Emergency Podcast: SCOTUS Looks Ready to Completely Overturn Roe

On May 2nd, 2022, a Politico article was released that contained a leaked copy of the Supreme Court’s draft decision of the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case that would most likely have been released formally in June or July of this year. The leaked decision, penned by Justice Samuel Alito, overturns Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court case that guaranteed the constitutionality of abortion in the U.S. Caroline Reilly, Reporting Fellow with Rewire News Group, sits down to talk with us about the recent leaked draft and what this decision means for the future of abortion in America.

The leaked draft ultimately upholds Mississippi’s 15-week ban at the heart of the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case, overturns Roe v. Wade, and overturns Planned Parenthood vs. Casey, which ruled that patients cannot face “undue burden” when attempting to access an abortion. Technically and currently, abortion is still legal in all 50 states. This draft is not a ruling, but a window into what the Supreme Court is possibly planning to decide regarding the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case.

If the Supreme Court indeed rules in line with the leaked draft, it will mean abortion will be illegal in half of the country. 26 states are likely to ban abortion if Roe is overturned. Those states and others will also likely take the opportunity to pass additional legislation that severely restrict or ban abortion care. This will lead to broad swaths of the country where abortion is inaccessible, and smatterings of states where abortion is accessible— leading to overwhelmed reproductive healthcare infrastructure in the states that do offer abortion care.

As the U.S. faces these unprecedented attacks, we must remember that abortion is healthcare, abortion is freedom, and abortion is autonomy, and that the majority of Americans support upholding Roe. The fight to ensure access to basic, timely, and critical reproductive healthcare will continue.

Links from this episode

Caroline Reilly on Twitter
Caroline Reilly on Rewire
Rewire News Group on Twitter
Rewire News Group on Facebook
Center for Reproductive Rights “If Roe Fell” map

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, we gotta talk about what happened on Monday. It was, um, unexpected. I was had just like finished eating and was chilling on the couch watching… I don't know, some TV show, just relaxing, having a quiet Monday. I started off my morning being like, oh, what a relaxing start to the week. My bad. Sorry. When all of a sudden I get a text from a friend being like, “oh my God, did you see the Politico story?” And no. So I like quickly go and click through the Politco link and holy… y'all I knew it was coming to a degree. Right? Like I knew they were gonna overturn Roe. I thought I was, I was a little more prepared for it to be more of a technicality than just a flat-out overturning of Roe and Casey. I guess we're gonna talk about what happened more in the episode. So I'll, I'll skip that part and just kind of go where my head is at. I'm in a bunch of places on it right now, right? Like I'm kind of numb. I think I had like my morning period of like “what this is all going to mean” when Trump was elected and when Ruth Bader Ginsburg died, like, I, I think I cried all my tears over this potential loss of rights then like, I don't have that in me anymore. Or I'm so burned out with all of the things that I just don't have the capacity for it anymore… So a little numb, but I was instantly nauseous, like just the pit of my stomach, just hollowed. And I thought I was going to be sick. Like, all I could think about is all of the people who need abortion, who will no longer be able to get it. And like first let's be really clear. Like this is a, this was a leak. It is not a final decision it while it is likely the final decision, it is not formal yet. So if you have an appointment, if you need an abortion in the interim, you may, you can still go get one with all of the caveats that all of you know, already, right? Like there are already a lot of obstacles to accessing abortion, especially if you are in Texas or Oklahoma right now, but it's not easier in a lot of other places. So like my, my thought just went to all of the people who are not gonna be able to access care. And as we know with so many things, that burden is not gonna be felt equally by everybody. There are so many people who are already marginalized that this is gonna disproportionately impact. And unfortunately, that means generally that it falls hardest on, on Black people, on people with low incomes, on people with disabilities, young people, the LGBTQ+ community. Like these are the people who are gonna have a harder time accessing abortion and they already do. That's already the case and the loss of abortion rights under Roe, like has the potential to be really devastating. So I that's where I'm at. Like my gut is just, was really nauseous and I'm tired and angry and burned out and ready to keep fighting. Right? Like this isn't an end, right? We're not throwing up hands and giving up. We are going to keep fighting and we'll get to that more. I guess I just wanted people to know like where my head is at on all of this. And I'm sure we're all, in various places with this right now. I'm hoping to maybe take some time this weekend to step away a little bit and just try to decompress and, and not stress about all of this and, and deal with that. And hopefully you recover a little bit. It's been a long week and when I'm recording this it's only Wednesday. So yeah, I think, I'll just say the fight's not over. We will keep fighting. Everybody has, should have the right to access abortion care. Abortion is healthcare. It is a human right. And the fight does not stop here. We will keep fighting. And I guess with that, um, let's just jump into this week's episode. I was so excited to have this person on for the episode. I really was so excited when she said yes. So we had Caroline Rilley with Rewire News Group on to talk all about what happened on Monday, what it means right now and what it will mean when this decision finally comes down and we have some great recommendations for what you can do to fight back. So with that, let's go to my interview with Caroline.

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

Caroline: Hi Jennie. Thank you so much for having me.

Jennie: So I guess before we get started, maybe would you like to introduce yourself and include your pronouns?

Caroline: Sure. My name is Caroline Rilley. I am a reporting fellow with Rewire News Group and my pronouns are she/her.

Jennie: I am so excited. It feels weird to be like, I'm excited to have you here today. I mean, I am, but like, we're gonna talk about some pretty horrible things. So, so I guess deep breath.

Caroline: Yep. Definitely.

Jennie: What happened on Monda?

Caroline: So on Monday, if you were me, it was right before you were about to take your eight o'clock sleep-ruining nap, right? Like you were just like, so chill. I was watching TV, just put my feet up for the first time all day.

Jennie: Yes.

Caroline: And my phone buzzed and a reporter at Politico obtained a leaked copy of the decision in the Dobbs case, which we anticipated, we will and still anticipate we will be getting some time in June or July. And this leak is completely, I mean, I don't wanna say unprecedented because I'm, I, I would be able to speak to like anything beyond modern history of the Supreme Court, but in modern history of the Supreme Court, we have never seen something like this. This is absolutely wild. Just on a, as the term goes, palace intrigue, sort of palace intrigue sort of level, the concept of a leaked Supreme Court draft is absolutely insane. It's, it's just like nothing we've really ever seen before. And in that decision, it overturned Roe versus Wade. It was written by Samuel Alito, who I think, you know, I think with the nominations to the Supreme Court, under Trump, there was a little bit of focus taken off of the existing conservative justices, Alito Thomas, primarily.

Jennie: Yeah. I don't think about him that much…Like he's just there.

Caroline: Yep. And I think as soon as I knew Alito wrote it, I was like, this is bad even before I really dug into the text of the decision because I listened to the Dobbs hearing and Alito was absolutely bat shit. Like he was just, I mean, I would say even more so than Brett Kavanaugh, like he was, you could tell there was so much venom in him for this. Right? And so, yeah, so they obtained a leadked copy of the Dobbs decision in it. He not only affirmed the 15 week ban in Mississippi, which is an early gestational ban. Um, he overturned Roe and Casey and as Imani Gandy from Rewire News Group pointed out earlier today, this case was sort of rigged from the beginning because the initial ask of the case was simply to assess the 15 week ban. But then after Amy Coney Barrett was appointed to the court, they added in the decision to also put the question of Roe on the table. So we kind of knew from the beginning also just from the makeup of the court, that we were going to get a bad decision in this case. I think that some folks, myself included to an extent though, I, I, I've never been an optimistic person, generally speaking, were holding out hope that we could get a decision that maybe straddled a line that maybe upheld the gestational ban, but didn't overturn Roe that, you know, and, and, and that's not to say that that would've even been logistically much better because upholding even a gestational ban would overturn certainly Whole Women's Health, which was decided a couple of years ago that said, you know, if you want to pose a restriction, you have to actually put forth empirical evidence as to why it's not an undue burden. You know, I think there was some hope that we were gonna get a decision that maybe didn't go all the way, but with Alito being the one writing it… And I mean, I think people still are holding out hope that you know, this outrage that this is incited is going to prompt a change on the decision. I don't think that is the case. I think this is the decision we will get. I will be thrilled to be wrong about that if it happens. But I think as long as Alito is writing that decision, we are looking at exactly the draft that we got on Monday. If not exactly, we are definitely looking at the end of Roe and Casey, I cannot imagine he softens on that. If anything, I feel like this outrage might make him feel even better.

Jennie: I, I will definitely put myself in the camp of the, like, I didn't think we were gonna get a good ruling, obviously. Like, I didn't think they were gonna like, strike it down. I really thought they were gonna go the route of overturning Roe without actually saying those words. And then like trying to convince the media that like, Hey, upholding the 15 week ban didn’t overturn Roe. Even if they didn't say those words it is really the case. I thought we were gonna be in of like, having to convince people like y'all, this was really bad. And like the media, not wanting to say that. So I was not surprised because like nothing in this area surprises me anymore. But like, yeah, it just like caught me off guard because like I really think I had it in my head that they were not gonna utter those words. Like we're overturning Roe and Casey. Like I, I thought that was maybe a couple years down the line before they got that bold. I just, uh, yeah, it, it really caught me off guard that it's coming right now.

Caroline: Mm-hmm.

Jennie: I knew that like the, the holding was still like gonna be terrible and overturn Roe. It just, I don't know. I don't know why there was like a difference in my head.

Caroline: No, I mean, I think that that's fair. I think, you know, for a while I've been saying to folks, this decision would effectively overturn Roe, right? Because if we uphold a 15 week ban that essentially makes the undue burden standard, which has protected access across the country, moot. And so it would open the floodgate for states across the country. As long as abortion was technically legal, it would mean that, you know, laws like SB8 and Texas, which bans most abortions in the state after six weeks, it would mean that they basically can create any abortion restriction they want, as long as they say that abortion is still legal. So they can say like, yeah, you can't have abortion five minutes after conception and that's technically fine once you undo Casey because Casey designates the undue burden standard. And so you're right. You know, like we were always gonna lose Roe one way or the other. And I think the fact that they just went for it and they didn't even try to look as if they were, you know, beholden to stare decisis or they, they really just don't care. And I think that is something that the right, that is something that anti-abortion advocates, that is something that evangelicals and conservatives have honestly, always been really good at is seeing an opportunity and taking it and I think it's something we're not, you know, folks in the abortion movement. I mean, certainly Democrats are not fantastic yet. We don't, you know, not they're good at sinking their teeth in when, when it's, when it's ripe. I think so to speak and I think lead us on opportunity and he took it, I think, you know, with Ketanji Brown Jackson coming on the court with Biden, there is a shift where, you know, you never know if we get another Democratic president, you know, in what is it two years now and who would be next to retire? Thomas, maybe, you know, there's a chance that we could rebalance the court a little bit. And you know, I think Alito said, “let's do it. Let's let's overturn it.” And I mean, the decision is not coy about it. It calls Roe an egregiously decided case. It opens by saying abortion is a contentious issue that many people feel is the taking of a life. It, it is not, you know, I've read a lot of Supreme Court cases in law school and lawyers are great at using fancy language to say horrible things. And he just used horrible language to say horrible things. It is not flowery. It is not nuanced. It is direct. And it is clear that his goal was to gut access to abortion in this country. And it's scary. It honestly is. There's really no two ways about it.

Jennie: Okay. So maybe let's get to what does that mean right now? So assuming, so we're recording just because God knows what's gonna happen. We are recording on Wednesday afternoon on May 4th. This is coming out tomorrow. So like in theory, nothing should change between now and then, but right. You know, whatever. So like that's where I'm at right now. Like it could, what, what does it mean at this moment?

Caroline: So right now nothing changes. So abortion is still technically legal in all 50 states. And I hesitate to say abortion is legal in all 50 states because I know a lot of folks in the movement say that. And I think that that is true and we don't wanna scare people. But I think the reality is, is that large swaths of this country have already been living in a post Roe world. And I think that we do a disservice when we say it's still fine, everything's fine. It's not fine. Like, even if we never got this decision, it would not be fine. But in all 50 states, right now you can, at some point in a pregnancy access abortion in a much larger percentage of the country than will be the case when we get the decision, you can access abortion at multiple stages in pregnancy, you can access self-managed abortion through the mail. This draft of the decision does not change anything right now. And you know, I, I have been thinking about this question because it's something that we talk about a lot. And it's obviously something that folks are talking about because you know, there are concerns of patients who might turn on the news and see this and think that they have to cancel their appointments tomorrow. You do not. If you have an appointment it's yours to keep; like this is not going to hurt access until we get the decision from the Supreme Court. I think if we want to look at this from a productive point of view and I'm coming at this, obviously as a journalist. So, you know, this is advice, but you know, I had conversations with people in my life last night about, and the night before about getting pills, advanced provision pills. I think, you know, we have been given the opportunity here to get a heads up and we need to do with that what we will, you know, we have been given this space to let our voices be heard before things become official, whether or not that changes anything. I, I, again, I'm not very optimistic about, but right now the country looks a lot different than it is going to look when the decision comes down, there is more access to things right now than there will be in a few months. So if I lived in a red state, I mean, I live in Massachusetts. So I don't live in a red state, but for me, the idea of getting advanced provision pills, which we can talk about. And I'm sure we will, later on, you know, about the, the availability of self-managed abortion for first trimester procedures, pregnancies, rather, you know, I know that where I live chances are I'll always be able to access abortion. But if I lived in a red state right now, I would be going through Aid Access and purchasing pills through advanced provision. I would be buying Plan B. I, I mean, we have a little bit of a heads up here. I think it's not unreasonable or paranoid or scare mongering to act accordingly. If that makes sense.

Jennie: Yeah. I've been trying to be careful when I'm talking about the, the abortion is still legal and being like, it, it is some exceptions may apply, right? Like, especially if you're in Texas and Oklahoma, like, it's very hard to get in a lot of states, especially hard to get there, but like, if you have an appointment or need an appointment right now, please still go. But yeah. And I do, I like the idea of thinking of this as like a bonus time to like, get, get our stuff together and like start thinking through what you need to, what you need to procure to be prepared.

Caroline: Mm-hmm and you know, the good news, term used relatively, right, is that, you know, there are a lot of folks [being loud] right now who, all due respect, don't have the range. And you are hearing a lot of things about coat hangers and herbs and all these sorts of things. And the bottom line is there are groups of people who have been preparing for this moment. For years, there are organizations that have been working on the ground. A lot of them, you know, led by marginalized people for whom the protection of the law was never a full reality and they are ready. They are ready to make sure that abortion is still accessible. They are ready to make sure that people have the resources to travel, to defend themselves against prosecution. There are people and organizations who have made sure that this moment would be one we were prepared for. And I think it's incredibly important alongside acknowledging how horrifying and despicable this decision is and what a stain it is on our country's history, that there are people in this movement who are doing everything they can to make sure that people can still access abortion. There are providers who are fighting tooth and nail to make sure that their patients have what they need. There are, you know, hotlines designated for people who need to manage their own abortions and states where they can't get procedural abortions in clinics, the resources are there. And I think, you know, it's a really fine line and there's a lot of nuance to saying abortion is still legal in 50 states. It's just, it's not that simple, but it also, you know, we just need to be realistic about it. We can't on the one hand say, everything's gonna be fine. You can just take a pill and you'll be fine because that's not true. Even though self-managed abortion is legal. We know that the use of it is going to mean different things, especially legally for people in different demographics, people in different geographical regions, the implications are going to look different depending on who the person taking the self-managed abortion. On the other hand, we cannot erase the work of people who have done everything to make sure we can be in the best possible situation right now. You know, we are not, you know, the language about coat hangers and back-alley abortions is, is outdated frankly. And you know, we owe it to the people who have put in that work to make sure that the framing that we use when we talk about what happens next recognizes the work that they have put in to get us here.

Jennie: Yeah. I think that is so important right now. Like we don't need to be scaring people, and stigmatizing self-managed abortion by using the coat hanger imagery, like it is not the 1970s, there are safer alternatives. So saying that abortion isn't going away when it's illegal, it's just gonna become unsafe is not true in this context, right? There are places in the world where that is true, but the US is not one of them at this moment. There are ways to access pills, which are safe. So in the context where abortion becomes illegal, it becomes criminalized. And that's where your risk is versus unsafe abortion, which I think people need to understand. And which, when you start using the coat hanger, imagery and stuff, it scares people from self-managed options. It may prevent people from understanding the options that are available, that they have access to, which may hold criminal risk, right? Like we already saw in Texas, like, you may have to worry about prosecution, but pills are safe. So it's not a safety risk. It's a criminal risk.

Caroline: Absolutely. And I think, you know, just reminding folks, when you access self-manage abortion, either through an organization like Plan C pills or like Aid Access, you are getting the exact medical protocol that you would get in a brick and mortar abortion clinic. They are not illicit pills. They are not off market. They are the medications that your provider in a state, like if I do self-managed abortion in a state like Texas or Oklahoma or wherever I am getting the same medical protocol that I would get, if I walked into my OBGYN in Massachusetts, they are safe, they are effective. And we have resources in place. Like I said, there's the Repo Legal Defense hotline for folks who do find themselves feeling like, you know, there's a compromise in their legal safety, but we also have miscarriage hotline. There are resources that, you know, if you do take self-managed abortion and you do have fears either about medical or legal risks, you know, we can't neutralize those things entirely because of the, you know, the climate right now. But there have been efforts to make sure that people are supported in these decisions and that they are available to them. And at the end of the day, it's about making sure that people still feel empowered because, you know, I talk to a lot of folks in this space and I've interviewed a lot of people and you know, I'm biased because she's one of my closest friends, of Amelia Bonow who runs Shout Your Abortion is always sort of my north star on these sorts of issues. And, you know, I interviewed her a couple of months ago when the Dobbs case was being heard. And, you know, she said that it was kind of like from the start that we even thought abortion was something, the court like… the court never had the right to tell us that this was something they could give us or take away, you know? And I think that's a really radical, but very honest way of thinking about it. You know, this is not, they’re still our bodies at the end of the day. And I think that empowerment, even in the face of what is literally the worst possible scenario will at least hopefully give people the fire to keep fighting. You know, that this is not hopeless. This is not, this isn't the end for abortion. Right? We still have so much fight in this. We still have so much that we can do.

Jennie: We're tired and we're not done

Caroline: Exactly. We're, we're exhausted. But if there's any movement that is good at running on fumes, it’s repro.

Jennie: Yes. Okay. So now it's June or July and the decision is the decision. What does that mean?

Caroline: So it means that abortion is functionally illegal in half of the country, 26 states, many states in the country have what are called trigger bans, which have been put in place already so that they go into effect immediately. When we get a decision that overturn Roe versus Wade and a number of states will also use the opportunity to pass, uh, if not outright bans, other types of laws that will make abortion effectively and accessible or illegal in the state. Things like SB8, but, you know, trigger bans are already very common and they're already on the books. And like I said, many, many states. So the latest statistic is that 26 states will have abortion be functionally illegal. So what will happen is we'll have what are called abortion deserts for broad swaths of the country. And then other parts of the country will become abortion havens, I guess, is the word, oh, well, haven implies like that you can go and get one exactly, you know, and that you, you know, and that they won't be overloaded or overrun. I mean, we've already seen the impact of Texas's SB8, which is one state. And, you know, the rate of patients in clinics in surrounding states has already gone up exponentially. That's one state who has banned abortion at six weeks. Right? So multiply that like 26 and you put the burden of managing that care on the remaining half of the country. And that is a terrifying prospect, especially for a procedure that is time sensitive, right? So in the first, I think it's 11 weeks of pregnancy, the early pregnancy, you can use procedural or a medication abortion, but the, as we know, the later in a pregnancy an abortion needs to happen, the more logistical hurdles you might have, even in liberal states, there are restrictions on later abortion. You know, it means something as simple as taking a couple extra days off of work because the procedural abortion later in pregnancy is gonna be a little bit more to physically recover from, right? It's gonna be harder to travel if you're, you know, recovering… there are so many things that are going to happen that are gonna be logistical nightmares that will make access even in states where it's available not great. So yeah, we are looking at the worst case scenario, basically, you know, I think we've seen states like Connecticut recently pass a safe haven law that makes Connecticut like literally a haven for abortion care. And it is the most radical state in the country to do this. A number of other states have passed like post Roe laws, Massachusetts being one of them, New York being one of them, post Roe legislation that safeguards abortion in the state. One of the things that will be a new tactic that we're probably gonna see from conservatives is the use of extradition policies. So if you do have to travel out of state to access your abortion, we will see conservative states use extradition policies to try to criminalize citizens in their state who get abortions in other states, which is a terrifying prospect. Considering travel is the only option that many, many, many Americans will have. And yeah, I mean, I could go on probably for hours about what we are about to face.

Jennie: I have so many thoughts, like so many, like you hear 26 states and like that is unreal and, and just like overwhelming, but like to give people who may not understand what this means, an idea, we're not talking like you can go to the state next door, like we're talking these states are really in like a big swath in the Southern area of the country, up into the Midwest. So you're talking about like vast swaths of the country where you're gonna have to travel long distances, like with all of the caveats, right? Of like, if you are able to afford to travel, if you're able to take the time off like abortion already, hasn't been accessible for so many people because they can't afford it for a whole host of reasons. This will just make that so much worse. And as, as with everything like the effects, aren't going to be felt equally, right? Like Caroline said, she's in Massachusetts. She’ll be able to have access. I'm in Washington, DC. I should, in theory, still have access unless the federal government decides to mess around with DC, which they can. But I have enough money that I can travel out of state, the burden of this is gonna, as so often does fall on Black and brown people. It's gonna fall on people with disabilities. It's gonna fall on young people, the LGBTQ community, people with low incomes. And they're the people who are gonna be who are already bearing the burden right now with Roe in place. But like, it's just gonna be so much worse without Roe.

Caroline: Mm-hmm.Yep. Absolutely. I think that that is a critical reminder, which is, you know, the, and that is one thing that has not changed from the days of back-alley abortions, right? Which is that wealthy white women will always have access to this procedure. Even if it means going overseas, like they will always be able to terminate pregnancies, which I mean really gets to the root of why they're doing this, right? They're not doing this because they actually care about abortion. They're not doing this because they care about babies or fetuses or any sort of medical implication of this procedure. They're doing it because they know the right to determine what you do with your body. With regard to family planning, pregnancy, parenting is a direct correlation with the ability to self-determine your ability to earn, to make decisions about your life. They know that if they control the reproductive decisions of marginalized populations, because that is like you said, who these laws are going to hit, they will keep them marginalized. It is a means of governed eugenics. Essentially. It is saying that certain populations will not be able to engage in self-determination. And as a result, they will stay living below the poverty line. They will stay unable to access education or, you know, job security or food security, or, you know, housing that they need. They will not be able to leave relationships that are unsafe or unstable. They will be reliant on people who put their lives at risk. It is simply a means to ensure that marginalized people stay that way. It has nothing to do with the procedure of abortion, the concept of life, nothing. And I think if Republicans could figure out another way to do this and they do, they're doing it through voting, they're doing it through a number of pieces of legislation. You know, it is simply a means of marginalization and, uh, you know, your garden variety, like anti-abortion neighbor thinks it's about babies, but Samuel Alito just knows that it's about keeping people in poverty, keeping people marginalized, keeping people on the fringes of society in a way that prevents them from succeeding and holding power in this country.

Jennie: And all of this is why the story right now is about overturning Roe and the loss of rights and human rights and not the leak. like, I cannot even like, yes, it's important that it is like the first time it ever happened. And we can talk about like, why it happened, whatever, but like the issue and the story is like, what is gonna happen to people who need abortions and what that means, this loss of this real attack on their fundamental human rights.

Caroline: Yeah. And also for what it's worth. You know, I went to law school, I spend a lot of time around lawyers. A lot of my friends are lawyers. And I think that the person who leaked the document should be canonized. I think that we have upheld the Supreme Court to this sort of mythical status. You know, when you're in law school, the concept of the Supreme Court is almost religious. Not almost it is, you know, the way that Supreme Court justices are revered is like cult. Like I would say, you know, it is a very bizarre and insulated institution. I think that for the first time, a lot of people are realizing that this is a political arm of government. This is not, you know, like when you're in law school, you're taught all these different things. Like if you wanna be a Supreme Court justice, you can't be political early in your life. You can't have, you know, open political opinions as you're growing up. And you know, like, I'm sorry, Amy Coney Barrett signed onto a public letter saying that IVF should be, you know, banned because they destroy embryos. Like it is an illusion that the Supreme Court is not a political arm. It is an illusion that they are somehow above accountability, above reproach. And I think this leak, you know, for obviously, the decision itself is much more important, but if we are going to talk about the leak, I think it should be in praise of the fact that it has pierced through this mythical presence of what is essentially just nine people who make decisions like it's, you know, there are so much intrigue and like piousness about the Supreme Court and it always has been this way. And I mean, after Gorsuch and Kavanaugh and Barrett were confirmed, I think it's kind of a joke. I mean, like, I don't think we need to pretend anymore that, you know, when you have an alleged gang rapist sitting next to an accused sexual harasser, Clarence Thomas sitting next to Barrett who couldn't name like constitutional protections... Like I think it's time we maybe drop the act and stop pretending that this leak somehow did harm to this unimpeachable entity. It's a government entity and it deserves accountability and oversight like any like Congress, like the judicial branch, like anything, it's judges are not above reproach. And I think I'm glad I, I, if I met the leaker, I'd buy, 'em a drink. I'm all for it. And I hope I never do because I hope they get to live out their days in complete, you know, anonymous, you know, I hope they are protected. I am glad there was a national security reporter on the story, because I think that that indicates that all the encryption and all the protections are there for them, but I am incredibly proud of that person. And I would assume it was a clerk. And to that, I say, yeah, good make 'em scared.

Jennie: Okay. I think the one other thing that's worth touching on, like as if this whole scale attack on abortion rights is not enough, this is gonna have broader implications to a bunch of other rights as well. Right?

Caroline: Mm-hmm absolutely. And I think I wanna preface it by saying too, that I think that is incredibly important. I am seeing a lot of folks and Biden did this when he talked, was it yesterday? You know, I don't , you know, talking about this, isn't just about abortion. This is about birth control. This is about this and this… and that is true. And we'll, you know, I'm, I'll talk to that, but, but like abortion is enough, right? Like even if this stopped with abortion, I, I, I hate that people are, I think it's important to say, this is how many things this is going to impact. So people wake up and realize that this has never been about abortion. It has been about, like I said, marginalizing people. What I don't appreciate is the idea that we have to tie this decision to issues, to make it more palatable for people to make people be like, well, I don't care about abortion, but I do care about X, Y, Z. Yeah. And I think that, that is how we got here is the apologetic tone that even liberals and progressives take when they talk about abortion, like, well, it's not just about abortion, it's about this and this and this. And that can be true, but if it was not true, what, what would you be saying?

Jennie: Right.

Caroline: Like, would you still be saying, we need to focus on this. Like, we don't always need to couch conversations about abortion in what else, these laws, you know, what other kinds of issues these laws create because the abortion issue itself is worthy of, you know, all of the outrage. I do think it is important and critical to connect those dots, to make the point that for conservatives, this is not about abortion for us. It should be about abortion at this moment, because that is the right that we're losing. But for conservatives, I think it is important to point out that this was never just about abortion. This was always about using abortion because they have created this narrative that it's salacious, that is contentious, that it is the taking of a life, all this other stuff that they have fabricated about what is essentially a medical procedure. They have used abortion as a conduit to get their way with other rights, gay marriage, trans rights, voting rights, birth control, all of these things will be on the table. And I think, you know, it's interesting because when Roe was decided, it created the right to abortion as part of the right to privacy under the constitution. And for a while, Ruth Bader Ginsburg was very critical of the Roe decision because she felt, and I have always agreed, that couching the right to abortion in the right to privacy is very tenuous because of what we're seeing right now. She said that the right to abortion should be instead placed in gender equity. Right. Which I think probably would've, I don't, I don't have the legal pros to identify what would've happened. If that would be the case at this moment, I'm sure Alito would've found a way to overturn that too. But I think that, you know, there is a lot to be said about just sort of the way that the law is just kind of nebulous and the way that we have given these nine people, the ability to just sort of manipulate it and play with it however they see fit. And I think to that point, yeah, we do need to consider that if we let them get away with this on abortion, if Congress lets them get away with it, which they're really, unfortunately, one of our only hopes right now, which is not promising we are going to see other rights topple. We will absolutely see Obergefell go. We will absolutely see… I mean, a lot of folks are talking about Griswold, which is the birth control case, but I think it's important to say that Griswold only gave birth control access to married couples. It's actually Eisenstadt that gave it to unmarried couples, but we will see Griswold and Eisenstadt outta here. I don't know actually what will happen to Griswold to be completely honest. I think a lot of people are talking about it, but I think I can't see someone like Alito really caring what married people do. I think they're gonna go after single people's access to birth control. Um, but I mean, that's an equal…

Jennie: I think it's gonna be expanding the definition of abortion to get at it versus going after birth control, head on.

Caroline: Mm-hmm, and it'll be IVF, it'll be miscarriage care. I mean, you know, we are going the way of countries like Poland, right? We're just a couple of months ago, a woman died of sepsis because her pregnancy couldn't be ended because her fetus was killing her and they wouldn't terminate her pregnancy because abortion is illegal in Poland, right? That is where we're headed. You know, this is, you know, I do a lot of work at Rewire on connecting the dots between pregnancy loss, infertility and abortion care. And again, the same way as I say here, if it was just about abortion and not about all these other rights, we should care. If it didn't ever touch miscarriage management, pregnancy loss, infertility, it would still be bad. I think if we can pull people into the tent by saying your right is also gonna be an issue here, everybody knows someone who has had an abortion, who has lost a pregnancy, who has utilized in vitro fertilization, who has had a high risk pregnancy. Everybody knows somebody, or they are somebody who's had that. If you've ever had a high-risk pregnancy, if you've ever lost a pregnancy, they're coming for you. If you have, you know, miscarried early on and used mifepristone and misoprostolto complete that miscarriage medically or had a DNC, first of all, you've had an abortion. Second of all, they're coming for you. This is so widespread and conservatives know exactly what they're doing. And they do it with the trans youth bills as well. They latch onto what they know are the most socially…evoke the most visceral reaction from folks, right? That's why they started with later abortion bans. And then they sort of inched up, you know, that's why they're starting with trans rights and young people because they know that they can scare monger about that. And then they're gonna inch up. They always start where they think people will, you know, have the most immediate recoil reaction. And then they expand. And absolutely this is the first domino. And I hate the canary in a coal mine analogy that I've seen people use because abortion's not a canary in a coal mine, like enough, but this is the first of many cases like it, this is the first of massive gutting of civil rights and civil protections. And again, if it was just abortion, if it was stopping with abortion, that would be egregious. It is not because it was never just about abortion for conservatives. And I think Republicans know that. And I think Democrats don't, I think Democrats think that they can piecemeal these rights off, you know, Nancy Pelosi can say, we need anti-abortion Democrats. And Joe can say, I'm personally, pro-life-- no, can't say that anymore. You're either with us or you're not, this, this isn't a game. So yeah. I mean, if you think that we have pro-life quote unquote Democrats in the party, then you also need to understand that we, you know, we're gonna have to accept anti-gay marriage Democrats, and anti-climate change Democrats because it's all the same. They it's, you're either, you either, gut the civil liberties, especially of marginalized people or you don't abortion is not siloed off from this. It is one and the same.

Jennie: That feels like a really good place to, to like wrap up. Except we already got to this part a little bit earlier, but it's always good to end with like actions. So what can the audience do? Like what actions can they take right now?

Caroline: So I think the most important thing folks can do is to put resources, so money, if you've got it time, if you've got it visibility, if you can, to organizations, not national organizations. So not NARAL, not Planned Parenthood…these orgs do important work, but they're gonna be fine right now. I wanna see money to the Abortion Care Network, which supports indie clinics, which already perform the majority of abortions in this country. And increasingly that will become even more the reality as clinics and care shutters around the country. Always, always, always to organizations like Jane’s Due Process, which helps young people in Texas access abortion, and has also started expanding into helping young people in other states, you know, young people are one of those demographics that they've been basically living in a Roe world for a really long time. They need consent from a parent or judge in 30 something, 36 to 37 states to access abortion. So money to Jane’s Due Process, money to the Repro Legal Defense Fund and the Repro Legal hotline, the Repro Legal Defense Fund is the organization that just bailed out Lizelle Herrera in Texas who was arrested for murder when she went to the emergency room after herself managing her abortion, they bailed her out. So if you want to really make sure that the people who are caught in the crossfires of prosecution and our criminal justice system, when these laws do come down, make sure that we have the cash to bail them out. The Repro Legal Defense Fund also does things like ensuring that people have housing, ensuring that their trials have good experts, have the right resources to defend them. You know, I think that is probably one of the most critical parts of this space that we will be needing to bolster moving forward is making sure that the most marginalized people among us. So the people who will be caught up in criminal prosecutions have every single resource they need beyond that. I was talking to someone recently with Jane’s Due Process, and she said that when you're with family, talk about abortion. And I know that that is what everybody says, but one of the things that she touched on that I thought was really incredible was that you don't know, who's sitting at that table with you. If you have a, you know, a niece or nephew or a younger sibling or someone, or even a sister, a friend, someone your own age, and they need an abortion, they need to know who the safe person in the family is. They need to know that, you know, if something happens, they have someone to drive over the state line. They, you know, be loud about it. The best thing anybody can do that is free. That is, you know, you don't need a computer or anything, is talk about it. Don't continue to perpetuate this idea that abortion is a volatile issue, normalize it in your conversations, normalize it in your friend circle. If you are friends with someone who's, anti-abortion deal with that, don't have sex with people who are anti-abortion, which is a personal piece of advice. But yeah, I'd say money to Repro Legal Defense Fund, money to the Abortion Care Network, money to Jane’s Due Process, check out the Shout Your Abortion website. They have so many resources right now on how to obtain and distribute abortion pills. And you know, what doing SMA, self-managed abortion looks like and, you know, making sure folks have the resources to get through that. And I would also say as a little plug, please follow and donate to Rewire News Group, cuz we are really the only news organization that is going to be on the ground, covering this with the, you know, a decade of expertise. We have attorneys on staff who know these issues better than anyone and we're not afraid. You know, I think a lot of news organizations are gonna be afraid. They're not gonna be talking about these. Even if they're covering these issues, nobody's gonna give you the honest, you know, reporting like we are because we always have, and we're ready. And we've been preparing for this moment since the organization started. So that's…

Jennie: That’s who I always turn to and have since I've been working in this field, uh, for so long, we won't talk about it, but for so long, and I will just add on to the, you never know who's at the table part just super quick, unrelated to abortion. But my previous life I was when I was getting ready to move to DC, to go to grad school for work in global environmental policy, I was at a big dinner with my mom and I, there was like assigned seating and I got stuck at a table with a bunch of people I didn't know. And they were asking me what I was doing. And I talked about, you know, going to grad school for whatever. And the, one of the people at the table was the head of a huge roofing company. And he was… harassing isn't quite the word, like gently giving me a hard time about being an environmentalist. And I was really impassioned about talking about like why we needed to care and why we needed to care about forests and then fast forward, like year or two later. And they started a huge green roofing line. And not saying, I take credit for that, but like you never know like where you can like plant seeds. And I am a huge believer in planting seeds that may bloom later when somebody else says the right thing.

Caroline: Mm-hmm. Yeah, absolutely. I think, you know, lead by example, if you've got money, give it to the organizations that are gonna do direct action to the most marginalized people and be loud and proud about it. Abortion is great. It's a social good. It gives people their lives. It's freedom and there's really no nuance to it. Abortion is freedom. Abortion is healthcare. You know, you're either pro medicine and you know, I mean we are having these conversations about appendectomies and tonsillitis now, but it's the same thing.

Jennie: Well, Caroline, I can talk to you forever, but I have to let you get back to your day. Cause like things are crazy right now. So thank you for being here. It was a pleasure talking to you as always.

Caroline: Likewise, thank you so much for having me. It was really, really a pleasure.

Jennie: Okay. Y'all I know that was a lot deep breath. Like we said, this is a long haul. This is gonna be a long fight. Has often said this is a marathon. It is not a sprint. If you need to step away at any point, step away, recharge, regroup and hop right back in. This is gonna be a long haul fight and there are no better people to be in it with than all of you. I am so happy to have all of you involved and so happy to be fighting by your side. So let's keep up the fight. And even though things may look bleak right now, it is not the end. It is just the beginning of this fight. So with that, I will hopefully see you all in two weeks. Hopefully we don't need to have another emergency episode.

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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