Janine Jackson interviewed NARAL’s Taryn Abbassian about one year post Dobbs for the June 30, 2023, episode of CounterSpin, which also included archival interviews on the forced-birth ruling. This is a lightly edited transcript.
Janine Jackson: The Supreme Court has just, as we record, dismantled affirmative action in college admissions, part of a concerted right-wing campaign to sabotage multiracial democracy. We will certainly talk about that going forward.
The US public’s belief in and support for the Supreme Court has plummeted with the appointment of hyper-partisan justices whose unwillingness to answer basic questions, or answer them respectfully, would make them unqualified to work at many a Wendy’s, and the obviously outcome-determinative nature of their jurisprudence.
Key to that drop in public support was last year’s Dobbs ruling, overturning something Americans overwhelmingly support, and had come to see as a fundamental right: that of people to make their own decisions about when or whether to carry a pregnancy or to have a child. The impacts of that ruling are still reverberating, as is the organized pushback that we can learn about and support. We’ll hear from Taryn Abbassian, associate research director at NARAL.
Also on the show: Meaningful, lasting response to the Dobbs ruling requires more than “vote blue no matter who,” but actually understanding and addressing the differences and disparities of abortion rights and access before Dobbs, which requires an expansive understanding of reproductive justice. CounterSpin has listened many times over the years to advocates and authors working on this issue. We’ll hear a little today from FAIR’s Julie Hollar; from Kimberly Inez McGuire, executive director of the group URGE: Unite for Reproductive and Gender Equity; and from URGE’s policy director, Preston Mitchum.
That’s coming up this week on CounterSpin, brought to you each week by the media watch group FAIR.
***
It’s been a year since the Supreme Court overturned federal abortion protections, and the avalanche of consequences is still growing.
They include, of course, restricting people’s access to abortion—some 20 states have passed either bans or very restrictive policies—but also hampering the ability to access a range of pregnancy-related and general healthcare.
One professor of health law was quoted saying, “It’s like somebody dropped a nuclear bomb into public health.”
The ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization was anticipated, but that doesn’t necessarily mean we were ready. So what have folks been doing, and what needs to be done to address its devastating effects? And what role can media play?
We’re joined now by Taryn Abbassian, associate research director at NARAL. Welcome to CounterSpin, Taryn Abbassian.
Taryn Abbassian: Thank you so much for having me.
JJ: Most people will have a general sense, but, as always, things look different depending where you are and who you are. So if you’re trying to explain the impacts of the Dobbs ruling—expected, unexpected—where do you even start?
TA: As you alluded to, a lot of this isn’t unexpected. We anticipated this happening, and unfortunately a lot of the things we were worried about, we are seeing play out.
You mentioned that 20 states have already eliminated and restricted access to abortion. Folks are being forced to travel hundreds of miles, in some cases, when they’re pushed completely out of their reach in their states.
And there’s just all kinds of instances in the news that we’re hearing about horrific situations that folks who are trying to access care are having to experience.
And again, it’s just like you said, it was not a surprise, but we are facing the realities of that every day, and countless stories about how pregnant people are being denied abortion access, and being denied lifesaving care in the case of miscarriages and all sorts of medical complications.
And it’s devastating, but we as always at NARAL are working really hard to push back and do what we can in the wake of the decision. And we’ve just had the one-year anniversary, and we haven’t stopped working since that decision was handed down last year, both in the states and at the federal level, and just doing what we can, organizing and trying to get folks tuned in and working together to hold the line and protect the access we can, and expand it in the places where we can expand it.
JJ: People are changing decisions about where they’re going to live, about where they’re going to go to college or where they’re going to practice medicine. I’m not sure that everyone really understood how deep and wide this was going to be.
TA: Yes, of course. We just saw some polling recently that tons of young people, and we know young people are with us more than ever, and young people are our strongest cohort of support, and they’re making these big decisions about where they’re going to live, where they’re going to study, where they’re going to take their lives as adults, and they’re having to think about these things that, a generation ago, they weren’t having to think about.
And it’s very disappointing, but it also, again, as you mentioned, it’s a bright spot, they’re making these considerations. Young folks are tuned in, they’re paying attention to this, they know about the impact that this is having on their lives, and they’re deciding accordingly.
We obviously wish they weren’t having to have these forced choices and difficult decisions around just access to basic medical care. But we know folks are engaged, and are doing what they can to mitigate the effects of the decision last year.
JJ: We know that a right is meaningless if you can’t exercise it, which is why we’ve always distinguished between the right to abortion and abortion access. And we know that there were problems even before Dobbs. People on public assistance, for example, Roe was not meaningful to them. So lifting up those disparities, including racial disparities, geographic, economic—it seems more important now than ever.
Taryn Abbassian: “When you put it to the voters, when you ask folks whether they want to protect reproductive freedom, they resoundingly say yes.”
TA: Yes. And, again, I think abortion gets put in this hole of being a very political issue, and it’s politicized unlike any kind of other medical care. And what we like to talk about at NARAL, and focus on in our work, is that we want to talk about the people. We want to talk about the human beings that are being affected by this lack of access.
We want to center the folks that are most impacted: Women of color and low-income women, and folks that already have a hard time accessing care, are the ones that are going to be disproportionately affected by this, and we want to center those voices and center those sorts of stories as we try to push back on what’s happening, and the harm that this decision is causing, day in and day out.
JJ: I want to talk about responsive federal policy, but let me just draw you out a little bit about the state level; what’s happening there? I saw a quote from a nurse practitioner in Pennsylvania, who said, “There’s always a temptation to go somewhere that’s going to be idyllic”—”idyllic,” but you know—but “Pennsylvania needs people like us who care enough to stay here and fight.” And there is pushback at the state level, isn’t there?
TA: Of course. And I think we saw that right out the gate after the Dobbs decision; we saw in Kansas an overwhelming show of support for abortion access, abortion rights, reproductive freedom.
And we’re seeing that, even though there’s a lot of states right now moving to restrict or eliminate access, there are a lot of states that are doing a lot of great, proactive work to try to make sure abortion access and reproductive freedom is accessible to folks.
And so what we’ve seen over and over again, in red states and purple states and obviously in blue states, that when voters are asked directly about abortion, how they feel about it, what they want to do in terms of protecting it, overwhelmingly, huge majorities vote in favor of abortion access and reproductive freedom.
We see that every time, almost every battle we’ve had since the Dobbs decision, when we’ve asked voters directly about where they stand on abortion, it’s in favor of more access, broader freedom.
So, unfortunately, our opposition knows this, and we see in a lot of places where we’re seeing ballot initiative thresholds changing, and things like that.
They know that when voters are being asked to give their input and voice their opinions about abortion, they know it’s popular. And so instead of just allowing the will of voters to stand, a lot of folks are pushing to change rules in some of these states. And we’re fighting back and fighting against those changes as well.
So it’s a lot of battles happening in a lot of different states, but we’ve seen time and time again, when you put it to the voters, when you ask folks whether they want to protect reproductive freedom, they resoundingly say yes.
JJ: And have for many years. That leads to the next question: Do we need a federal response, or what role could that play vis-a-vis state policy?
Vanity Fair (6/23/23)
TA: Certainly federal response would be great. We have great allies in President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris. We endorsed them just last week, and they’ve been a huge ally to us and real fighters for reproductive freedom.
Of course, we’d love to see some sort of federal protection and codification of Roe, and we really need a pro–reproductive freedom Congress to do that.
And so again, a lot of the work we do is in organizing, it’s in getting out the vote, it’s in motivating young people and talking to folks about the stakes so that they know how important it is, and that their votes make a difference when it comes to this stuff. So certainly federal protections would be great.
We’ve already seen Republicans, they claim that they would leave this to be a state issue, they’re already working to put in place federal bans, and talking about that, and using that as a litmus test for their 2024 candidates.
So certainly that would be ideal. And we need to put in the work to build a Congress that can deliver that, because that ultimately is to make sure that it’s not going to be dependent on what state you live in, or what state you’re nearby, to be able to access care. We want folks around the country to have the medical care that they need.
JJ: Absolutely.
TA: The GOP is using all the tools at their disposal, and we need to do the same.
JJ: That brings me to the question about media, because I think reporting sometimes gives us a picture of a “divided country.” The New York Times last year said Dobbs was plunging the country “back into the contentious debate over abortion,” but as you’ve just said, it’s not like half the country supports abortion rights and half opposes it.
But media sometimes get into this kind of both-sidesing. And I wonder what you think would be—you’ve talked about centering human beings, which I think is the key, but are there other things or thoughts that you have about what media could stop doing, or could start doing?
Gallup (6/14/23)
TA: Yeah. As you’ve alluded to, the media play a really fundamental role in this discussion about abortion care, and we’re thrilled that more folks than ever are talking about it and engaging in this since the Dobbs decision.
But as you said, it’s not a 50/50 issue. I think unlike any other part of healthcare, medical care, it’s presented as this political, divisive, 50/50 issue, when we know it’s not the case. And we know over and over again, based on public research and polling and our own internal research, that the majority is with us.
Eight in ten Americans consistently show that they are supportive of reproductive freedom and abortion access. And we know this, and the anti-abortion movement can say whatever they want about the support that they have, or the fact that this is a really divisive issue, but we know it’s not.
We don’t want the coverage being driven by the politicians and the talking points of this side and that side divisiveness. It’s about the people that are being impacted by this.
And, ultimately, we want to remind people that this is a healthcare issue. It’s a medical issue. Folks should be free, no matter where they live, to make these really important decisions about pregnancy and about parenthood and all sorts of things with their loved ones and with their doctors.
It should not be this political battle where politicians get to weigh in on it, especially given how we see, over and over again, that it’s unpopular: Folks don’t want politicians making those decisions.
JJ: And I’ll just say, finally, I was talking to Jessica Mason Pieklo last July about Dobbs, and she was saying it’s a different kind of ruling in terms of reproductive rights, that it’s more outcome-determinative.
And so it requires a different kind of approach, in a way, that it needs really a full-force fight. It’s not necessarily—obviously, legal issues are important, but at the same time, we recognize something bigger happening here.
TA: Yeah, of course. And, again, like you said, the media play a huge role. We of course love that there’s a lot of discussion around this issue, and there’s more chatter about it than ever before. But we also know that some of this charged rhetoric is not helpful.
And what it really comes down to is that the voices of people being affected are what’s important, and not the opinions of politicians who are trying to divide us on this topic.
JJ: All right then. We’ve been speaking with Taryn Abbassian, associate research director at NARAL. Their work is online at ProChoiceAmerica.org. Taryn Abbassian, thank you so much for joining us this week on CounterSpin.
TA: Thank you so much. It was great to be with you.
***
JJ: The overturn of Roe v. Wade was expected. Here’s a bit of our conversation with veteran reporter Jessica Mason Pieklo from Rewire News Group, July of last year.
Jessica Mason Pieklo: “For the conservative legal movement…it doesn’t matter what the law says. They will find the outcome that they are looking for, and work the law backwards to make it fit.”
Jessica Mason Pieklo: Within the legal movement, both the conservative and progressive legal movements, prior to the Dobbs decision, really since Planned Parenthood v. Casey, there was, in the courts, a more honest debate over what the state could or could not do, in terms of regulating pregnancy and childbirth and those outcomes.
And that was under the Planned Parenthood v. Casey framework. That was the great abortion compromise that the Supreme Court came up with as a way to save Roe and settle this debate, so to speak, for the ages.
And what happened as a result of the political campaign to take over the courts, and to really move this issue away from the will of the people and into a minoritarian space, is that the Dobbs decision is a perfect reflection of that. It cherry-picks history, it cherry-picks the law, and it really just comes to a conclusion that was predetermined by Sam Alito and the other conservative justices on the court.
And I think that’s the one thing that I really hope folks understand, that is really different with this iteration of the Roberts Court, and what we will see amplified moving forward, is that for the conservative legal movement, it is outcome-determinative. So it doesn’t matter what the law says. They will find the outcome that they are looking for, and work the law backwards to make it fit.
JJ: Well, that seems seismic, and something that we would hope that journalism would recognize, and not simply try to stuff this new reality into an old framework. And I wonder what you as a reporter make of the way—and I know it’s all in medias res; they’re trying to figure it out, as we all are—but what do you make of the way media are addressing…. What you’re saying is, this is not the same. We have to address this differently. Are media rising to that challenge?
JMP: There are fits and starts. I think that, along with the general public, there is an understanding within more mainstream and Beltway media that the institutions are failing in this moment, whether it’s the political leadership, whether it’s our institutions like the Supreme Court, they are failing.
And our entire democratic experiment in this country is at risk right now. And my concern is that that realization is starting to dawn a little too late for folks who really have the ability to do something about it.
But I do remain hopeful that folks are seeing the moment for what it is. I think the shift that we saw in some of the conversation around the court when the Dobbs opinion was leaked in May—and then the follow-up opinion actually being released and not changing substantively at all—I think what’s been really interesting to see is how how the leak happened, and then the final opinion came out and there weren’t really any changes, even some of the most egregious parts of the opinion that media latched onto, about a steady domestic supply of infants, for example, that’s still in the final opinion, right?
So I think as the dust settles and truly how extreme the reality is, I do think they’re starting to latch onto it.
I worry, though, that media has ingrained habits. And that is one of the areas where, in three months from the Dobbs decision and in six months from the Dobbs decision, I’m concerned that journalists who don’t cover this issue and the Supreme Court on the regular will fall back into habits that they know, just because that’s what we all do as humans, right? We just fall into our old habits.
I’m concerned that we’ll see that in the media as well, and a return to treating abortion as a political issue to be resolved in statehouses and in Congress, as opposed to a human rights crisis that is unfolding in this country right now.
***
JJ: In May 2022, CounterSpin spoke with FAIR senior analyst and managing editor Julie Hollar in the wake of the advance leak of the Dobbs ruling, when elite media were evincing some strange priorities about the impact of this monumental change.
Julie Hollar: “When the right was ramping up state-level campaigns, and laws to restrict abortion access…we saw a sharp drop-off in national media coverage of abortion.”
Julie Hollar: I think you have to ask what’s the priority here for the corporate media in their coverage. And if you look, the day that this leak happens, it’s obviously front-page news. It’s at the top of the nightly newscasts. And, yes, they talk about what’s the impact going to be for people in this country, but the priority here, the top of the show, the first story that they tell, is about the leak itself, who might’ve done this, what is the impact on the Supreme Court, the relationships between the justices and their clerks. That’s story No. 1.
And then story No. 2 asks, what are the consequences for others? But even there, when you watch the nightly newscasts, it wasn’t exactly, “What’s the impact on people who might get pregnant?” It’s: “What is the impact on the clinics who serve them? What is the impact on the pro-choice and the anti-choice movements?” I didn’t see the people themselves who would be most impacted getting interviewed on these shows.
So I think, yes, there is some coverage of that impact. It is downplayed, and it is sandwiched in between all of these other stories that are distracting attention from what is really the heart of what’s going on here.
JJ: And then even a finding within a finding, I thought it was interesting in the piece that you wrote about the initial coverage of this leaked ruling, that one place when the question was asked, what’s going to happen to, they said to the women, many of them low-income, who every year get abortions in states like Mississippi, Texas, places like that—the one time that was asked, it was asked of the leader of an anti-choice group.
JH: Exactly, who gave a very reassuring answer: “Oh, we will step up our efforts to take care of those people, and make sure the outcomes are good.”
Well, you know what, that’s not a satisfactory answer, because that’s not what’s going to happen. You know, there could be some “stepping up,” and what’s really going to happen is, all of the research has shown, that there will be more people dying, there will be greater poverty. There will be worse health outcomes all across the board for people.
JJ: I think that we have seen news media acknowledging that an overturning of Roe v. Wade will launch myriad other efforts at the state level. They talk about these “trigger bills,” but at the same time, these things didn’t come out of nowhere, they’ve been building for years. And when you looked last year at coverage of these state campaigns, it seemed like media were not acknowledging them appropriately as they were brewing.
JH: Not at all, not at all. The first four-and-a-half months of last year, there were hundreds of state-level restrictions introduced in state legislatures. Many of them passed, and the national media just simply ignored them, for the most part. You got a few mentions here or there, very short, nothing in depth. Nothing at all that gave a sense of the scale of what was going on.
And it’s not just last year. I feel like I’ve been writing this article since I started at FAIR, which was quite some time ago. I wrote this article 10 years ago, when the right was ramping up state-level campaigns, and laws to restrict abortion access. And we saw a sharp drop-off in national media coverage of abortion exactly when these things are happening.
So the media will pay attention when there’s a huge blockbuster story, like the Supreme Court leak. But during the steady drip-drip of what’s been happening for years, for decades, they’ve been just completely missing.
***
JJ: In January 2021, CounterSpin heard from Kimberly Inez McGuire, executive director of the group URGE, Unite for Reproductive and Gender Equity.
Kimberly Inez McGuire: “That’s the first piece, is just saying the word ‘abortion.’ It’s not a bad word. It’s a word that’s saved people’s lives and helped shape better futures.”
JJ: Framing is powerful, which is why I appreciate the way that you at URGE and others describe legal abortion as “the floor, not the ceiling,” as part of that expansive understanding of reproductive justice. Can you talk a little bit about how we talk about abortion, and why it matters? What are you trying to do with that “floor, not the ceiling” phrase?
Kimberly Inez McGuire: Absolutely. So I think there’s a few key pieces here. One is about how we show respect to people who have had abortions. And first and foremost, those who have had abortions deserve the dignity of recognition. We need to use the word “abortion.” We need to talk about abortion as necessary healthcare and as a social good. Anything less, honestly, disregards and disrespects the one in four women in this country who have sought out this healthcare. So that’s the first piece, is just saying the word “abortion.” It’s not a bad word. It’s a word that’s saved people’s lives and helped shape better futures.
The other piece around “the floor, not the ceiling” is: For people with economic resources, what is a legal right on paper has so much more meaning than for people who are blocked because of economic barriers, because of racial barriers. So we look at something like abortion access: Even before Roe v. Wade, when abortion was illegal across large swaths of the country, the reality is that women of means have always been able to get abortions; that has always been the reality for people with money.
The vision for reproductive justice is not just, you have a theoretical right to abortion if you can fight your way through all of the muck and the restrictions. Reproductive justice means that if you’ve decided to end a pregnancy, you can do so safely, with dignity, without upending your family’s economic security, and without being subjected to, frankly, misogynist hate speech and stigma.
***
JJ: And finally, in May of 2021, we followed up with URGE’s policy director Preston Mitchum. Here he’s responding to my question about media coverage that presents abortion as a “cultural issue,” as though it were “soft,” as opposed to a “serious” issue like economics—though it’s hard to imagine anything more central to economic life than the ability to decide whether to have a child.
Preston Mitchum: “We’re talking about the human right to maintain bodily autonomy, have children, not have children, and parent the children we have in safe and sustainable communities.”
Preston Mitchum: Exactly. And what it does is, it continues to drive a wedge that shouldn’t be a wedge. When we’re talking about abortion, we’re talking about life-saving treatment that people actually need: It’s medical care, it’s healthcare. And all statistics show that abortion care is in many ways safer than giving birth.
And so those are statistics and facts that many people, unfortunately, who are driving this “culture war” narrative don’t want people to believe or understand, but it’s true. And, unfortunately, what it does is undermine the necessary conversation we must have around reproductive health, rights and justice, especially reproductive justice, right?
So, of course, reproductive justice is more than abortion; it’s comprehensive. We’re talking about the human right to maintain bodily autonomy, have children, not have children, and parent the children we have in safe and sustainable communities. Abortion access is a critical part of maintaining reproductive justice for Black folks, for Indigenous folks, for Asian-American and Pacific Islander communities. And we must center it on the work where people can create a future for themselves, where every person can make their own decisions with dignity, with autonomy and with self-determination.
And you’re absolutely right: When media coverage and narrative is about “culture war,” it creates this idea that only some people should have abortion access, that the people who do want abortion access are the people who are against what is actually the moralistic framing of this country.
And it creates this divide of good and bad. Abortion is not about good or bad; abortion is about access and creating the families and the communities that we want, that we can see, and that can survive in the system that we have today.
JJ: That was Jessica Mason Pieklo from Rewire, Preston Mitchum and Kimberly Inez McGuire from URGE, as well as FAIR’s own Julie Hollar.
The post ‘Huge Majorities Vote in Favor of Abortion Access and Reproductive Freedom’ appeared first on FAIR.
This content originally appeared on FAIR and was authored by Janine Jackson.
Janine Jackson | Radio Free (2023-07-06T21:57:07+00:00) ‘Huge Majorities Vote in Favor of Abortion Access and Reproductive Freedom’ – CounterSpin interview with Taryn Abbassian on Dobbs’ anniversary, with archival interviews on the forced-birth ruling. Retrieved from https://www.radiofree.org/2023/07/06/huge-majorities-vote-in-favor-of-abortion-access-and-reproductive-freedom-counterspin-interview-with-taryn-abbassian-on-dobbs-anniversary-with-archival-interviews-on-the-forced/
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