Slowly but surely, states with Republican majority leadership are working toward ending women’s access to abortion—and they are looking to do it by any means necessary. Last week in Iowa, Republicans managed to pass a law which will result in preventing low-income women from using their state-provided insurance at any provider that offers abortion services. This has resulted in the closing of four Planned Parenthood clinics that serve more than 15,000 patients in the state.
And in Texas, the state Senate is looking to ban abortion coverage in health insurance—nearly everywhere. The ban includes private insurance plans as well as in plans offered to state employees or anyone participating in the Affordable Care Act. Basically, they want zero access to abortions and think women should pay for abortion coverage under separate insurance plans. On Monday night the legislation, House Bill 3124, was added to a Senate bill which had support from all Republicans and one Democrat.
Supporters argue that Texas policyholders, particularly those who oppose abortion, should not have to pay into plans that could reimburse someone else’s abortion. Opponents say the prohibition improperly limits Texans’ health care options and would have a disproportionate effect on low-income, young and minority Texans.
This was preceded by another anti-abortion bill passed on Saturday in the Texas House, which can only be described as draconian. Apparently, Republican legislators don’t want women to have abortions but if they do, they have very specific, bizarre, and completely invasive ideas about what has to happen after the procedure.
On Saturday, the Texas House passed an omnibus anti-abortion bill that would require abortion providers to bury or cremate fetal tissue, bans the safest type of abortion women can undergo during the second trimester of a pregnancy, and prohibits donation of fetal tissue from abortion for medical research.
And they aren’t done yet. One lawmaker felt so passionately about abortion that he decided to bring it up during discussion about an animal cruelty bill.
Abortion even made it into debate on an animal cruelty bill Tuesday, when Rep. Tony Tinderholt, R-Arlington, derailed a bill which would have enhanced the criminal penalties for torturing and killing pets in order to make a point about abortion regulations. He said he does not believe that the punishment for animal cruelty should be harsher than the punishment for doctors who perform late-term abortions.
“I cannot, will not and shall not allow the Texas House to place a higher value to a pet over the life of a human being,” Tinderholt said during the debate.
Tinderholt’s own anti-abortion bill, which would have charged any woman who had an abortion with murder, is one of the few anti-abortion bills proposed this session that did not receive so much as a committee hearing.
Tinderholt said his bill would force women to be more personally responsible for sex.
If there was any doubt that these Republicans want to punish women for being women and for having sex, Tinderholt’s words are proof.
It’s no wonder that reproductive activists on Tuesday protested the passage of these bills dressed in garb from the dystopian novel The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood. Imagining a United States where a totalitarian theocracy reigns supreme and women are forced into reproductive servitude where they have no say or control over their bodies? Never say never. With this group in charge, it really does seem possible now.
