying a woman an abortion is currently illegal, because any case that makes it to the Supreme Court could change the law.
So which case might be the one to change the law? Vice reported this week that states have enacted at least 46 new anti-abortion restrictions. Some of the highlights include:
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Legislators in Missouri, Texas, Arkansas, and New Jersey have filed legislation attempting to ban dilation and extraction, the safest and most common second trimester abortion procedure.
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Kentucky, New Jersey, Virginia, Texas, and Florida lawmakers are attempting to pass measures banning abortion at 20 weeks. The proposed laws claim that fetuses can feel pain at this point—a fact that credible scientific research undermines.
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Indiana lawmakers are attempting to ban all abortions with House Bill 1134, which defines life as beginning “when a human ovum is fertilized by a human sperm.” Most medical experts agree that not even a pregnancy begins this early. Pregnancy tests cannot detect pregnancy until implantation, which is usually about a week after fertilization.
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A number of states have mandated funerals for aborted or miscarried fetuses, including Missouri.
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Kentucky has joined a number of other states with House Bill 2, which hopes to compel women seeking abortions to look at ultrasounds of their fetuses.
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Legislators in Nebraska want to compel abortion providers to publish on their websites images of fetuses at various stage of development.
If any of these laws produces a legal case, that case could wind its way to the Supreme Court, potentially affecting abortion laws for generations.