KY Abortion Rights Activists Ready to Fight Gilead

It's an underground railroad for women barred from basic health care, and with Rapey McLiarFace now on the Supreme Court, it's going to be working overtime.

Think Progress:

Kentucky pro-choice activists have prepared for the day when the court rules against them and makes abortion inaccessible — a possibility the country at large is now reckoning with since Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy announced his retirement last week.

Kentucky’s last remaining abortion clinic is only open right now because a federal judge issued a (final) order in September and blocked the state from revoking EMW Women’s Surgical Center’s license.

“We have a contingency in place,” said Kentucky Health Justice Network’s Marcie Crim ...  if, let’s say, Roe v. Wade is overturned in a post-Kennedy court.

If a person can’t access abortion services in the state, Kentucky Health Justice Network will drive or fly them to where they can get one. They already drive people to Granite City, Illinois — a five hour car ride from Lexington where one abortion clinic recently closed. When Gov. Matt Bevin (R) successfully shut down the Lexington abortion clinic in January 2017, requests for her group’s services had “gone through the roof,” said Crim. They also drive people to Chicago, Illinois, Baltimore, Maryland, and Washington, D.C. for the procedure.

In May 2018 alone, the grassroots abortion fund helped 78 people get the procedure. Activists drove 45 people to nearby clinics or gave them a gas credit card. They also paid for 33 people’s abortion services because insurance wouldn’t cover it under state law restricting coverage; for a handful of those people, they also provided child care and lodging because Kentucky requires that a pregnant person wait at least 24 hours after mandatory counseling to get an abortion, thus turning an hours-long procedure into a two day event. 

The contingency plan works for a hobbled or vanished Roe. The latter is a real concern since Kentucky lawmakers have made it clear that they’ll ban abortion to the maximum extent allowed under the Supreme Court. If Roe is overturned, Kentucky Health Justice Network will need to hire more than the 60 volunteers they currently staff or have them work overtime. It means they’ll need more people to donate money. It might mean having to turn people away. And for Kentuckians who need the procedure, it means a lot of hard choices. 

Thanks to the Kentucky Health Justice Network, one of the choices does not have to be an illegal, back-alley abortion likely to kill the woman.  Support their work or ask for help here.