What would it take to build a world where every pregnant person in this country had the rights, resources, and respect they needed to decide what to do with their pregnancy, whether to continue it or not? That world that we want to build is what’s possible with this election and the organizing that must happen after it, no matter the outcome. That world is possible, even as some of our political options drift dangerously far from it, fully embracing reproductive coercion, violence, and oppression as core to their white nationalist and fascist ideals.
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Trump’s presidency was the final blow to a crumbling infrastructure maintaining abortion’s legality. Even before he installed several Supreme Court justices with his sole stated goal of overturning the landmark Roe v. Wade decision, the majority of people who sought abortions encountered one of the hundreds of abortion restrictions. They ran up against unaffordable costs, inability to travel to clinics, insurance coverage refusals, and legal denials at courts and clinics. Some had been turned over to police by friends, family, and hospital staff who suspected them of self-managing an abortion, which is largely not a crime, nor should it be. Others were delayed in receiving care because they or their providers feared criminalization, and some have died. While anti-abortion candidates attempt to temper the impact of their actions, nationwide criminalization is their dream.
Unfortunately, much of the US did not heed our warnings ahead of the 2016 elections. When the Supreme Court re-criminalized abortion, people in the United States and around the world had to face the reality that the myth of American exceptionalism and our supposed ideals were not promised and would not save us. We’re forced to face the reality of a nation that punishes lack of wealth, health, home, and education with criminalization.
We must rebuild access to abortion—and all reproductive health care—in a way that doesn’t leave out those who have the least among us.
Rather than using any and all tactics to avoid the proverbial iceberg, President Biden and his administration offered no proactive plan to protect abortion, even waffling as the state of Texas enacted an abortion ban in clear defiance of Roe, and Biden himself couldn’t be bothered to say the word abortion until the Dobbs decision came down. While anti-abortion politicians certainly destroyed access to abortion, we have to be honest that inaction by some pro-choice ones made the current landscape possible.
Although the calls to “restore Roe” this “Roevember” are loud and clear, they are simply not enough. As we rebuild, we must demand our pro-choice candidates offer us a robust plan for rebuilding abortion access to better than ever. It’s time for a full decriminalization of abortion and building toward abortion liberation. We must rebuild access to abortion—and all reproductive health care—in a way that doesn’t leave out those who have the least among us. We cannot accept abortion access that doesn’t include young people under 18, later abortion patients, undocumented immigrants and incarcerated people, trans and disabled patients, people enrolled in Medicaid, or those who live in rural communities.
We must have a system that allows people to freely choose whether to have their abortions in local clinics by pill or procedure, via telemedicine or doula, or on their own within their own homes. Our politicians must see how abortion access is connected to their other policy platforms including ever-ballooning policing and military budgets, that not only defund healthcare, schools, housing, and food, but criminalize abortion, pregnant people, and certain families.
No matter what happens with this presidential election cycle, we have work to do, and that starts with each of us creating a more supportive community for our loved ones who need abortions, and calling on our elected officials to build a safety net for abortion—and all families. We all have a role in a culture that makes abortion available to all at any time, for any reason, anywhere in this country. Together, we can liberate abortion.
