Clinics Forced to Turn Patients Away Under Texas's Unconstitutional Abortion Ban

On September 1st, 2021, Texas effectively banned abortion in the state. Amy Hagstrom Miller, founder and CEO of Whole Woman’s Health and Whole Woman’s Health Alliance, sits down to talk to us about the tremendous stress that Texas’s new legislation has already had on patients, abortion providers, clinic staff, and abortion funds.

Texas’s SB8 outlaws abortion care after six weeks of pregnancy—far before many people even know they are pregnant and before many people can even receive an abortion appointment due to the pre-existing restrictive laws in Texas. Because they are so blatantly unconstitutional, six-week abortion bans have been knocked down in twelve states before Texas. The statute also empowers Texas residents to become pseudo-vigilantes, reporting anyone who “aids and abets” someone in accessing an abortion. The Supreme Court allowed the law to be enforced on September 2nd. For more detailed information on the Texas law, check out our past podcast episode here.  

This new ruling will force patients to drive out-of-state to receive basic abortion care, putting a burden on the healthcare infrastructure of neighboring states like New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Kansas. The law also puts an enormous emotional weight on the staff of clinics like Whole Woman’s Health, who are being forced to tell patients that they cannot receive the abortion care that they need.

Links from this episode

Whole Woman’s Health on Twitter
Whole Woman’s Health on Facebook
Whole Woman’s Health Alliance on Twitter
Whole Woman’s Health Alliance on Facebook
Amy Hagstom Miller on Twitter
Why Texas’s New Abortion Law and the Upcoming SCOTUS Case are Stressing Us Out Podcast
Abortion Fund T-Shirts

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 y'all, I cannot believe it is mid-September. I'm not really sure where all of September was, honestly, I'm not even sure where the summer, this year, like it has just passed so fast and just such a blur, but I am excited for fall for the weather to cool off a little bit so I can have my windows open. I think I've talked about this before, but like my cats adore just sitting in the window when it's open. So, they get so excited when the weather cools off a little bit and I can have the windows open and they can sit in the window. So that's exciting, but I'm also really excited for, you know, maybe going to an apple orchard. I'm not really an apple picking type person, but I do love going and getting fresh apples from an orchard. There's just something they're just better. I mean, they're just better. And, you know, making all of the fall treats, I'm ready to make, you know, pumpkin muffins or, you know, fall food. I'm just really excited, you know, like warm stews and stuff. Oh, I'm ready. But you know, I'm still dealing with all of the feelings around the Texas abortion bans. So, you know, still lots of rage, still lots of heartbreak. I mean, honestly, I can't hear the stories or think about the people who need care without just my heartbreaking. Like I just would, all of the people are going through right now. So I think last episode I talked about, I was coping by donating to Texas abortion funds. So I've switched from donating to Texas abortion funds to, I saw somewhere on social that the Texas Equal Access Fund had t-shirts that said “fuck abortion bans” And I was like, well, “I need that. I need that.” So I had posted a tweet that I was sitting here in my National Network of Abortion Funds “Everyone loves someone who had an abortion” t-shirt buying the Texas Equal Access Fund t-shirt. And if anybody had any other good abortion funds gear, let me know. Y’all, I bought so many t-shirts, I got so many lovely recommendations for t-shirts supporting abortion funds. I bought so many. So if anybody's interested and wants to also get some abortion fund gear, I have pinned that tweet where I asked for recommendations to the top of my Twitter profile. So that's @JennieinDC and you can see all the amazing recommendations I got. I bought so many all, I, I kept being like, “okay, you're done. You can't buy anymore.” And then somebody would like, share something new. And I'm like, “well, yeah, I need this one too. What are you doing? Why don't I have this already?” So yeah, I have so many now abortion fund t-shirts or I will, none of them are here yet. So I'm super excited. I'm sure I will share pictures when they get here and we will make sure to share them on our social, at least some of them. But yeah. So if you're interested, check out my Twitter profile. I'll make sure to keep it there for a while. So if you want to support abortion funds by buying amazing abortion fund t-shirts, that is a great resource. There were a lot of great t-shirts there to check out. There were other things too, but I focused mostly on t-shirts. I did get some stickers as well because I love getting stickers and then sending them to friends. So, um, so I guess, yeah, if anybody sees any great abortion related stickers, let me know. I know Liberal Jane always has amazing ones, so I always buy out all of hers to send to friends. So, you know, keep an eye out, I guess, with that. That's what I've been doing to cope with my stress around all of the Texas stuff right now is buying all of the abortion funds here. So I hope that some of you are interested in going and check out some of the stuff that is available with that. Let's just turn it to this week's interview, which as I promised is on Texas. So I talked to the wonderful Amy Hagstrom Miller with Whole Woman's Health. I'm so excited that she was able to take the time to talk with me. I know they are so busy right now, dealing with all of this stuff. So I really am grateful that she was able to take the time to talk to us and have a wonderful conversation about all of the things that are happening in Texas right now and what this is meaning to their patients and to their staff, both of which are really struggling under this Texas law. So I hope you enjoy my interview.

Jennie: Hi Amy. Thank you so much for being here today.

Amy: Thank you so much for having me

Jennie: Before we get started. Do you want to take a moment and introduce yourself and include your pronouns?

Amy: Sure. I am Amy Hagstrom Miller. I use she, her, hers, and I am the founder and CEO of Whole Woman's Health and Whole Woman's Health Alliance. And we operate nine clinics in five states and we do lots of advocacy work and communications work all with the umbrella of it’s time to shift the shame and stigma that surrounds abortion in this country and ensure that all people have access to safe, compassionate care, no matter where they live.

Jennie: Wonderful. So I'm really excited to have you here today to talk about what's happening in Texas. So I guess before we do that, maybe we should start with the real basic, like, let's talk a little bit about this law. So what is this law that Texas passed?

Amy: So unfortunately Texas has quite a history of passing laws that regulate people's access to safe abortion services. Sometimes I say the only good thing about the Texas legislature is they meet every other year instead of every year, because every time they meet, they pass at least one, if not four or five restrictions on people's access to care. And I want to lay that groundwork because this new law, SB8, came in on top of a whole bunch of restrictions that already exist that make it very difficult for people to access abortion care and for people to provide abortion care in Texas. And of course, that’s by design, not by default. And so there's already, you know, 24 hour waiting periods, two visit requirements, all this stuff that's already enforced and then comes SB8, which is a ban on abortion after cardiac activity is detected in the embryo, which is usually around about six weeks into the pregnancy, which is incredibly early-- before most people even know they're pregnant and way before most people in Texas can often even get an appointment because of the restrictions that I just described. It’s difficult to even get an appointment in the first place in Texas. And so that's the sort of root of SB8. I think one of the unusual pieces about SB8 is the way it's structured. Six weeks bans on abortion had been attempted and knocked down in 12 states before Texas tried it because they're blatantly unconstitutional. And everybody knows that even this super conservative Supreme Court in their recent decision on SB8, you know, said, “we're not weighing in on the constitutionality of the six week ban.” What they're weighing in on is this sort of new structure of the law. So what the authors of SB8 did is that they basically had the government enact a law and then took the government off the hook for enforcing it. It's kind of a strategy that they're, that they utilize to hope that it would withstand legal challenges and court challenges. So they've put the hands of enforcement of this law into the general public, really into anti-abortion zealots and vigilantes out in the public who can bring lawsuits against anybody they decide may have provided an abortion or helped somebody get an abortion that's over this new legal limit of about six weeks.

Jennie: Yeah, it's so different in, but in some ways, like you said, there have been plenty of six week bans that have been struck down already. So it really is the enforcement mechanism. that's different this time, but it's still just pretty horrifying. I can't really shake like what you were talking about at the beginning of like this patchwork of other laws that already exist. So, you know, six weeks and there's a 24-hour waiting period and two visit requirement. So like that's eating into the time of this very short window.

Amy: Correct. And you know, this the third time in what, seven years that we Whole Woman's Health have experienced a ban on abortion in the state of Texas and the first time in 2013 with--it was called HB 2, at that point, it was what's called an omnibus abortion bill that had all these different restrictions embedded in it that serves to close, well, over half of the clinics in Texas. We went from 44 clinics, all spread across the state, down to six when the law was enforced. Whole Woman's Health, you know, was able to get an injunction to block some of that law from going into effect. And so we reopened to about 18 clinics and as your listeners probably know, Whole Woman's Health won that lawsuit three years later in the Supreme Court. And it's considered, you know, the reproductive rights win in a generation, we knocked down a whole bunch of restrictions and really were able to illustrate the kind of harm that this kind of law does and how it doesn't advance women's health and safety. That said it was oftentimes in my mind, you know, I think about it as a win on paper, right? Huge legal standard. But to this day, five years after that, when we still only have 20 clinics in the state of Texas, because it's extremely difficult to keep a clinic open when you don't have any patients and you're not able to take care of anybody and you can't, you know, you can't pay your bills just like any doctor's office. And so those clinics that closed as a result of, of HB2, haven't really reopened. And so that's also part of the landscape we're dealing with now in SB8 is that there are still only 20 clinics. And so people are traveling. People are, you know, having to make multiple appointments over a couple of days, time, and it's by design, it's extremely difficult to access abortion. And now they've got this ridiculous restriction enforced that really makes us deny, you know, the vast majority of people who come to us for help.

Jennie: So this takes us back to the Supreme Court and what happened. I am one of I'm sure a lot of people who were up until 1:00 AM on August 31st waiting to see what the Supreme Court was going to do or not do. So what happened with the Supreme Court?

Amy: Yeah. You and me both. I was so upset when I found out, it was midnight central time instead of east coast…And, you know, keep in mind that we had clinic staff still in our clinic, in Fort Worth. We were seeing patients until just before midnight. And then, you know, the staff, I think didn't even get to go home until like 1:30 in the morning that day. And so I can't even begin to say how disrespectful it is of that Supreme Court to, you know, take their time and not weigh in and not really pay attention to the urgency that is happening on the ground. You know, every time somebody is denied the abortion that they need, we're met with just anguish and desperation on behalf of that person, you know, who's trying to seek care and that's still to this day with what's happening. Right? And so it was heartbreaking that SCOTUS didn't weigh in that they didn't say anything for as long as it took them. And then once they did that, they really just sort of like, didn't do their job. You know, they issued a big decision without any evidence and oral argument and, you know, discussion and really just sort of stepped away from weighing in on the real issue at hand and, you know, kind of let the law go ahead and be enforced on a technicality just because of the way the enforcement structure set up. And so it is definitely not the Supreme Court that our Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt case was in front of in 2016. And I think it really shapes our thinking about where are we going to get justice and where are we going to seek, you know, the restoration of our civil rights here. And I think we'll segue into, you know, last week I had the honor to be invited to the White House by the Vice President. And part of what, you know, Vice President Harris talked about in our time together was how there's three branches of government for a reason, right? And when we don't have justice from the court system, we need to look to the executive branch and Congress. And I think, you know, that's interesting and hopeful for me to, to think about, because for years, what we've had to do is challenge these terrible laws in the court system. And, you know, there's this pattern of Whole Woman's Health challenges, some terrible restriction. And then we win in the district court in Texas, and then the decision gets overturned in the fifth circuit. And then we go back and forth and have to go to the Supreme Court, you know, all the while, real people's lives and their futures and their dreams and their families are at stake. Right? And, and it's turns into this sort of political, legal football when it's actually, to me, the most important thing for us to look at is how these restrictions impact real people's lives on the ground. And so I'm encouraged that maybe we have some potential relief from other branches of government and we have an administration that's going to take this seriously, you know, and, and really look at all the ways that they could step in and support those of us on the front lines, doing the work, you know, to quote the Vice president. She said, “we don't want you to feel alone. We don't want you to feel abandoned on the front lines. The work that you're doing is so important, and we're going to do all that we can to restore justice and restore people's civil rights in Texas.”

Jennie: Yeah. I think the point about it's great to hear all these things moving, but like the people, I mean, my heart just sunk and was just like, just so sick over like people who had appointments that are canceled now and just breaking for the people who need access to the care. And, you know, you're hearing stories of so many Texas people leaving the state to get care, but like that's only the people who can afford to take the time off or to travel and makes me worry about all the people who are being left behind. Amy: You're absolutely right. 80% of the patients that we serve in our four Texas clinics at Whole Woman's Health, our parents already…they are navigating, you know, multiple jobs, their kids' school, their childcare, and, you know, even thinking about travel out of state, not to mention that we're in a pandemic and the Delta variant is raging in Texas because our governor also is an anti-masker, big surprise. Right? And so I think we have to look at the conditions in which we're sort of expecting somebody to travel out of state and really why shouldn't they, like, why should Texans be denied care in their own community? And why should Texas export its healthcare needs to the surrounding states? It puts a huge burden on the healthcare system in New Mexico and Colorado and Kansas and Oklahoma, and these places that are now all of a sudden seeing the thousands of people that have now been displaced in Texas. And so, you know, most of our patients can't even consider travel outside the state. Like I said, this is the third time we've experienced an abortion ban. And so the most recent one was last year when Governor Abbott decided that abortion is not essential medical care and blocked us from being able to provide abortion care services and the pandemic. And we, you know, had to challenge that in court and he eventually backed down, but for about three weeks, abortion was virtually banned throughout the state of Texas. And most people just carried a pregnancy against their will. You know, most people can't entertain the idea of traveling out of state. And, you know, they look to us to be the experts who can comfort them and guide them. And, you know, they basically are like, do you think you're going to overturn this law? Is it worth it for me to wait? Can you put me on a waiting list? Can you call, you know, if you overturn it, can I come in? And so they're really just like hoping that somehow Whole Woman's Health and the other people trying to challenge this law will be able to make abortion legal again before they're too far into the pregnancy. Right? And some people can travel out of state. There's a lot of noble work being done right now to raise money, to help people travel, but it doesn't work for everybody. And it really doesn't work for the majority. I mean, we serve a population in our clinic in MacAllan, which is on the Texas-Mexico border. We're the only clinic south of San Antonio and the whole state of Texas. So it's like for, you know, a few hundred miles in each direction. And many of our patients are immigrants. Some are documented, some aren't documented, right? And so it's just sort of saying in some kind of cavalier way, all people would just go to New Mexico-- people can't just go to New Mexico. People can't travel into the state. There's many things that they're risking. We serve a population of people that are here with a certain visa that allows them to be in the United States but restricts them to only the four-county area that makes up the lower Rio Grande valley. And people get that visa for like commerce and medical care and, you know, travel back, work, traveling back and forth. They can't travel anywhere besides those four counties. And so for people to just sort of say, “oh, you know, people can get abortions in surrounding states.” That's not true for so many people that we serve. And you know, this law has a super big impact on these populations that we can't just sort of forget to talk about and pretend that their rights to safe abortion care in the United States are just the same as people in other communities. Texas is part of the United States. Abortion is legal here. And so for people to just be like,” oh, no big deal. Somebody in Austin could go to Albuquerque.” It's like 10 hours each way. Right?

Jennie: Yeah. People lose sight of that. Right? Like the distance. And that a lot of the states around Texas are just as hostile and have, you know, 72 hour waiting periods instead of 24 hours. And that's a huge difference.

Amy: Yeah. You may have noticed, I didn't happen to mention Louisiana or Arkansas as being places. People would go from Texas and the same, you know, there's multiple barriers in those states for people to access. And there's also, even in Oklahoma, there's a 72-hour waiting period. Right? And so I've spoken to my colleagues, independent abortion provider colleagues all over the country who are seeing people from Texas displaced and people are also, they've heard about this law and people are scared. They're wondering, like if I provide this patient from Texas an abortion in my state, what is our liability as a provider? Some people think that patient could be prosecuted, which is not true. The patient is the only, only person involved in the abortion so far that SB8 doesn't allow for them to sue. And so I think it's important for people to understand is they're seeing people from Texas that it's okay to do so, that Texas law doesn't leave Texas. Right? It's not going to follow people to the states where they do have an abortion. And so you're, you know, you're free to help people. You're free to care for people. And also, you know, I'm encouraged by companies like Lyft who issued a memo to all of their drivers saying, you know, we're going to stand by any of you that may have one of these stupid lawsuits brought against you. You know, we, we support, you know, women's access to abortion services. And we also think it's just, you know, none of our job’s business where people are going and, you know, I think it would be amazing if more companies stood with us like that, because it's, you know, it's terrifying to be the provider and to have frontline clinic staff, like our receptionists, our nurses, medical assistants, these people don't like, they can't retain attorneys. Right? And so it's terrifying for them to think of all the, the sort of threats that could be made by this sort of vigilante, bounty hunter kind of situation.

Jennie: Well, to me, I also just see that as on top of already being a hostile place to go work often because of protestors and, you know, clinics have been attacked. And so like, it's just like this whole, I can't imagine right now what your staff is going through.

Amy: Yeah. I think the hardest part for all of us, and I just came off a couple hour meeting talking to folks on the front line and it was just heartbreaking. People can't even finish their sentences as they try to describe what it's like, because they're just breaking down in tears and it's like killing them to say no all day. In fact, they're like, “I just had to say no to five people in a row, you know, can you talk to the next patient?” Like they're trying to like tag team with each other because they're highly trained, compassionate staff who are here in our clinics because of what we do, right? They're super committed to human rights and justice and abortion access. And they're fully trained and capable of helping everybody who comes through that door yet, they have to turn away, you know, the majority of people. And they're put in the position of educating the public about this law and enforcing this law. So they're serving kind of like as agents of the state against their will, really. And so the patients get mad at the staff. I mean, you should hear some of these phone calls, right? Where, and of course, they're, they can't believe what they're being told and the anguish is, is palpable. And so it's just incredibly cruel to put these wonderful staff who are actually just like the patients in the community. They're working parents, primarily women of color who dedicate their lives to helping people in these clinics. And then they're put in this position of enforcement and denial. It's awful what they're going through right now. And we got, you know, this Justice Department, we just have to get action because we can't endure this much longer, both financially and also just the emotional and psychological trauma for the clinic staff and for the patients that they're turning away.

Jennie: Yeah. It, yeah. It just, when I think about it and start hearing the stories, like it kind of paralyzes you because it is just so devastating to think about, oh, all the people being impacted. So I guess let's try to turn it to what's next. Um, you mentioned the Justice Department, so what are they doing?

Amy: So, you know, it's amazing to be in a position… you know, I've been doing this work for a while now, like almost 30-- or a little over 30 years. And it was my first job out of college and I was 21. And, you know, I come to the work from this human rights kind of perspective, and I've never had a White House step in like this. I've never seen a Department of Justice say, we're going to sue the state of Texas. It's about time. You know, Texas has been chipping away at people's rights to safe abortion care for decades incrementally. And we've all just sort of been like, “oh, that's understandable.” Or at least the clinic could still be open and people can like, you know, jump over that ladder and run across that street and climb that mountain. And then maybe they could get an abortion, right? There's this sort of acceptance of all these regulations and restrictions. And we just keep like trying to bend to accommodate them and keep the doors open. While if you pick up your head and kind of look at what's happened, people's rights are completely dependent upon where they live and upon oftentimes their ability to pay, the color of their skin, it's unacceptable. And so it's amazing to have Merrick Garland and there's some sweet justice there as well, leading the charge in a case that's called United States versus Texas. The amazing. And so we, I submitted what's called a declaration as part of the case. Many people did that, sort of share all of these stories from the clinics and the impact in our experience over the last couple of decades of restrictions on abortion to really illustrate to the judge and, you know, as part of the case kind of what what's happening on the ground. So I'm encouraged by that. I also know from my own experience being, you know, the plaintiff in the case against HB2, that it took three years for us to get justice and, you know, hundreds of thousands of lives were affected in that time period. And so it can't happen soon enough. And just trying to think of other ways that the administration could help. I actually, when I, myself and six other people from the front lines in Texas and a couple other states were invited by the Vice President Harris to the White House last week-- and I will tell you it's the first time an abortion provider has been invited to the White House at 25 years, and that in and of itself is remarkable-- and as we sat around the table and shared the stories from the work that we're doing and the impact, and, you know, not only did she listen remarkably genuinely and acknowledge our work and ask follow-up questions to really understand what's happening with people, what's happening with the staff, what's happening to them, pregnant people denied care. We asked for things, you know, I asked for some kind of relief. I think it's important, you know, for your listeners to know that the majority of clinics that provide abortions in this country are small, independent providers. We're not connected to, you know, a big fundraising machine or a big system like Planned Parenthood. And our only ability to stay open comes from seeing patients. And so to this day, 14 out of 20 of the clinics I described in Texas are independent clinics. And there is no revenue if we're not seeing any patients, we run just like any medical practice. And if we don't get relief, what's going to happen is that we might, you know, win down the road in the legal system, but pregnant people's rights will be restored and there won't be anywhere for them to go. Right? And the people who crafted this kind of law, that they totally understand that, right? There are sort of backdoor ways that they serve to shutter clinics so that you might have a right, that exists on paper, but you can't actually actualize it in real life because there's less clinics, there's all these barriers, et cetera. And so I tried to tell that story as much as I could,I was given, um, to say, you know, is there a way to federal government could give us, you know, financial support like they did during COVID or, or FEMA, is there other ways other than the Justice Department litigating that can really help keep this infrastructure as stable as possible in Texas so that we don't have clinic closures and the kinds of things that we've had, you know, as recently as seven years ago with HB2?

Jennie: I think that is such an important point. And it's one we talked of when we talk about global issues, we talk about like the global gag rule and how, when it's in place, clinics close. And people seem to think that like, when it's not in place anymore and magically the clinics reappear, and people can easily get the services, but it's not that simple. Like once a clinic closes it doesn't just reopen.

Amy: Right. And I mean, our physician's got other jobs, our staff got other jobs. We can't, you know, we had to, I had to sell the building…I had to sell the equipment. You know, you can't just pay a mortgage or rent for three years without any income. Right? And so I think the operational details of what it takes to run an abortion clinic in the Midwest and the south are tremendous. And it's a lot less of an investment to keep us stable in this interim right now than it is to like, try to restart the whole community. That's why there's only, still 20 clinics open in Texas, even five years after we won our Supreme Court case.

Jennie: Yeah. Yeah. It's like the logistics, like the antis are so good about thinking of the things that like, like the TRAP laws, right. Designed to force the clinics to close, like trying to like get rid of the care without outright banning it. And they've been unfortunately super successful.

Amy: Yes they have. And I think one of the things that we did in our Whole Woman's Health case at the Supreme Court has really sort of knocked down this framework where they kept claiming for decades, that they had women's health and safety in mind. And we knocked that down. We proved that that's not true, you know, restrictions on abortion actually make things less healthy. And you know, our victory, part of the majority decision, is that a state can’t insert itself between a pregnant person and their ability to access abortion and add restrictions, unless they can prove the restrictions advanced women's health and safety with scientific evidence and medical facts, right? That was a huge part of our win. And so what you see after Whole Woman's Health, the italics Whole Woman's Health, right? The Supreme Court case is a pivot of the anti-abortion strategy away from even pretending they care about women's health and safety to a focus on the fetus and forgetting about where the fetus lives and where the context of the fetus is. In fact, they call the pregnant person, “the host” in a lot of their language now, and they've focused on restricting the kind of abortion. You can have the gestational limits, fetal tissue, disposal, et cetera. Like a lot of those laws that have been passed in the last five years are really focused completely differently. And they're trying to get people to think on an emotional level about abortion and actually forget about the pregnant person and their rights and their civil rights and their right to, you know, health and happiness.

Jennie: Okay. So now that people are hopefully just as upset as I am about what is happening and what is going on, I'm sure they are looking for an outlet for what can they do. So what actions can our audience take to try and help out right now?

Amy: So the first action I'm going to give you might sound like it's not as active as others, but I think it's actually the most active, which would be for people to stop being silent about abortion and to talk about the positive aspects of abortion and how access to safe abortion makes communities healthier, makes communities safer. Kind of finish the sentence because of access to abortion, somebody I know or love has been able to do X right? Open up the ability for people to talk about the moral and ethical positive framework of abortion care access, and have all people be able to talk about it, including, you know, cis white men who have benefited tremendously from access to safe abortion, right? Do we talk about how they've had an abortion and how they have benefited from access to abortion? It has allowed them to pursue their dreams, their hopes, their future in the same way that many of us women have experienced, you know, because of my abortion, I was able to ask what parents, children, I have better finished school, whatever it might be. Talk about it in an aspirational, positive way, instead of through this framework of tragedy of regret or all this stuff that the anti-abortion folks have really dominated the mainstream. I think that would be extremely important. The second would be to, if you have the means to donate to people doing work on the front lines in Texas. So Whole Woman's Health, my organization, Whole Woman's Health Alliance, we have the only nonprofit independent clinic in the state, and we're doing a lot of the work around thought leadership, communications work and litigation work in Texas. And so folks can donate to our 501C3. There's also a coordinated campaign from all of the Texas abortion funds through Act Blue and AOC actually amplified this a couple of weeks ago, which has helped a lot. But, you know, if you make a donation to the coordinated campaign of the Texas abortion funds, it gets split evenly between all 10 abortion funds. And so it will help people no matter where in the state that they live. And there's a website called needanabortion.org that lists, you know, that shows you how to link to that campaign. But also you can go through Act Blue as well, but also shows you some of that information people might need about what's happening on the ground in Texas. Like what clinics are open, you know, where people can go in the region, et cetera. So I think that's helpful. And the third place I would offer is the Abortion Care Network is a national organization that does work with independent providers all over this country. And they have a fund called Keep Our Clinics fund and they have been collecting donations and then turning them around and dispersing them to the, the 14 independent clinics in Texas. Also like the only clinic left in, in Mississippi as an independent provider, the only clinic left in North Dakota is an independent provider, right? And so they're helping give money to clinics that need help with, you know, overhead, how do I pay my electric bill, my mortgage, and my rent during a time when I can't see patients, et cetera. So that…would be a really great place for people to donate if they have the means.

Jennie: Well, Amy, thank you so much for being here and thank you for giving such great resources for our audience to take action with. I think those are all really important and I have definitely been taking advantage of honestly, most of those I have donated to, but I haven't donated to Keep Our Clinics. I'll have to check that one out and make sure to donate but thank you for your time. I know you have been just swamped dealing with all of this, so I really want you to know I appreciate it.

Amy: Thank you so much. I appreciate your questions. And I appreciate the opportunity to share a little bit of what's going on.

Jennie: Okay. Everyone. I hope you, my conversation with Amy, it was so wonderful to get to talk to her about such an important issue. I'm sure we will be coming back and talking about Texas more. It is such a big story and it is having such a huge ripple impact. I mean, around states, right? Like you have people traveling to get abortions and clinics. Aren't really able to handle this flow of patients. So it's kind of a compounding tragedy. And I think another is that, that I saw that I really just has like stuck with me. And just to give you the scale of what this means, because Texas is, I think the second most populous state in the country, that because of this Texas abortion ban 1 in 10 women of reproductive age no longer has access to the rights guaranteed under Roe. 1 in 10, that was mind blowing when I saw it, you know, it's one thing to know how huge it is and to like, think you have an idea, but like 1 in 10 women. And again, that's what the data shows. That's why I'm saying women versus people just to flag that. But yeah, 1 in 10, that that's just unbelievable. All of these women are not able to exercise their rights. And again, just heartbreaking, heartbreaking for all of the people who need access to abortion in Texas. So yeah, we'll definitely be talking about it more with that.

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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