Becca Andrews on Her New Book No Choice: The Destruction of Roe v. Wade and the Fight to Protect a Fundamental American Right

What was access to abortion like before Roe v. Wade, and what will access to abortion look like after its overturning? Becca Andrews, reporter at Reckon News, talks to us about her new book No Choice: The Destruction of Roe v. Wade and the Fight to Protect a Fundamental American Right, including what communities will be hardest hit by the Supreme Court’s decision, as well as the inspiring, groundbreaking work that leaders, activists, and providers are doing around the country to ensure that patients are able to access essential abortion care. 

The history of reproductive coercion has been and continues to be rampant in the United States, disproportionately targeted towards people of color and non-cisgendered folks. This unjust thread, foundational to the beginnings of the U.S., continues to weave through access to reproductive healthcare and modern medicine in general. The Janes, the Clergy Consultative Service on Abortion, and the Society for Humane Abortion were collectives that supported, counseled on, referred to, and facilitated access to abortion care before the Supreme Court’s 1973 implementation of Roe.

However, Roe’s legal protections were not around long before they started to be chipped away at; Roe had not even been in place for 50 years before its repeal. Throughout Roe’s standing, many white women’s reproductive health and rights advocacy did not extend to include all who have a right to care. This was made expressly evident through the application of (and lack of fight against) the Hyde amendment, which systematically prevents those receiving Medicaid coverage from accessing an abortion. In addition, the multi-layered barriers—such as a lack of access to childcare and transportation, inability to take time off of work, and lack of access to funds for the procedure and associated costs—coalesced overtime to make an unnavigable labyrinth to accessing care that was particularly felt by those with low-incomes, people of color, young people, LGBTQI+ folks, and immigrant communities.

Links from this episode

No Choice: The Destruction of Roe v. Wade and the Fight to Protect a Fundamental American Right
Becca Andrews at Reckon News
Becca Andrews on Twitter
Plan C
Abortionfinder.org
Ineedana.com
Repro Legal Helpline
Repro Legal Defense Fund
Digital Defense Fund

Transcript

Jennie: Welcome to rePROs Fight Back, a podcast where we explore all things reproductive health, rights and justice. I'm your host, Jennie Wetter, and I'll be helping you stay informed around issues like birth control, abortion, sex education and LGBTQ issues and much, much more-- giving you the tools you need to take action and fight back. Okay, let's dive in.

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Jennie: Welcome to this week's episode of rePROs Fight Back. I'm your host, Jennie Wetter, and my pronouns are she/her. So before we get to this week's episode, some housekeeping. Don't worry, it's fun housekeeping. Our last episode was our 150th episode, which I still am having a hard time wrapping my head around. And in December, we're gonna be, have been a podcast for five years. Again, all of this is mind boggling to me. I could have never dreamed that this little podcast would still be going five years later. I, and I've loved every minute of it. I'm so proud of the work that the podcast has done of that everybody working on the podcast has done. We have done so many different sexual and reproductive health rights and justice topics. I just am so proud of our work, but at this moment, it doesn't really feel like enough. So I'm super excited to announce that the Population Institute has decided to spin off rePROs Fight Back into a separate initiative that is gonna focus solely on sexual reproductive health rights and justice work. That means rePROs is growing beyond just the podcast. We are growing into an initiative that will include the podcast, but we'll also encompass advocacy work on global and domestic sexual and reproductive health rights and justice issues. We're gonna have education materials on the website. We will have more ways for you to take action. We're all still growing and figuring out everything that's gonna be available, but we're really super excited to announce this new initiative now. And I'm honestly, I cannot believe that rePROs Fight Back is growing into something bigger and better. And it just, it's a lot. Creating and hosting rePROs has really, it's been a dream for me. So I am just so excited to see this dream grow into something bigger and better. I am so proud of the work our team has done and then really grateful for all of the support from Population Institute to grow into an initiative that's solely gonna focus on sexual reproductive health rights and, and justice. You know, at this moment, we know it's at stake with the loss of federal abortion protections. And it is imperative that we are telling the full sexual reproductive health rights and justice story to ensure that everyone, no matter who they are or where they live, is able to exercise their full bodily autonomy and their sexual reproductive health and rights in order to build a more just future for all. So I'm really excited. I think that this is going to be a great adventure. I cannot wait to see everything that we're gonna grow rePROs.

Jennie: On the website, we have done some temporary updates that will show the new initiative and have a release, an announcement about it. We are working on building a brand new website that is going to be launching hopefully about the end of the year. Just stay tuned. We'll have a bunch of new information and things that will be coming. I, I am just so grateful for all of you and all of your support. Thank you for those who have been in this with us since day one. Thank you to all of the people who have joined us today, and I hope you continue to join us in this fight. Okay. So with that out of the way, I am super excited for this week's interview. We have the wonderful Becca Andrews with Reckon News on, and she is here to talk about a brand new book she has coming out next week on October 11th. So make sure to get those pre-orders in. It's called No Choice: The Destruction of Roe v. Wade and the Fight to Protect a Fundamental American Right. Yeah, it was a really great book. I enjoyed reading it. I can't wait for you to hear our conversation about it. So with that, let's turn to my interview with Becca. Hi Becca. Thank you so much for being here.

Becca: Jennie, thank you so much for having me.

Jennie: I'm so excited to have you on again. I had so much fun talking to you about your last, about that feature piece. My God. Like a year ago. I'm not sure how that happened; that it was a year ago.

Becca: Just completely different life.

Jennie: Again, like, time has no meaning. Like, I was like, looking back, I'm like, “Oh, she was like just on not that long ago… oh, it was like a year ago.”

Becca: Yeah, the, the whole context of our work has just completely changed. No big deal!

Jennie: Nothing major. It's fine.

Becca: Mm-hmm. Super chill.

Jennie: I guess before we like dive in, do maybe wanna take a quick second and introduce yourself and include your pronouns?

Becca: Yeah. Hey y'all, I'm Becca Andrews. I'm a reporter at Reckon News and my pronouns are she/her.

Jennie: Okay. I'm so excited to have you on Becca. What she didn't mention in her intro just is releasing a book that's coming out next week when y'all hear this called No Choice. And I was very lucky to get to read it in advance and I'm so excited for y'all to get it. So like, definitely go out and buy it. We'll include like bookshop link and stuff. It's really a wonderful book and y'all should read it. And maybe I'll just let you say like a couple things where your head is at on your book before I start asking like a million questions.

Becca: Sure, yeah. I mean, clearly my head is all over the place. I think I'm still like, in sort of a state of disbelief that I can call myself an author. I think just like growing up in loving books the way that I always have, and I don't know, it's, it's a very, very strange but very cool feeling.

Jennie: It's like magic to me as somebody saying, I'm a very big reader. So when I have people who I know who have written books, it's just this whole, you created magic.

Becca: I appreciate that. It's weird. My brain is doing this thing right now where I'm also like, I created magic and it's like erasing all of the like tears where I just like sat at my laptop and cried…

Jennie: I really enjoyed all of it. You had so many like, good stories within it.

Becca: Thank you.

Jennie: That I, I won't ask about anyone specifically, but there were a couple that like, I could just, my heart was breaking hearing them trying to navigate the system at various different times throughout, you know, pre-Roe while we supposedly had Roe protections and, and even like post-Roe and yeah, there, there were just so many stories that like, just really pulled on my heart and you did such a great job of giving them that like humanity and soul that I think doesn't always come easy to some people.

Becca: Thank you so much.

Jennie: I had to like lift that up real quick.

Becca: I really appreciate that, that that's the highest compliment you could give me because I think always as a reporter, but with this book in particular, you know, people trusting me with their stories to put it in something as like, tangible and long lasting as a book came with a really immense way to responsibility for me. So it's, it's good to hear that, that some of that care came through on the page. So thank you.

Jennie: Okay, so let's dig into like the rest of the book. And I appreciate you had three parts. So we'll kind of like structure the interview that way and talk about like the three parts. The first part was before Roe and I really appreciated the section, not just for what access was like, but you like went back even further into like the history of reproductive coercion in this country, which I think especially in this moment in time, like those who don't know the history, like live to repeat it and like it's so important that we know that history, acknowledge it and keep it in mind as we're building back a much better system. Yeah, I just thought that was a really smart and important place to start.

Becca: Thanks. Yeah. And I hope that it showed the ways that that history has continued to impact access to care, right? So non-white, non-cisgender bodies in this country have, have always faced reproductive coercion and have always had a greater burden when accessing equitable reproductive healthcare. So it felt really important to me to go all the way back, right to, to native land being stolen and the founding of this country that we now call America to slavery and the ways that enslaved women were not given agency over their own bodies, but then also the ways that they use their community to try to create agency. I think that's really powerful and I think it's something that we don't talk about enough. It's not like slavery happened and these human beings were just accepting it, right? Like there were ways of creating power, there were ways of organizing within communities, and there were, there was community care. So I, I felt like that was really crucial to recognize.

Jennie: Yeah, I agree. And it just as I was like reading further then like, it just like carries through because you talk about, you know, the reproductive justice movement and the disparities of access and like you could just feel that thread through the whole book and like remember where we came from and like, it's not gone, like it may be showing up in different ways, but this disparity in access to care shows up to this day.

Becca: And the ways that the medical system as we see it now, I mean medicine started out as care, right? As a way for us to take care of each other. And then it sort of morphed into this way for men to have control, economic control and also control over people's bodies. And I think that history really resounds today. You know, as we're hearing people like Lindsay Graham propose a 15-week national abortion ban or, or all of the different men in, in state houses that are sort of like playing with how far they can push abortion restrictions now that Roe is officially dead. I mean this is, this is something that has been going on since the creation of professional medicine.

Jennie: Yeah. And I also really appreciated you had a little bit into like how abortion became separated and like became like seen as separate from healthcare, which I thought was also really important history because it is often talked about is like this, this other thing. Like we always have to remind people that abortion access and abortion care is healthcare, but so often it is seen as separate.

Becca: Yeah, a hundred percent. And that that's by design. That is a feature, not a, Yeah.

Jennie: My other favorite thing and it's something that is absolutely a failing of mine… of so many other things to like have to read that uh, they're on my list to learn more about. But like it was really great to learn more about, about Janes and the Clergy Consultative Service like, and the Society for Humane Abortion. It was really great to learn about those pre-Roe groups that like came together to make sure that people were getting access to care.

Becca: Yeah, I mean I have to say like digging into the historical side of things was actually one of my favorite parts of writing this book, which I didn't expect. But getting to sort of get into these characters heads and really doing my best to understand their motivations and understand their, their desires to really help people who needed it was inspiring. It was a total privilege. I, I think particularly in the chapter about the Society for Humane Abortion, I really fell in love with the character of Patricia McGuinness. I mean she is just the original abortion baddie, like she does, she did it all right. And she bucked convention and she bucked the religion. She was raised Catholic. She bucked the religion that she was raised in and ended up just doing this incredible thing for so many people. And she's not, she just did that on her own. She wasn't empowered to do that. She didn't have the tools to do it, she just made it happen. I think that there's a lot of that in our history.

Jennie: Yeah, it was really great. You hear about Jane or those other groups and like you hear about them often as like this organization that was doing all this work, but it was really great to focus it a little bit on the people and like what they were going through. Like it really brought those stories to life in a different way. And like I said, this was an area that I definitely need to do more reading on. I know about them, but like it was really great to get a deeper knowledge and like created this hunger to like read all the books now and like learn even more.

Becca: Yes. Oh my god, I hope everyone looks at like the back of the book where I, you know, included where I got a lot of this information. Cause there I'm, the book stands on the shoulders of so many books before it. So yeah. I hope y'all check those books out.

Jennie: Okay. So I guess maybe that'll bring us to like the middle of the book, which is probably the bigger section, which is the beginning of the end, which is so sad because really Roe wasn't around, the protections of Roe weren't around very long before it was already starting to be chipped away at.

Becca: Yeah, not at all. I mean it's really depressing that Roe did not even really last a full generation, right? Like we had cut off right at 49 years. So it maybe the most surreal part for me of this book was interviewing women about their experiences before Roe as we knew the Supreme Court was moving to overturn it. I mean it's, it's so wild that people have been through seeking illegal abortion in this country and now they're, they're watching their grandchildren potentially have to do the same thing. It's just, I don't have words. I'm a writer and I don't have words.

Jennie: Yeah, it's, it's really amazing to think that that's where we're at, cause we always think that, you know, progress is a straight line or feels like it could be a straight line when you like look back at history, it feels like we're always moving in like a steady flow, but like it's a jarring/important reminder that sometimes there are these times where we step backwards, but that just means we have to keep fighting harder to like make sure that we continue to go forward.

Becca: A hundred percent and that we have to fight for everybody.

Jennie: Yes. And I think that was again, the really important thing that came out, right? We talked about how when Hyde was first put in place, that it didn't create as much of a ripple among a lot of the white feminists and just kind of okay, like, “bummer, keep going forward. We're good. We have Roe.” And like not seeing that that really impacted so many people and that those were already the most marginalized and like we needed to fight to make sure that everybody kept access.

Becca: Yeah, absolutely. I mean that was really disturbing for me, really digging into the white feminism parts of this book and the ways that like upper middle class white women in particular, obviously not all but a lot, I mean enough to make a significant change in history, really got complacent and decided that, you know, their needs kind of took priority over everyone else's. So, um, Hyde is I think the most crystallized example of that where it's just they were so convinced that they had the power and that it was all gonna be fine and that something like Hyde just would go away, that they didn't take action against it and then people died for that. You know, Rosie Jimenez died. I, it's sobering to me, especially as a white woman of privilege to think about, you know, what our, our foremothers did and how they acted. And I think it places a great amount of responsibility on, on our shoulders to, to do better.

Jennie: Absolutely. And you know, it, I think one of the chapters that I really enjoyed was the one with Laurie Bertram Roberts talking about access in Mississippi and like telling that broader like reproductive justice story of like, listen, it starts before the abortion where people are not being able to access care or being marginalized and like we need to remember that and like talk through the whole thing and after, or if people are choosing not to have an abortion, like they need to be supported through the whole range. I just thought that was a really important point to like pull out. But yeah, that was one of my favorite chapters.

Becca: Yeah. And let me be super clear, like this book would not exist without Laurie Bertram Roberts. Like it would not exist without my relationship to her as a source and our conversation. And she really an incredible person and does really incredible work and, and I'm very, very, very grateful for her wisdom and her leadership and she's absolutely right. I think one thing that Laurie and I really connect on, obviously our experiences are not apple to apples, but we both know what it's like to grow up low income in the rural south, right? So we know that the barriers to access start so young. And I, I write in the book too about my own experiences about growing up an evangelical Christian and I've written about how I didn't get sex education growing up. I got absence-only education and it was college before I knew what like certain parts of my body, like how to, what to call them, you know? And it can't be like that. Like if we, if we expect people to have the resources and then knowledge to control their bodies, we have to empower them from a young age. It's, there is no way around that.

Jennie: Yeah. I definitely related. And again, I feel like this is something we talked about last time you were on, like I went to Catholic school so obviously had very similar, not helpful sex ed experience, but you talked about your sex education and talk about like birth control and condoms and like, I was like holy… like I had that exact same like, you know, “they're porous” like, “they don't really work anyway so like why are you, why bother?”

Becca: Oh yeah. Mm.

Jennie: I really just had flashbacks to having sex ed with Sister Rosemary.

Becca: Yeah. It's upsetting... There were women from the ministry that I used to work with who had come to me for sex advice. Like specifically to be like, “Hey, this guy that I'm about to marry says that birth control is the same thing as abortion.” And like it would, I would sort of walk them through like why scientifically that wasn't accurate information, but it's also just like, oh my God. Like think about relying on like your network of college friends to get information like that. Like that's, that's not okay.

Jennie: It just again feel like we have this, like it just doesn't prepare you for like actual situations you're gonna face in life. And I wasn't prepared. And so yeah, like it goes all the way back, like we need to be starting with sex ed and like abortion isn't talked about in so much of it, but like even just getting factual freaking information is so important.

Becca: Yeah. But it's connected, right? Like yes, abortion is healthcare, abortion is part of like a larger spectrum of reproductive healthcare that also includes sex education, also includes this knowledge building, right? And something that I tried to do with the book was examined the ways that stigma against abortion affects every part of reproductive healthcare. It's not as much as like the instinct has been to it out, it's not separate. Like it's all, it all comes together.

Jennie: Well and it's even like, yes. And like we're seeing it impacting even more, like, some of the fights we're seeing in like Congress to pass legislation around like girls' education globally or like talking about child marriage. Like they're getting flagged as abortion bills even when they don't have anything to do with that and it's preventing making sure girls get secondary education and it's just mind boggling that all of this just gets shut down as listed as an abortion bill so that it won't move forward.

Becca: Yes. It's wildly frustrating.

Jennie: So frustrating. And like going to meetings and having that same conversation.

Becca: Oh honey, I live in Tennessee. I, I understand. I feel like the legislative calendar comes out and I'm just like, ok, here we go again.

Jennie: Yeah. Some days it just feels like Groundhog Day, like… We just had this fight. Or like, this is what we do every year. Anyway, DC problems. Sorry y'all. I really enjoyed looking at all the different barriers that people face to get to care. So, you know, you talked about TRAP laws, and you talked about extra barriers that undocumented people face with not being able to travel. It's like people who are in an abusive situation who are facing other barriers. And I, I thought it was really important to talk about all of them together and that they all impact people's ability to access care in just so many different ways. And like people can have multiple of those ones that they're dealing with and it just makes it so much harder.

Becca: Yeah. I wanted to show the ways that those factors can compound each other. And I also, I feel like, and maybe you've experienced this distance a little bit too, but I feel like growing up where I grew up and the context that I grew up in, going from that to a job in national media where suddenly I'm like surrounded by a lot of very privileged, very educated, very white folks, they don't, it's really hard for them to understand the ways that those barriers add up. And it's really hard for them to understand the lived experiences of people who don't have the resources that they have. I wanted this book to be a way to show those people in an empathetic narrative what that's like. Like I, I want them to be able to, not to like be cliche, but to walk a mile in their shoes. You know, I think that in this moment storytelling is so powerful and so important and one of the best tools we have for affecting change. Also shout out to Renee Bracy Sherman at We Testify, the work they're doing is phenomenal. I'm all about it.

Jennie: Absolutely. I was so grateful; she provided storytellers. We did two episodes in the spring with storytellers sharing their stories and like, they’re some of my favorite episodes. And again, your stories were definitely the things that like stood out in the book of like illustrating all of these barriers that people faced or are still facing to really put that human face on it. Cause I think, you know, this makes me think of something else you were talking about. I guess this gets a little bit towards like the end of Roe, but it was the challenges of getting newsrooms to like talk about all of these different things that were coming out, but they weren't like the big and splashy like six week bans or stuff and like, so they weren't getting as much coverage or getting clicked on and so people were not aware. I think for a lot of us who like work in the movement and live and breathe this stuff all the time, the like shock when the decision came out, we were all kind of like, but yeah, like this is where we've been headed for a really long time. And like that's not to blame people, right? Because they don't live and breathe this luckily like we do. But it was just surprising in some degree to see the level of people who are just like completely caught off guard.

Becca: Well, and I think it is a direct side effect of misogyny, right? I think is a direct side effect of abortion rights being deprioritized in the news and being framed as a political issue and like a political football instead of a real thing that impacts people's lives. A real thing that can change what economic bracket you're in, you know, like something like that. And I think that like we as the media have really failed to cover it in its proper context.

Jennie: Like, like politicizing of it. Like it automatically becomes a political issue. The amount of people who in April were like, “Don't worry, don't worry, don't worry darling. Like this isn't gonna happen. Like don't worry.” There's a list of like all of the people for years have been like telling us this isn't gonna happen. Or they'll… like people who are like, “Well maybe it's a good thing. Like they can do it and like face the repercussions of their actions.” And like, okay but those are real people's lives that you're talking about that are gonna be harmed in the interim. Like what are you talking about?

Becca: Nothing makes me angrier than the people who for the last year, six months have been like, “maybe that's what needs to happen. Maybe Roe needs to fall,” because it's always, always privileged white women who will not bear the brunt of it. And it makes me furious. Anyway. I like I cannot, I cannot handle it. I mean I think what's frustrating from like a journalistic perspective is that there's so many incredible reporters out there who do this work well who are on like the beat and, and who do what they're supposed to do, but they're in newsrooms that are really strapped for resources and also led by people who don't consider repro, you know, maybe like the sexiest beat or like the most important beat. So time and time again those reporters are not invested in right? And so they keep writing these stories and, and the stories don't have to reach cause the newsroom is choosing to not invest. And I think a consequence of that has been that, after Roe, you saw people really scrambling and overwhelming funds and clinics and anyone even like remotely connected with abortion care in a kind of clumsy way. They were also just throwing reporters on it. Please don't call a fund hotline. Like use their media email. Like yeah. Just like basic things like that. Everything was so intense and there was so much pressure and just got really and really in a, that made me very sad.

Jennie: Yeah. And I think the other part of that was seeing the places you were talking about that do have reporters who like write on abortion, they're often health reporters and then this gets covered when this happened… is like politics. So then the politics person who's not as conversant in all of this or is only thinking of like the political game and not the people is the person who's writing some of the big pieces and then like the next level down. Like the health person's writing great pieces, but like they're not getting that same, that same pickup in a lot of places.

Becca: I think it's hard, I think it's an impossible situation for reporters to be put in who aren't on this beat because this beat is hard. Like it is tough. It is, you have to study medicine and law and you have to be like a certain kind of emotionally intelligent, you know, like it's, it's a lot. It's a lot of things that, that you're juggling a lot of knowledge that you're trying to gain. So I don't, I think it was also really unfair to just like throw people into that and just be like, you can go do a story. Good luck. The fact that abortion is no longer in the constitution, like constitutionally protected…

Jennie: Okay. Actually wanna take a step back.

Becca: Sorry.

Jennie: No, I know this is to say like, it makes me mad but there was like another chapter that I really wanted to make sure we talk about cuz I think this is something that isn't talked about as much anymore. And that was the one where you talked about abortion providers and security and I, like, I, I remember when Dr. Tiller was killed, like I had like just started working in this field then. And so like I have like an understanding of it, but reading the part where Dr. Torres is like talking about the steps that she takes to keep herself safe. Like there was like knowing and then there was like reading it and I was just like, man, like just thinking of the abortion providers and people who work in clinics who are having to deal with all of this and like the fall of Roe, you talked about the burnout clinics are facing, but also having to deal with very real security threats.

Becca: Yeah. It's a lot, it's a lot to have to manage. And I think that I really feel for abortion providers in a specific kinda way because they're working in a field where their work has also been devalued. They're not making the money that people think they're gonna make going into medicine. Right? And they're taking on like all this extra personal risk and that risk leads into every single part of their lives. Right? So if you have, if you're an abortion provider and you have kids like, and you live in a hospital state, like you have to worry about that. Like you have to think about whether or not someone is a threat to your children. Like I, I cannot imagine that. Like I cannot imagine having to, to think about that and like what school I'm in my kid too. And like, if they're gonna be safe there and if their teachers are like pro-choice or anti, you know, they have to think about what church they're gonna go to, where they go to the grocery store if they should take different routes to work. I mean it is exhausting. Like it must be completely draining to have to go through those steps and those checklists in your head every day. Not only like for your own personal safety, but for the personal safety of those around you and those people that you care about. And I don't think that we, we really think about that enough and the cost that comes with that.

Jennie: Yeah, it, that was a very upsetting chapter and like again, I already had like a base level of knowledge of that, but it just, I don't know if there was something about the way you told those stories that again it just like really like made it hit home in a different way.

Becca: Yeah, totally. I mean I think sort of like with looking at barriers to abortion access, I wanted to really portray like how all this stuff adds up in someone's life because it's never just one thing, Right. All of these things are at once.

Jennie: Okay. So maybe we'll just like go to the end and I think you did a really great job of like, man, I'm sure you were like scrambling to get these like last couple chapter. I'm sure you had your book like almost turned in when Roe [went], so oh my god. Kudos to like, thank you for getting it done and out. But it was really great to like talk about how we need to like learn from our past to move forward and like how our foundation needs to be built on reproductive justice to be able to get to where we need to be

Becca: Yeah. And suddenly it was like, oh no, like this needs to be done in a couple weeks. Uh, you should hire another fact checker. So yeah, I I also just like live in fear of it, that that section isn't quite as, as hammered out as I would've liked. So it's good to hear that it resonated with you. Um, yeah, I mean I think like, to be very clear, like again, I'm not one of those people who's like, oh, you know, “maybe like Roe will fall and then like, we can do things better or like, that's what it will take.” Like that's never been my position, but I do think that the only way to get through the devastation of this moment is to also view it as an opportunity. So Roe was not a ruling that protected everyone. Roe did not give us reproductive justice in this country. In some ways Roe really exacerbated inequality. So, you know, we're at this moment where hopefully, you know, in our, our march toward a better future where abortion is once again legal in this country and is seen as part of reproductive healthcare, hopefully that can be more inclusive, hopefully. Like that can be something that's accessible for everyone and that isn't just successful to people with privilege and with resources.

Jennie: Absolutely. Like the same, right? Like I wanted to build for more and we still had Roe, right? like we were always fighting to like ensure that we got to this better place. So never of the like Roe, go so we can build something better. It was always we should build off of Roe to make something better. And I, I'm just, the thought now is like, hopefully this is the impetus to build something better. But like, man, my heart just like, I'm just like gutted when I think about all the people who are trying to access care right now and trying to be able to get care that they can't access and like that breaks my heart and we need to like figure things out to like get them to be able to access care as soon as possible. But yeah, we also need to build for that moment where everybody is able to access care close to them in their neighborhood that is affordable or free or that they can just go around, you know, somewhere close and not have all of these barriers that are preventing them from, from accessing care. Like that's the dream and like keep pushing till we get there.

Becca: Yeah, absolutely. I, I think, I mean, no question, the hardest part of the past few months for me as a reporter has been those stories of, of, and seeing people on the ground who are driving to clinics and then getting there and being turned away took in the first few weeks. Like I don't, I don't know how to deal with that as a human being.

Jennie: That was the story that almost broke me. Yeah. Was your story where the one went to like, had to go back like three times? Like that story almost broke me.

Becca: Yeah. I, like, I don't, people often will ask me like how I take care of myself on this beat, particularly like now that things are so devastating and I'm just like, I don't have a good answer for it. Like, I wish I did. I go to therapy. Like I think that's really important, but like, I don't know how to not feel that stuff. And so when I talk about how I hope that this moment poses an opportunity for us to move toward a better future, I'm saying that as like a way that helps me get outta bed in the morning. And I think a lot of people are like in that space right now.

Jennie: I think I, I was talking to somebody else who works in the movement about this recently and we were talking about how like I, I'm doing okay, right? Like I, I'm struggling in a different way. Like, but like the thought of like the the clinic staff or the abortion fund staff who are not only hearing those stories every day but are having to turn people away from, from funding or can't get them an appointment. Like if I had to deal with that every day…that's a whole level that would break me. Like, I, I can't imagine what those people are, are going through. So it's one of those like put things in perspective of like, I'm, I'm handling carrying my load and some days it's harder than others, but like I'm trying to balance all the things, but like I do worry for the people on the ground.

Becca: Yes, absolutely. I mean, I, I think if you go into that sort of work, you're doing it for several reasons and I, I don't think that there are a lot of people who go into that work is just a job. Right. I think for a lot of people it's, it's hard work, it's mission oriented and to not be able to care for people and the way that is really necessary. I mean, it, yeah, it's awful. If I couldn't do my job, which is not as important, I don't think as, as what those folks are doing, like, I think I would lose myself. So imagining what that's like for, for clinic workers and staff just is horrible and talking to them about it, I think it's just devastation all around and they deserve better.

Jennie: Okay. So I usually wrap up my interviews asking like what can people do? But I think I'm gonna just answer that question this week and say everybody should go out and buy Becca's book No Choice and read it. It's really, it's really a great book and I'm grateful that I got an advanced copy and I could talk to Becca about it. It comes out next week, October 11th. I'm sure she would appreciate the preorders if people could, could do that. But also whenever you get the chance or even requesting it for your library to get it is also really important as well. Becca, thank you so much for being here.

Becca: Aw, thank you so much Jennie. I really appreciate this and I appreciate you and your podcast.

Jennie: Aw, thank you. Okay y'all, I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Becca. I hope you are just as excited about growing repos as I am. I cannot wait to see what all is going to come out of it and I am just so excited. I know I keep saying it, but I'm really, I'm really excited to see rePROs grow into a larger initiative beyond the podcast.

Jennie: Thanks for listening everyone. And we'll see you on our next episode of RePROS Fight Back. For more information, including show notes from this episode and previous episodes, please visit our website at reprosfightback.com. You can also find us on Facebook and Twitter at RePROS Fight Back, or on Instagram at reprosfb. If you like our show, please help others find it by sharing it with your friends and subscribing, rating and reviewing us on iTunes. Thanks for listening.

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