Let's Get Proactive About Expanding Abortion Access!

Note: This episode was recorded before the Supreme Court agreed to hear Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health, a challenge to Mississippi’s 15-week abortion ban.

While Roe v. Wade may be the law of the land, abortion has always been inaccessible and a right on paper only for so many in the United States. Since the passage of Roe, there have been 1,200 abortion restrictions enacted, with 2021 on track to be one of the worst years for abortion restrictions. Jamille Fields-Allsbrook, Director of Women’s Health and Rights at the Center for American Progress and Nora Ellmann, Research Associate for Women’s Health and Rights at the Center for American Progress, sit down to talk with us about what actions need to be taken to ensure a proactive abortion agenda for the U.S. from their report, A Proactive Abortion Agenda: Federal and State Policies To Protect and Expand Access.

First and foremost, the comprehensive right to abortion, without restriction and without political interference, must be codified at the legislative level. Championing laws like the Women’s Health Protection Act would help block many of these restrictions, such as 20-week bans and targeted regulation of abortion provider (TRAP) laws. Financial support for abortion access is also critical; passage of the Equal Access to Abortion Coverage in Health Insurance (EACH) Act would permanently repeal the Hyde Amendment and prohibits political interference with decisions by private insurance companies to cover abortion. Individual states can repeal harmful legislation and pass proactively progressive legislation to expand access to medication abortion, decriminalize self-managed abortion, and remove restrictions on physicians.  

At the executive level, it’s important that they select judicial nominees that are diverse and have backgrounds in civil rights, reproductive rights, and abortion rights. The President must also have a budget that doesn’t allow for federal funding restrictions, like the Hyde Amendment, on abortion access. Finally, undue regulations on abortion-related insurance billing practices must be repealed. Already, the current administration has increased access to medication abortion during the COVID-19 pandemic. To learn more about this step taken by the Biden administration, listen to our podcast episode here. 

When it comes to the judiciary: we need to pay attention to the courts! Again, it’s critical that judges appointed to all levels of the U.S. court system come from diverse backgrounds and have supportive records for reproductive health, rights, and justice. The courts must continue to uphold precedent and respect abortion as a right that has been established under the Constitution.

Links from this episode

Center for American Progress on Facebook
Center for American Progress on Twitter
Center for American Progress’ Proactive Abortion Agenda
Center for American Progress’ State Actions Undermining Abortion Rights in 2020
More information on the Women’s Health Protection Act
More information on the EACH Act

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 this week I want to stop and take a minute and give a great big congratulations and happy anniversary to my parents. Y'all, they have been married 50 years on Saturday. It was their 50th wedding anniversary. And I personally cannot wrap my head around being married to somebody for 50 years. That just seems wild. So, it is very exciting and nice to see them celebrate their 50th anniversary. They were able to take a small trip in Wisconsin and go and get away for a long weekend, which is very nice to see. And hopefully they will be back to traveling the world again soon when it is safe. So happy anniversary, mom and dad. I hope you had a great trip. And, um, mom, tell dad, I said happy anniversary since we know that you're the one that listens with that. I thought we would turn to some good news that happened since our last episode. So, we have done episodes before talking about how the Trump administration was attacking trans rights and had enacted a rule that allowed discrimination based on who people are or who they love within healthcare. So, that meant that doctors could refuse to treat somebody because they were trans or because they were LGBTQ, and the Biden administration have taken the first steps to roll that back. I think that is so important. It is personally, I find very disgusting to think that a doctor would refuse to treat somebody because of who they are, who they love. Everybody should be able to access basic healthcare free from discrimination. So, it is really, um, a hopeful step to see the Biden administration taking the steps to ensure that happens. The administration has also made it clear that they are going to be fighting back on states that are targeting trans rights. So, that is really also very exciting to see. It's really, really troubling to see the ways that trans rights have been under attack in the States right now. And it's really a hopeful sign that to see that the administration is intending to push back on that. I hope we see good things come out of that. And another kind of related news. I think it's also worth mentioning on a much, much smaller scale. You know, one of the things we tried to be really good about on the podcast is having people introduce themselves with their pronouns. It's really important that, you know, you share your pronouns and ask people there's, it is a way to, you know, make sure that we are being as inclusive as possible and in creating an inclusive and respectful environment. So, in that vein, um, Instagram actually just added a new feature where you can add your pronouns. So, if you go to your profile and go to edit your profile, it's one of the fields you can fill out. Now, I think that just goes really, like I said, a long way to de-stigmatizing and creating an inclusive environment around pronouns and pronouns usage. It's such a simple thing to do, but it matters so much to people. So, make sure you are asking pronouns, make sure you are giving yours and let's just make a more inclusive world.

Jennie: With that, let's turn to this week's episode. I'm really excited. We're going to be talking about a proactive abortion agenda, which is super fun. I love that we are getting to talk about good news recently. It's always fun. So this one, we're going to talk about what we need to do to make sure that we are building this world, right. So what actions does the government need to take to create a proactive agenda? So joining me today, I have Jamille Fields-Allsbrook with the Center for American Progress and Nora Ellmann, also from the Center for American Progress here to talk about their report, a Proactive Abortion Agenda: Federal and State Policies to Protect and Expand Access. And you can find links to it in our show notes. And with that, I will take you to my interview with Jamille and Nora.

Jennie: Hi Jamille, hi Nora. Thank you so much for being here today.

Nora: Hello.

Jamille: Hi, Jenny. Thanks so much for having us.

Jennie: So I guess before we get started, let's do quick introductions. So, do you want to each introduce yourself and include your pronouns? I guess we'll start with Jamille.

Jamille: Yeah. Great. So, I am a Jamille Fields-Allsbrook. I am the Director of Women's Health and Rights at the Center for American Progress and my pronouns are she/her/hers.

Nora: And I'm Nora Ellmann. I use she/her pronouns and I'm a Research Associate for Women's Health and Rights at the Center for American Progress.

Jennie: Great. Well, I really excited to have y'all here today because we get to talk about proactive things and instead of just like reacting to all of the terrible things that were happening, like it's exciting to kind of dream about what we can do to make things better.

Nora: It is.

Jamille: Yes. Yes. It was fun to write up this report that we're going to be talking about and to think thinking of in a future visionary world, but also still very practical.

Jennie: Yes. So I guess before we get to like dreaming big and what we need to do, let's start with like, what does access to abortion look like right now before we talk about a proactive abortion agenda?

Jamille: Sure. So I'll kick it off and then turn it over to Nora. But I mean, I think as most of your listeners know, you know, the right to abortion has never been fulfilled for unfortunately too many in this country, particularly among people who live in the South and Midwest, where I'm from, people who are of low-income people of color people with disability, young folks. And so, despite the right to abortion, we've seen since Roe over 1,200 abortion restrictions enacted increasing in number in recent years. In fact, this year we're on track to be one of the worst years for abortion restrictions, unfortunately, and those restrictions have come in the form of coverage bans-- so things where people can't use, whether it's private insurance or public insurance for abortion, it's coming in the form of TRAP laws, which restrict and limit abortion providers’, ability to be open and provide care. It also comes in the form of week-bans and unnecessary counseling restrictions. And, you know, just to add icing on the cake, targeted restrictions, as it relates to fetal diagnosis and race-bans to target certain communities, particularly the disability community, as well as the Asian-American community. So, you know, we have very limited access in certain, certain places. So, while we have a right, unfortunately many people aren't able to access that right.

Nora: Yeah. And I just add, you know, I think in the midst of sort of decades of attacks on abortion rights and access many, I think, have seen the courts as a stop gap in that way. But recently we've really seen this conservative shift in the judiciary at all levels, including of course at the Supreme Court. And so, more than ever, it feels like that stop gap is getting eroded. And, and I'd also say kind of beyond the policy landscape, we also live in a culture that doesn't treat abortion as healthcare, that doesn't value abortion as you know, a part of the full scope of people's reproductive lives. And it's where abortion is highly stigmatized. And so that's the environment where when someone needs to access abortion, they're sort of walking into this, both cultural and policy landscape that's really designed to make it hard for them to access care.

Jamille: Yeah. And one thing can, I could just chime in on something Nora mentioned. I mean, I also think that, you know, just like all things COVID has laid bare our systemic failures, particularly as it relates to abortion access and the healthcare system. And we saw early on in the pandemic states trying to use prohibitions around necessary and essential care to limit and stop abortion access. You also saw with restrictions on travel because there are, many people have to travel in order to get abortion, people were practically limited from being able to go and get their abortions because of the threats of violence and other inhibitions of people going into the field to actually provide abortions. We also have a limited number of abortion providers. And so, you also saw travel restrictions limiting abortion provider’s ability to travel and go provide care. And such as the, if one person sometimes in a region got sick, one abortion provider, that could shut down abortion access for entire region.

Jennie: Yeah, absolutely. That's um, there was so much that the pandemic really made clear and that's one of them, right, is how hard it is to access abortion care and how unnecessary some of this, like in-clinic stuff was like you don't-- for medication abortion, you shouldn't have to make multiple trips to a doctor to access care that is perfectly safe to do via telemedicine.

Nora: Absolutely.

Jennie: Okay. So let's talk about what needs to be done and you all had a number of great recommendations in the report. So, let's do it in buckets because I think that'll be easier versus kind of taking through it one by one. So one of the first buckets I think we should talk about is legislative. So at the federal level, what needs to be done legislatively?

Jamille: Yeah. So, I will start, I mean, there's a lot that could be done legislatively. Well, I'll start with just the right to abortion. So, one of the first things we talk about is this idea of codifying the right to an abortion into federal law and into a federal legislation; and to Nora's point about the courts, right? Like we have right to abortion as guaranteed under the constitution. And it's been interpreted by the courts, but you know, the courts giveth, the court has the authority to taketh away and to limit. And we've seen the courts say “yes, there is an important backstop for decades to the right to abortion.” We've also seen the courts give permission to like chip away at that right. So, which is how we get to the, all the things we just said. And so, for that reason, one of the first things we talk about is codifying a right to an abortion into federal law that is without restrictions and without the ability for government interference and a political interference otherwise. And we also go on to talk about, even that, of course, will not guarantee and give everybody right to abortion access. Uh, and so legislatively, we also talk about passing laws like that, our friends at the Center for Reproductive Rights champion and lead on the Women's Health Protection Act, which would prohibit a lot of these restrictions or TRAP laws and week- bans. And then the last thing I'll mention is also making sure people can afford to access abortion, just like to afford to be able to access any other care. So, at the federal level, that's obviously the EACH Act which would repeal-- permanently repeal the Hyde amendment and guarantee people, whether in Medicaid, federal employees, Peace Corps, and others can be able to use their health insurance in order to pay for abortion, because we all know, you know, those, those first things are great, but it means nothing if you are an aren't going to be able to afford it.

Nora: Yeah. And in addition to all of that, that Jamille mentioned, I'd also say, you know, at the state level, there's a lot that states can do in the absence of federal action or in tandem with federal action. You know, there's this whole host of restrictive laws that Jamille talked about that states can undo as well as pass proactive legislation to expand access to care. So undoing laws that restrict access to medication abortion, whether that's in person via telehealth or self-managed care, things like requirements that only physicians can provide abortion care, that you have to get care in person, laws that criminalize people who self-manage their abortions, as well as TRAP laws, restrictions on physicians, this whole host of laws that we've dug into. So states can undo all of those. They have, they put those laws into action, they can undo those laws. And then we've also seen some great examples of states passing proactive laws like in Virginia, that expand access to who can provide abortion care, allowing advanced practice clinicians, like nurse practitioners and nurse midwives to provide abortion care, things like anti-discrimination protections for providers and laws that protect patient safety and provider safety, expanding access to medication abortion and abortion via tele-health. There's a whole host of things that states can do to kind of compliment, or as we face a reality where maybe federal action is not going to happen right now. Um, there's, there's a lot that can happen. And I'll also say at sort of both the state and federal level, when we're looking at providers and access to care and expanding access, both state and federal legislatures can direct funding to provider training, to anti-racism training and cultural competency training for providers, they can fund community-based providers, abortion funds, doulas, you know, support this sort of whole network of abortion support.

Jamille: Also at the state level. I mean, some of the same things that discussed states have the authority as well to Nora's point to not wait on the federal government. So, states, and some states already do use their own state funds in order to cover abortion beyond the Hyde-permissible abortions. Some states go even further to require private insurers. So whether they're on the ACA marketplaces or not to cover abortion care, some states also have passed, just like Virginia passed last year, its own version of a law that would prohibit these unnecessary abortion restrictions and TRAP laws. So states don't have to wait on the federal government. We would love federal action in order to not leave it at the state discretion, because we know that if we just leave it to states, then you will have the same set of bad actors who will keep on doing bad. And you still have people in the Midwest of the South who will be disproportionately harmed.

Jennie: Yeah. That's, that's such an important point is like this way we're doing it right now means there are people in the country who have much easier access to abortion care and a huge swath of the country that has really terrible access or virtually no access at all.

Nora: Yeah. The reality is we know that wealthy people will always be able to access abortion care, whether or not it's legal and or accessible. And, and the people who are harmed are the people who experienced the most systemic oppression and discrimination in all parts of this country. And, you know, that's people of color, that's trans and non-binary people, it's young people, it's immigrants, it's people with disabilities.

Jamille: Yeah. And there was a, um, an article that came out in the New York Times some years back that talked about how nearly 11 million people live in counties, where they have to drive an hour or more in order to access an abortion provider. And so I imagine there might be some people who listen and say, “well, you know, if you just need an abortion, you, everybody, you could, everyone can, you can go find one.” And that's just not the reality for everyone.

Jennie: Yeah. For sure. Where I grew up, like I would have had to have driven an hour to go to Madison to access a Planned Parenthood. I don't know what the next closest one would have been.

Jamille: Yeah. And where I grew up in St. Louis in Missouri [which has] become notoriously bad around this… well always was, but really, as of late, I remember even when I started off working in health policy there, I literally thought that your, private insurance could not cover abortion. Like I thought that was some sort of federal ban on it. And I was like, and then it took me to like, get out of Missouri. It's about no, it's Missouri! And it’s not just Missouri, it's a state level restriction to prohibit private insurance coverage of abortion. And there is no federal prohibition against that. We can talk about some of the federal barriers, but no federal prohibition gets private insurance.

Jennie: So, let's move on to the next kind of bucket of actions that can be taken. And that's at the executive level.

Jamille: Yeah. So again, I'll start. So, you know, one, just picking up where the same order I was talking about before, which is that around the right to an abortion. So, you know, as I talked about before, I think that we need some of those proactive laws. We need the codification of abortion. We also need laws to prohibit these abortion restrictions, but all of that inevitably end up before a court. I mean, we just know that because we know the nature of our work. And so one, we need nominations. We need federal, uh, nominations to the bench that have… are racially and ethnically diverse that have a professional diversity and also other forms of diversity, LGBTQ folks, people with disabilities, and so forth. Because right now what we have and the Trump administration only exacerbated an existing problem, which is to have a judiciary that is, you know, disproportionately white and also with backgrounds coming from federal prosecutors. Oh, and corporate attorneys. And we don't have people who have civil rights backgrounds. So right now, we have no, you know, no one on the Supreme Court and many, not in the appellate bench that have a civil rights background. And so, we need the executive…so we need the President to nominate people with backgrounds that are civil rights and backgrounds specifically in reproductive rights and abortion rights. In our report, we talk about, you know, the ACLU, you have the Center for Reproductive Rights, are great litigators who've been doing this work. We need some of our own also to be nominated to the bench because we know all these laws will come up before them. So, then the other thing that I think the executive could do is one, uh, we, we hope to see, and this would be a quick test, we'll see that around a clean budget. Um, the President's budget can set a great tone for Congress. If the President has a budget that is free of abortion restrictions, like Hyde-like restrictions and other funding restrictions that limit, um, federal funding around abortion access, I think that would send an important signal. And then the last one I'll mention, and it's a little bit of a wonky one so digress with me a minute, but that relates to private insurance. So, as I said, there was no federal prohibition against private insurance coverage of abortion, but there is this law and this regulation that was promulgated under the Trump administration that creates these additional administrative barriers around abortion restrictions-- in short requiring insurers to send two bills, one for abortion coverage and one for all other health benefits that you might get through the marketplace. So you might get a bill, you open it up, you got a dollar bill for abortion and, you know, $99 or whatever your health premium is for everything else. We think that is unduly burdensome, that that will lead to insurers dropping abortion coverage. And also, just people getting confused and like, I didn't have an abortion, so I didn't pay that dollar. And so, we are looking for hopefully in short order, the Biden administration to rescind those regulations and rules, because remember just because Trump is gone, his legacy and regulations are not necessarily gone.

Jennie: And there are so many that I literally forgot about that one.

Nora: In addition to all those things Jamille mentioned, I think one area where the administration can be particularly effective is around expanding access to medication abortion. And we've already seen some movement on this, which is great, where the FDA announced that they would not be enforcing the requirement that people pick up medication, abortion in person during the pandemic. And most recently they announced that they're going to do a full review of the restrictions on medication abortion that include those in-person restrictions, but also additional barriers like limiting the providers who can even dispense medication abortion. And so that's really promising movement. And we feel that those restrictions-- not we feel-- there's a, a record of evidence that shows that those restrictions are medically unnecessary and that medication abortion is safe and can be safely used an accessed in person, but also at home and can be safely self-managed if people have access to the right information and support. And so on that note, you know, there are a number of states that currently criminalize people who self-manage abortions, whether explicitly criminalizing self-managed abortion, or using other laws on the books to target people who they suspect of criminalizing. So that can even include if you have a miscarriage. And there are steps that the administration can take to limit that criminalization, the Department of Justice can issue guidance that no one should be criminalized for their pregnancy outcomes. And the Department of Health and Human Services can also issue guidance on safe use of medication abortion, and how to safely self-manage an abortion, which will also be a huge step in sort of integrating abortion as part of healthcare. And as part of the purview of the administrative agency responsible for the health of the, of the people in this country and, um, you know, ensuring that abortion and making sure that people have the resources and the information they need is part of what we value as the health information and access that people need.

Jennie: Yeah. And I feel like it's also worth flagging around self-managed abortion and restrictions around it is that it's one of those again, where you definitely see disparities in who gets prosecuted for it.

Nora: For sure.

Jennie: And again, it's going to be race, income, people who are already oppressed, who are much more likely to then face prosecution for pregnancy outcomes.

Nora: Absolutely.

Jennie: Okay. So that's legislative and things that the executive branch can do. So, the last big bucket is judiciary, and we know that that's going to be a big group that i going to have a lot of say in the next coming years, especially after the Trump administration adding a ton of new judges. So, what actions do we need to see around the judiciary?

Jamille: Sure. So, I think one, I am happy for that question because I was on a panel earlier this week. “Why courts matter” panel, we were talking about how, you know, progressives haven't always paid attention to the judiciary, why conservatives have long recognized that judiciary is important. And again, you know, as you talked about like the Trump, and as I alluded to earlier, the Trump administration was able to appoint a record number of judges, not just to the Supreme Court, not just with three Supreme Court seats, which is already bad enough, but also with appointing people at the federal level as well, and the federal branch. And so, one, I think first people just need to, we need to pay attention to the courts, right? Like we need to pay attention when nominations come up, we need to just pay attention to legislation, just like we go out and march about, uh, and hold up our signs about some bad piece of legislation. We also need to pay more attention to what's going on with the judiciary. And to that end I’ll repeat what I said before, which is that, you know, the President needs to appoint judges who have a robust background, both professionally, but also racially, ethnically diverse, diverse with disability status, diverse in their gender identity and sexual orientation. And I think it's important for also people to pay attention to those lower court seats and who was getting appointed. I think we pay attention when the Supreme Court comes up to some extent, but not to the judiciary. But the thing I remember doing that Amy Coney Barrett nomination. So, you know, she, would've never made it to the Supreme Court if she couldn't make it to the appellate bench first. And so, you know, we should, we had to have a backstop there as well, and then going even further down, and this relates to Nora's last point about like criminalization. We also pay attention to our state courts, right? As well, some state judges are appointed, some are elected. And so, it will depend on your state of where you're at and how they get on the bench. You know, elections obviously vote, pay attention to that, but also the same way we're talking about the President being responsible and making, looking at the background in terms of racial and ethnic diversity, and professional diversity, we also need governors who have the authority to point their judges to also do the same thing as well. And then if those judges are elected and then they're not doing what we think they should do, that you need to pay attention when they come up for reelection. And some of those state judges will be the ones who will enforce things like Nora talked about around criminalization of pregnancy and other things. Nora: Yeah. And within the courts themselves, you know, we need the courts to uphold precedent and, and to respect that the right to abortion is established under our constitution and, and not allow these laws that both are attempting to outright overturn that right but also that chip away at it. And we've seen the courts allow so many of those laws to go into effect. And that is why we have such a patchwork of access to abortion right now. And so, you know, the antis are creative and they are writing and passing laws that are designed to attack abortion rights from every turn, from sort of these extreme bans that are meant to directly challenge Roe to also trying to chip away at who can bring challenges to abortion restrictions and, you know, allowing some limits to be placed on who can access and in what you can access abortion care. And so, we need the courts to recognize that those things also place burdens on people's access to abortion care and are creating a situation where the right to abortion as established under our constitution is not a reality for so many people in the country. And we need the courts to not allow for those restrictions to go into effect.

Jennie: Yeah. That is so many things that need to happen. And I'm sure our audience may be feeling a little overwhelmed because there is so much that needs to happen. So, what, what actions can the audience take? How can they help with this? What can they do?

Jamille: Yeah. You know, I think people should recognize that one, yes, there is a lot, that has happened that we think we say this line at the beginning of our report, that this is a visionary roadmap, but it's also very practical and real. And I think I, as a principal, who's worked in repro for quite a bit, we'll say, you know, sometimes we can feel a little bit defeated and that all we can do is be on the defense, which is important of course, but these things are real and that they can happen. So, I think first is just a mindset adjustment to know that we, even in the environment, even when it's friendly, it's not always that friendly to us. And that just is what it is. And we keep fighting anyway. So, I think that as far as that, I think, you know, paying attention to some of the pieces of legislation we talked about and seeing if you're paying attention to what's happening in Congress and educating your members of Congress, I'll say it that way, about some of these laws and policies that should get advanced is another. And I do think, you know, donating to your local advocates who do this sort of work and on-the-ground folks who are doing incredible work; part of the reason we wanted to do this report was not just to uplifted and spout out a bunch of ideas that we have-- and to be clear, we didn't come up with all of these ideas, even the ones we just mentioned-- was to also highlight the important work that people are doing on the ground. So, in the report we highlight, you know, our friends at All Above All, we highlight our friends at URGE, we highlight the Blueprint, which represent over 90, um, 90 organizations. And we also highlight some abortion funds including out of New York. And so, I think donating to those folks, because a lot of the things we talked about, either these groups have championed or have already made happen. So, for instance, one of the things we highlight there is how the National Institute for Reproductive Health was able to build a champion, a campaign, to get New York City, to provide city funds to its abortion fund and to help close some of the gaps. So, all to say, there are proactive, beautiful things happening out there, fund and support the people who are making them happen.

Nora: And I, there's also so much work that all of us can do around this sort of culture shift piece as well. And building a world that values abortion and values, the people who have abortions and shifting our mindset to that reproductive justice frame that sees abortion as part of the full scope of reproductive decisions we make in our lives, including having children or not having children, having abortions, being able to raise our children in safe communities and positioning abortion as part of that broader reproductive health and justice landscape, but also part of the broader system of healthcare. And there's so much de-stigmatizing work that we can all do. And sort of not being afraid to talk about abortion, to say the word “abortion” and to support, as Jamille said, all those people doing this work already, including within our communities, like abortion funds who play such an important role in helping people access care in the absence of government support, people can get engaged in advocacy, work in abortion work. And yeah, I just want to, I know Jamille said it already, but just want to emphasize that, you know, any of this sort of positive movement that we have seen from the Biden administration or the proactive laws that we have seen get passed in some states is the result of so much work that folks on the ground and the advocates and grassroots organizers have done. And so, you know, we're seeing movement and that's so exciting and that's just a real credit to the work that folks have done and are continuing to do. And I think having this hope and having this proactive vision as we approach the work is so important to sustain ourselves in this work. Um, and that was also part of why it was such a kind of joy to be able to write this report.

Jennie: Yeah. And that makes me think of like, thinking like even during the presidential campaign and being able to see, you know, Biden originally wasn't for repealing Hyde and all the reproductive groups really like were like bright red line no-go and you saw, you know, leadership of All Above All, really pushing this and sparking this feedback to be able to get them to say, at least while he was running, that he supports repealing Hyde. And hopefully we will see that in the budget.

Jamille: And actually, I'm glad you brought that up because I think for those who might not maybe have good new to the issue or newly around that, the Hyde example is a perfect one to give us hope and motivation to keep pushing forward. Even for some of these things where we think, oh, that's not gonna happen. Like, you know, we have to always push the boulder up the hill. I remember when I first started working in repros, I mean, even those who were friendly and I'm using air quotes for those who can’t see me, friendly to our cause you couldn't get people to talk about repealing the Hyde amendment. And it wasn't until 2016 that we saw at first in the DNC platform, you know, about repealing Hyde and you know, and we just last year had a hearing on it. And this year we saw introduced in both the House and the Senate. And so it is…you see a progressively each year we get closer and closer to this thing happening and will happen. And I think that should be the same way we think about all of these things we've talked about. I mean, some things we need, we need to happen right now. Like we need a clean budget. We need to rescind these private insurance restrictions… and then we need it all right now, but I'm just, you know, there's hope, but there is hope. And that we, that even if we are, you feel like you're out that marching or I volunteered and I've been doing the same thing forever, but we actually are, you know, getting closer and gettingwins even in a hostile sometimes environment.

Jennie: I think that's a good note to end on-- hope. Hope is always good to end on. Jamille, Nora, thank you so much for being here is always a pleasure to talk to y'all. Um, so thank you.

Nora: Thank you, Jennie.

Jamille: Thank you.

Jennie: Okay, everybody. I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Jamille and Nora. You can see the report at, on CAP’s website, it's called a Proactive Abortion Agenda. We will also have links to it in our show notes that you can easily see it and read their full list of recommendations. Like I said, they have a lot of great recommendations. We just tried to put things into buckets instead of talking about all of them, one by one, but it's really important to see everything that they are recommending. And with that, I will see you all in two weeks.

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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