Extremist judges will not stop endangering the lives of pregnant people or people who may become pregnant—overturning Roe v. Wade, attacking medication abortion, threatening the future of IVF, and this week at SCOTUS, emergency abortion care.
Our lawyers are waging strategic fights that make clear what is at stake for people who can become pregnant and seek to bolster our fundamental rights to control our lives, futures, and destinies.
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(Washington, D.C.) Yesterday, the National Women’s Law Center (NWLC) submitted an amicus brief on behalf of 72 organizations in the Supreme Court case, June Medical Services LLC v. Gee. This case is a challenge to a Louisiana law that requires abortion providers to have admitting privileges at a local hospital – an unnecessary restriction identical to a Texas law already deemed unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in 2016, in Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt.
As the amicus brief makes clear, this law should also be struck down as unconstitutional, because it would deprive women of their ability to participate in society on equal terms, undermine their economic security, and reinforce outdated stereotypes about women’s role in society. By making it harder to access to abortion, this law imposes substantial and sometimes insurmountable costs on women and others who can become pregnant, threatening their financial well-being, job security, workforce participation, educational attainment, health, personal security, and autonomy.
If the law isn’t struck down, Louisiana will be left with only one abortion clinic to provide care for the nearly one million women of reproductive age who live in the state. The Court will hear oral arguments in this case on March 4, 2020.
The following statement is from Fatima Goss Graves, NWLC’s President and CEO:
“This case could change the right to abortion as we know it. Despite striking down an identical law just three years ago, new Trump-appointed justices and an emboldened anti-abortion movement are focused on taking away the right to abortion – no matter the cost. The harms imposed would be limitless, and will fall hardest on the overwhelming majority of Louisiana abortion patients who are already facing barriers: patients who are people of color, people living in rural areas, people who already have children, and people subjected to intimate partner violence.
“Deciding whether or when to have a child is a fundamental right central to women’s equality and people’s ability to determine the course of their lives. If the Court allows the Louisiana law to stand, it will give lawmakers across the country the green light to decimate abortion access and block this fundamental right.”
The following organizations join NWLC on this amicus brief:
Abortion Access Front
Abortion Access Hackathon
American Association of University Women
American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees
American Federation of Teachers, AFL-CIO
American Sexual Health Association
American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC)
Anti-Defamation League
Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance
California Women Lawyers
California Women’s Law Center
Center for American Progress
Center for Law and Social Policy
Coalition of Labor Union Women
Colorado Women’s Bar Association
Columbia Law School Sexuality and Gender Law Clinic
Connecticut Women’s Education and Legal Fund
Desiree Alliance
Equal Rights Advocates
Feminist Women’s Health Center
Freedom From Religion Foundation
Gender Justice
Girls Inc.
Guttmacher Institute
Hadassah, The Women’s Zionist Organization of America, Inc.
Healthy and Free Tennessee
International Action Network for Gender Equity & Law
Jacobs Institute of Women’s Health
KWH Law Center for Social Justice and Change
LatinoJustice PRLDEF
Lawyers Club of San Diego
Legal Momentum, the Women’s Legal Defense and Education Fund
Legal Voice
Mabel Wadsworth Center
Maine Women’s Lobby
NARAL Pro-Choice America
National Alliance to End Sexual Violence
National CAPACD- National Coalition for Asian Pacific American Community Development
National Center for Law and Economic Justice
National Consumers League
National Education Association
National Employment Law Project
National Family Planning & Reproductive Health Association
National Institute for Reproductive Health
National Network to End Domestic Violence
National Partnership for Women & Families
National Women’s Health Network
National Women’s Political Caucus
Northwest Health Law Advocates
Nurses for Sexual and Reproductive Health
Oklahoma Call for Reproductive Justice
Partnership for Working Families
People For the American Way Foundation
Population Connection Action Fund
Power to Decide
Progress Florida
Reproductive Health Access Project
Sanctuary for Families
Service Employees International Union (SEIU)
Shriver Center on Poverty Law
SIECUS: Sex Ed for Social Change
The Women’s Law Center of Maryland
UltraViolet
Washington State Coalition Against Domestic Violence
Women Employed
Women Lawyers On Guard Inc.
Women’s Bar Association of the District of Columbia
Women’s Bar Association of the State of New York
Women’s Medical Fund, Inc.
Women’s Rights and Empowerment Network (WREN)
WV FREE, Advocates for Reproductive Health, Rights and Justice
Young Women United
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For immediate release: December 3, 2019
Contact: LySaundra Campbell ([email protected])
