Robin Marty Posts

The Georgia Department of Community Health voted 5 to 3, with one abstention, at a meeting last Thursday to approve a new benefit plan that eliminates abortion coverage from the insurance plans of over 650,000 state employees, bypassing a legislature that refused to pass a similar measure during the 2013 legislative session.

The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) has suspended the licenses of three abortion providers since May. The Charlotte Observer reports that the significant increase in closures in 2013 might be an indicator that regulators are becoming “more aggressive” at the same time that debate has raged in the state over an omnibus abortion bill.

Although a heartbeat ban was introduced in the Kansas House in 2013, the bill didn’t make it far. Drafted late in the session and after a massive abortion omnibus was already a near-done deal, the bill received a brief hearing in a house committee but no further action.

The legislation, which bans sex-selective abortions, telemed abortions, and coverage of abortion in the state health insurance exchange and could close many of the state’s abortion clinics, now heads to Republican Gov. Pat McCrory’s desk for his signature.

Just hours after a massive anti-abortion bill was signed into law by Republican Texas Gov. Rick Perry, new legislation was introduced to restrict safe abortion access in the state even further. On Thursday, Rep. Phil King (R-Weatherford) introduced HB 59, a “prohibition on abortion after detection of a fetal heartbeat.”

A roller-coaster reproductive rights battle in North Carolina has taken another turn. SB 353, a piece of legislation originally written as a motorcycle safety bill that was amended to include multiple anti-abortion restrictions, has been sent to the state senate’s rules committee for review.

Because Republican Ohio Gov. John Kasich refused to line-item veto any of the five anti-choice amendments tucked into the massive state budget for the 2014 fiscal year, the most vulnerable Ohioans will likely find themselves with less access to family planning services, health screenings, and abortion providers and undergoing medically unnecessary ultrasounds.

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie has signed the state budget, and for the fifth time the Republican politician has refused the inclusion of additional funding for family planning services. Christie previously vetoed the funding in 2012, in 2011, and twice in 2010.

The campaign promise Republican Gov. Pat McCrory made to the voters of North Carolina—that he would not sign into law any bills regarding abortion—has already fallen to the wayside. The governor said late last week that he will sign SB 132, a new bill that will require health educators to teach seventh-grade students, incorrectly, that abortion is a cause of preterm birth.

Ohio senators successfully passed a two-year budget Thursday filled with anti-choice amendments that could severely restrict access to birth control, accurate medical information, and safe abortion care. Attempts by pro-choice senators to strip some of the most extreme measures from the budget were unsuccessful, and the final version of the budget passed 23-10.

As some red states have become more hostile to abortion and birth control access, becoming reproductive rights “deserts” around the country, activists in some cities have proposed local city council ordinances to regain what anti-choice state laws have taken away.